THE MARKET. 
is well supplied with all the necessaries of life, and is cons- 
tantly crowded by a multitude of strangers and the inha- 
bitants of the neighbouring villages, who attend it to sell 
their produce, and to purchase salt and other commodities. 
There are several rows of dealers both male and female. 
Some erect little palisades of straw, to protect themselves 
from the excessive heat of the sun ; over these they throw 
a pagne and thus form a small hut. Their goods are laid 
out in little baskets, placed on large round panniers. 
In going round the market, I observed some shops 
pretty well stocked with European commodities, which sell 
at a very high price. There was a great variety of cotton 
goods, printed muslins, calicoes, scarlet cloth, hardware, 
flints, &c. Nearly the whole of these articles appeared to be 
of English manufacture. I saw however some French 
muskets, which are much esteemed. Among the other 
articles on sale, were glass trinkets, false amber, false coral, 
sulphur in sticks, and gunpowder which, I was informcdy 
is manufactured in the country. I am not acquainted with 
the materials of which their powder is made, but it appears 
that they are pounded together in a mortar moistened with 
water. They form this powder into lumps of the size of 
a man's fist, which they dry in the sun. The purchasers 
allow it to remain in the same state until they are going to 
use it, when they crush it and put it in a powder-horn. When 
they load their muskets with home-made powder, they use 
a much greater quantity than they would think necessary 
of the European kind, which they value far more highly. 
Their powder produces but a weak explosion ; it sometimes 
issues from the musket like a fusee, without any report. 
While descending the Dhioliba to Tercy, I saw at a 
village a large calabash full of saltpetre which appeared very 
fine, but 1 cannot tell how the people procured it. I ques- 
tioned a Moor, who merely replied : " It is powder," and 
I could learn nothing more about it. The dealers in colat- 
