FEMALE DOCTOR. 
337 
advancing. The roads were passable and the marshes dried 
up, and every thing concurred to make me regret the time I 
was losing at Time. Finding that I did not get better, Baba 
was moved with compassion and came to see me. He sat down 
by me, and, after inquiring how I was, he told me that he 
would bring me an old woman who understood my disorder. 
I thanked him for his kindness. The old woman came : she 
examined me attentively, and consoled me by saying that she 
would give me a medicine which would do me good, and that 
I should soon be quite well. She added that my disorder was 
common in the country, and that people who were attacked 
by it lost all their teeth if remedies were not promptly 
applied. 
She commenced her treatment by forbidding me to eat 
meat or salt, or even to drink the rice-water with which the 
old negress had supplied me. In the evening, she brought in 
the corner of Jier pagne some pieces of red wood : this she 
boiled in water, with which she desired me to wash my 
mouth several times a day. I punctually obeyed her direc- 
tions. The water was very acrid and had the effect of a 
strong astringent. However, I experienced but little relief. 
My cure promised to be very slow, and I felt no symptoms 
of convalescence until about the 13th of December. The 
sore on my foot, to which I had applied a diachylon plaster 
healed with my improving health. The weather was fine. 
The wind blew frequently from the N. E. and sometimes 
from the north. I went every day, supported on a stick, to 
take the air and amuse myself at the banancoro, a place, 
which, as I have already stated, is the rendezvous of idlers. 
Here it is shaded by large bombaces. The old men resort 
thither to spend a portion of the day, not to smoke like the 
Bambaras, for the inhabitants of Time do not smoke, though 
they take a great deal of snuff. They amuse themselves by 
talking about trade and their former journeys. The young 
people also assemble there to dance all night, 
VOL. I, Z 
