S ARA YA. 
Musulman, and he will make you pay transit duties." In 
the neighbourhood of the village, I saw some ferruginous 
stones. I broke one, which contained many particles of 
iron. These stones are found on the surface of the soil. 
The inhabitants smelt them to make their agricultural im- 
plements, which consist merely of hoes, seven or eight 
inches long, and three broad. The ends are rounded, and 
the handles^ which are two feet long, are much bent. 
The village of Saraya contains a population of about 
seven or eight hundred. The inhabitants keep many cattle 
which at night are driven within the two walls that surround 
their village. I was informed that the great river flows at 
the distance of a day's journey south of the village. Fish 
are caught in it, and, after being dried and smoked, they are 
used as sauce, and eaten with rice : they make them also an 
article of trade. The whole evening the young people of this 
village amused themselves by dancing to the sound of a tam- 
bourine, and a small instrument made of bamboo; their 
dances are sprightly and decorous. My guide and I paid a 
visit to the chief, who received us very kindly, and offered 
me a sheep- skin to sit upon. The door of his court was 
shaded by two bombaces. He afterwards sent us a very 
good supper of rice and gombo. 
At half past six o'clock in the morning of the 6th of 
June, we proceeded four miles E. S. E.^ over a fine plain of 
sand. We passed Fausimoulaya, a village surrounded by a 
mud wall. The country was covered with ces and nedes. 
We crossed the Ba-ndiegue^ which flows through a fine plain 
clothed with perpetual verdure. We advanced for two miles 
in the same direction, over a level plain, composed of red 
earth, with a great deal of gravel, and some red stone of 
the same kind as that of Sierra-Leone. 
We entered the village of Sancougnan, in order to visit 
the chief, a ceremony which all travellers are obliged to ob- 
serve. We found him lying on a large bullock's hide, with 
