314 
INHABITANTS OF TEND A MAIE. 
the surface ; the water which sometimes covers it, is salt 
in the dry season, and fresh during the rains. 
The language of the inhabitants of Tenda Maié, as I was 
informed, has no affinity with that of any of its neighbours ; 
this appears so much the more probable, as these people are 
only an assemblage of individuals of different nations, 
destroyed by the Mandingos or Poulas, when they invaded 
these countries. They are of a mild disposition, careless, and 
not very hospitable, for they are poor ; but at Kadé, which, 
from its wealth, and the fertility of the soil, ought to be 
classed in the first rank of the towns of this country, I was 
very well treated. There is little uniformity in the general 
character of the physiognomy of these Negroes, but the inha- 
bitants of Faran's village are remarkable for their low stature, 
their slender limbs, and their weak voices ; they are, in 
reality, the pigmies of Africa. Some of them follow the law 
of Mahomet; but the greater part do not acknowledge this 
prophet, and pay tribute to the chief of Labbé in Fouta 
Diallon, to purchase their religious independence, and the 
right of drinking ardent spirits. In general they have an 
attachment and even a regard for the whites, of whom most 
of them know something, having frequent communications 
with the Poi-tuguese establishments in this part of Africa. 
