INTRODUCTION. 
5 
to expose myself : the persons who felt a friendship for me, 
and M. Gavol in particular, had not therefore much trouble 
to divert me from my design ; and, to gratify in some 
measure my fondness for travel, that worthy officer pro- 
cured me a gratuitous passage on board a merchantman 
which was sailing for Guadeloupe. 
I arrived in that colony with some letters of recom- 
mendation, and obtained a petty appointment, which I held 
but for six months. My passion for travelling began to 
revive ; the perusal of Mungo Park gave new strength to my 
projects ; and lastly, my constitution, having withstood a 
residence of some length at the Senegal and in Guadeloupe, 
gave me hopes of this time executing them with success. 
I sailed from Pointe-a-Pitre for Bordeaux, and thence 
returned to the Senegal. Arriving at St. Louis, at the con- 
clusion of 1818, with scanty resources, for I had exceedingly 
diminished them by useless voyages, I was not to be deter- 
red by any consideration : every thing seemed possible to 
my adventurous spirit, and chance seemed to second my 
designs. 
M. Adrien Partarrieu, who had been sent by Major 
Gray to purchase at St. Louis the goods required by the 
King of Bondou, was preparing to rejoin the expedition. I 
called upon M. Partarrieu, and proposed to accompany 
him without salary or engagement of any kind for the 
moment. He replied that he could not promise me any 
thing for the future, but that I was at liberty to join him if 
I pleased. I had soon decided — happy to seize so favourable 
an opportunity of visiting unknown countries and parti- 
cipating in an expedition of discovery. 
M. Partarrieu's caravan was composed of sixty or 
seventy men both white and black, and thirty-two camels 
richly laden. 
We set out, on the sixth of February, 1819, from Gan- 
diolle, a village in the kingdom of Cayor, situated at a short 
distance from the Senegal. The darnel, or king, whom our 
