DESPOTISM OP THE KING OF CAYOR. 55 
trowsers with sand, and thus encumbered fell on his knees, 
and began to fire. The combat continued till their ammuni- 
tion was expended. Baol lost all its warriors on the field of 
battle; and the king of Cayor, though he saved a few, left 
behind a still greater number. 
The sovereign of Cayor possesses absolute power over the 
lives and property of his subjects, who call themselves the 
slaves of the Damel. The kingdom, nevertheless, is under 
a feudal system ; and the Dam el's orders are often resisted. 
One of his most powerful subjects, knowing that the king 
designed to take his life, appeared before him with a retinue 
of four hundred men, declaring that he never went abroad 
without that number of attendants. The tyrant had ordered 
a deep pit to be dug at his feet, and covered with a mat ; he 
desired the chief whose destruction he meditated, to seat him- 
self on the mat, but the latter guessing the perfidious inten- 
tions of the despot, thus replied : " Damel, I am thy slave, 
and worthy of reposing only in the dust upon which thy feet 
have trod." By this adroit answer he avoided the fate pre- 
pared for him. 
When a Damel wants a horse of great value, he sends for 
the general of his army: " Go," he says to him, " thou knowest 
that such a village contains more than one of my enemies ; go, 
let fire and sword soon deliver me from them." The general 
agreeably to the orders given him, plunders and lays waste, 
