78 
JOURXEY FROM KATUNGA TO BOUSSA. 
your way is to go from one king to another, not with caravans of 
merchants. You will find plenty of people to put evil in your head ; 
if you are wise, do not believe them.” 
Monday 20th. — At 6 A. M. left our encampment. Our road 
through a woody country, rising into hill and dale, with some beau- 
tiful rocky mounts, perched on the heights composed of blocks of 
sandstone and clay ironstone ; the soil a red clay and gravel. We 
halted at the village of Barakina, where I stopped until the carriers 
came up. As I arrived at this village, a hunter came in from the 
chase. He had a leopard’s skin over his shoulder, a light spear in 
his hand, and his bow and arrows slung over his shoulder. He was 
followed by three cream-coloured dogs, a breed as if between the 
greyhound and cur: they were adorned with round collars of dif- 
ferent coloured leather. The hunter and his dogs marched through 
the village as independently as ever I saw a man, without taking 
the least notice of us, or even looking at us. He was followed by 
a slave carrying a dead antelope that he had killed this morning. 
They say the people of Rorgoo are the greatest hunters in Africa, 
and that the people of this village and of those we have passed live 
entirely by the chase ; the little ground they cultivate being worked 
by the women. 
Leaving Barakina, and travelling until noon, I came to a rocky 
ledge, formed like a wall, in some places rising into beautiful rocky 
mounts with bold precipices, shaded on the top with trees of the 
most luxuriant foliage. The road lay through a narrow pass in the 
ledge, shaded with fine tall majestic trees. Here, I said to myself, 
is the pass, or gates, leading to the Niger. The rocks of which the 
ledge is composed are of a conglomerate, formed with large square 
pieces of white quartz, imbedded in a shining dark gray substance ; 
the pieces of quartz about an inch square, the strata forming an 
angle of about 40° with the zenith. At noon crossed the river Oli, 
which has a very rocky bed, and is said to be impassable, from the 
swiftness of the current, in the rainy season. At this place the 
