INTERIOR OF AFRICA. 235 
mount my horse, and was about to decamp, when the slave, who 
had before gone into the village, to my surprise, returned with 
the corpse of a boy about nine or ten years of age, quite naked. 
The Negro carried the body by a leg and an arm, and threw it 
into the pit with a savage indifference, which I had never before 
seen. As he covered the body with earth, the Dooty often ex- 
pressed himself, naphula attini at a (money lost) ; whence I con- 
cluded that the boy had been one of his slaves. 
Departing from this shocking scene, I travelled by the side 
of the river until sunset, when I came to Koolikorro ; a consi- 
derable town, and a great market for salt. Here I took up my 
lodging at the house of a Bambarran, who had formerly been 
the slave of a Moor, and in that character had travelled to Aroan, 
Towdinni, and many other places in the Great Desert ; but 
turning Mussulman, and his master dying at Jenne, he obtained 
his freedom, and settled at this place, where he carries on a 
considerable trade in salt, cotton-cloth, &c. His knowledge of 
the world had not lessened that superstitious confidence in 
saphies and charms, which he had imbibed in his earlier years ; 
for when he heard that I was a Christian, he immediately 
thought of procuring a saphie ; and for this purpose brought 
out his walba, or writing board ; assuring me," that he would 
dress me a supper of rice, if I would write him a saphie to pro- 
tect him from wicked men. The proposal was of too great conse- 
quence to me to be refused ; I therefore wrote the board full, from 
top to bottom, on both sides ; and my landlord, to be certain of 
having the whole force of the charm, washed the writing from 
the board into a calabash with a little water, and having said a 
Hh 2 
