TRAVELS IN AFRICA. 
75 
at least nominally so ; for in Africa, the further 
a town is removed from the capital, the less con- 
trol the king has over it, and, in almost all 
cases, those towns are exclusively governed by 
their own chiefs. 
Our animals were daily diminishing in num- 
ber, and there had not as yet appeared any op- 
portunity of replacing them ; four horses died, 
or were abandoned as useless, since our depar- 
ture from Tandicunda, and many more would, 
I feared, soon follow. We had, however, but 
not without much difficulty, procured a few 
carriers from among the natives j and some of 
our own native soldiers and civilians took for- 
ward that part of the baggage for which we 
had no other means of conveyance. 
One of the men from the Wallia chief came 
to our bivouac in the evening, and told us that 
his master was extremely sorry for what had 
taken place in the morning, and particularly so, 
as his people had no orders to that effect ; he 
had only sent them to request that we might re- 
main at Sindey until ten o'clock in the forenoon, 
at which hour he intended coming to pay us his 
respects. 
We were enabled here to purchase two bul- 
locks, together with a small quantity of rice and 
corn. The former cost fourteen bars each j value 
about one pound sterling. 
