ACCOUNT OF TOMBUCTOO. 
497 
the extraordinary assertion, that there are no 
shops in that city. M. Dupuis informs us, that 
some of the Barbary traders had assured him that 
there "were shops, while others had made a report 
similar to Adams. It appears' totally out of the 
question, that such a city should exist without 
some regular mode of publicly exposing goods to 
sale ; but it is very probable that this may be 
done, not in shops, according to the European 
sense of the term, but upon booths or stalls in a 
public market, as appears by Park's report to be 
practised at Sansanding. Whether these are to 
be called shops or not, becomes then a mere ver- 
ua 1 distinction. 
At about SOO yards to the south-east of the 
town passes a river, called La Mar Zarah, about 
three quarters of a mile wide, and flowing, as 
Adams conceives, to the south-west. About two 
miles south of the town it passes between high 
mountains, where its breadth is contracted to half 
a mile. Some observations upon this river, and 
the direction in which it flows, will be introduced 
on a future occasion. It is navigated by canoes, 
composed of fig-trees hollowed out, and the 
largest of which is ten feet long, and will not 
contain above three men. In the narrative, they 
are described merely as fishing-boats ; but M. 
Dupuis thinks Adams described them to him as 
VOL. I, I i 
