AFRICAN EXPLORERS OF TEE NINETEENTH CENTURY. 127 
an exchange of complimentary speeches and handsome 
presents, in this strange proposal from his majesty to 
the travellers : “ If you have come to buy female slaves, 
you need not be at the trouble to go further, as I will 
sell them to you as cheap as possible.” Denham had 
great touble in convincing the merchant prince that 
such traffic was not the aim of his journey, but that the 
love of science alone had brought him to Luggun. 
On the 2nd of March, Denham returned to Kouka, 
and on the 20th of May he was witness to the arrival 
of Lieutenant Tyrwhitt, who had come to take up his 
residence as consul at the court of Bornou, bearing costly 
presents for the sultan. 
After a final excursion in the direction of Manou, 
the capital of Kanern, and a visit to the Dogganah, who 
formerly occupied all the districts about Lake Fitri, the 
major joined Clapperton in his return journey to Tripoli, 
starting on the 16th of April, and arriving there in 
safety at the close of a long and arduous journey, whose 
geographical results, important in any case, had been 
greatly enhanced by the labours of Clapperton. To the 
adventures and discoveries of the latter we must now 
turn. Clapperton and Oudney started for Kano, a large 
Fellatah town on the west of Lake Tchad, on the 14th of 
December, 1823, followed the Yeou a« far as Damasak, 
and visited the ruins of Birme, and those of Bera, on the 
shores of a lake formed by the overflowing of the Yeou, 
Dogamou and Bekidarfi, all towns of TIoussa. The 
people of this province, who were very numerous before 
the invasion of the Fellatahs, are armed with bows and 
arrows, and trade in tobacco, nuts, gouro, antimony, 
tanned hares’ skins, and cotton stuffs in the piece and 
made into clothes. 
The caravan soon left the banks of the Yeou or 
Gambarou, and entered a wooded country, which was 
evidently under water in the rainy season. 
The travellers then entered the province of Kata- 
goum, where the governor received them with great 
cordiality, assuring them that their arrival was quite an 
event to him, as it would be to the Sultan of the Fel- 
