THE AFRICAN ASSOCIATION. 
attention to the western shore of the continent. 
The estabhshment formed at Sierra Leone seemed 
to offer peculiar facilities for expeditions of dis- 
covery on that side. In 1794 Foota Jallo, the 
extensive and powerful state in the interior of 
Sierra Leone, was explored by Messrs Watt 
and Winterbottom, two gentlemen in the ser- 
vice of the Sierra Leone Company, who un- 
dertook this expedition upon being informed by 
some of the Foulahs, that their king was desirous 
of establishing an intercourse with the colony. 
They sailed up the Rio Nunez to Kacundy, where 
they procured interpreters and guides, and expe- 
rienced various civilities from a mulatto trader in 
its vicinity. Leaving Kacundy February 7* 1794^j 
they travelled sixteen days through a country in 
many places barren, but in others extremely fruit- 
ful, abounding remarkably in cattle. After cross- 
ing some small rivers, among which the Dunso 
seems to be a continuation of the Rio Grande, 
they arrived at Laby. Soon after their departure 
from Rio Nunez, they found that a considerable 
intercourse subsisted between the interior districts 
and the higher parts of the river, and often met 
500 or 600 Foulahs in a day, carrying on their 
backs large burdens of rice and ivory to exchange 
for salt, which, in the interior countries, is the 
greatest of all luxuries, both on account of its 
scarcity, and the painful longing that the constant 
