RESIDENCE AT KATUNGA. 
59 
and attitude of the principal man in the groupe with a lofty air, 
and the drummer well pleased with his own music, or rather deafen- 
ing noise. There are seven different markets, which are held 
every evening ; being generally opened about three or four o’clock. 
The chief articles exposed for sale are yams, corn, calavances, plan- 
tains, and bananas ; vegetable butter, seeds of the colycynth, which 
forms a great article of food, sweetmeats, goats, fowls, sheep, and 
lambs ; and also cloth of the manufacture of the country, and their 
various implements of agriculture. The price of a small goat is 
from 1500 to 2000 cowries ; a large sheep, 3000 to 5,000 ; a fowl, 
150 to 200 ; yams, 4000 per hundred ; a horse, 80 to 100,000 ; and a 
cow from 20 to 30,000 ; a prime slave, 40 to 60,000 ; — 2000 cowries 
being equal to one Spanish dollar. Trona, or natron, is brought 
here from Bornou, and sold to all parts of the coast, where it is 
much in request, to mix with snuff, and also as a medicine. 
Saturday, 25th. — This afternoon we had a visit from the king; 
he brought with him a duck, some rice, and goora nuts. I told 
him I was all ready to go, whenever he chose to give me the escort 
and messengers. He said the caboceers of the different towns 
through which I had to pass were still here, but as soon as they 
left I should go. I asked him, as I was writing to England, what 
he wanted from thence. He said, a brass crown, fine yellow and blue 
cloth, large coral, some gaudy carpeting, an English drum, and 
about half a ton of cowries. The whole of this curious catalogue 
would not cost, as I suppose, more than T?200. I told him, there- 
fore, that I should send the list home. 
Sunday, 26th. — Morning dull and hazy, with an oppressive 
sultry heat, the wind north-north-east, causing the same depression 
of spirits as the siroc wind in the Mediterranean, and which affected 
every one of the party, and made us all sigh for a breeze, and to pro- 
ceed on our journey. 
Wednesday, 1st March. — On this day the weather began to clear 
up, with a fine breeze from the eastward. Our friend the fat eunuch 
