the African association, 319 
nations with whom they engage in hostilities, build, 
for their defence, forts of brick, strongly interla- 
ced with timber. The walls of these forts are six 
feet in thickness ; they are of a square form, with 
a tower furnished with stairs at each angle, loop- 
holes dispersed along the walls, the gate concealed, 
and the whole fortress surrounded with a deep and 
wide ditch, slightly covered with canes and earth. 
As the Foulahs have no method of assaulting these 
forts, they can only reduce them by blockade, 
which is commonly for the most part unsuccessful, as 
they contain springs, and are generally stored with 
provisions. The king's vicegerent, in a conversa- 
tion with the travellers, openly avowed that the 
sole object of the wars of Teemboo was to procure 
slaves, " as they could not obtain European goods 
" without slaves, nor slaves without making war." 
He also admitted, that the old men and old women 
captured in these wars, who were known to be un- 
saleable, were put to death, by cutting their throats. 
When the travellers suggested, that, by a trade in 
ivory, rice, cattle, and the other native produce of 
the country, they might acquire wealth without go- 
ing to war for slaves, by which they must certainly 
offend the God to whom they prayed five times in 
the day. " The people on whom we make war," 
replied he, " never pray to God : we do not go 
" to war with people who serve God Almighty. 5 * 
He farther stated, that the European factories 
