IN CENTRAL AFRICA. 327 
traveller as his memory furnished them, and comparing 
them in his presence with his journal. 
Among other generic terms which have been consi- 
dered as proper names, I shall particularize two, on account 
of the confusion which they have introduced, and which 
involves in obscurity some important geographical ques- 
tions, namely the situation of a considerable chain of 
mountains to the south of the 8th degree of latitude, and 
the still unknown outlet of the great central river. Kong, is 
the name given, particularly since Mungo Park, to a great 
chain of transverse mountains which he reports to have 
seen at a distance to his right, when travelling from the 
Gambia to the Dhioliba. Now, M. Caillie learnt from 
the natives that Kong is a generic word, and that in the 
Mandingo language it signifies a mountain; the moun- 
tain or chain of mountains in question is accordingly far 
from being the only one of its name. I remark also, that 
the English traveller in his Mandingo vocabulary explains 
the word Kong by head ; whence perhaps the significa- 
tion of Kong; and himself translates Konko by hilL^ 
When the later English travellers had gained intelli- 
gence of a river called Couara, to the west of Saccatou, 
and of the river which is near Funda, it was remembered 
that this name is also borne by the upper Dhioliba, and 
these three rivers have been at once identified ; but it ap- 
pears that Couara is a general term signifying a river. The 
* See Chapter 2 below. 
