132 
THE FRENCH SOUDAN. 
The people of Timbuctou have been ever widely awake on this point, 
and as soon as Djenne was taken they sent emissaries to Colonel 
Achinard protesting their desire to be at peace with the French so that 
it may be expected that some day, providing the French act with 
wisdom, Timbuctou will open her gates of her own accord to the pro¬ 
tectorate of France. The Colonels Archinard and Combes have thus 
for good and all thoroughly settled French predominance in the Soudan, 
and obtained in a few months and without a great sacrifice of men 
unhoped for results which guarantee relative security in the regions 
situated on the right bank of the Niger, and complete security for the 
territories under the direct authority of France. 
At this moment Soudan, by reason of its territorial development, is 
divided into three great regions :—Nioro (Commandant Claude), which 
comprises the northern circles; Segou (Commandant Brisse), with the 
eastern circles, Djenne, Bandiagara, etc.; lastly, Siguiri (Commandant 
Rochard) to which the French posts in southern Soudan are attached. 
Kayes remains the capital of French Soudan, and it is there Lieut.- 
Colonel Bonnier resided till lately, superior officer jpar interim. 
Movements on the Frontiers, 1893-94. 
It has been shown how, in 1893, whilst Colonel Combes—the dreaded 
“ Coumbo ” of the Sofas—was pursuing Samory in the valleys of the 
Milo, of the Sankaran, and of the Bani, those large southern affluents 
of the Niger, Captains Briquelot and Dargelos, at the head of flying 
columns, destroyed the bands of marauding Sofas which Kemoko- 
Bilali, Samory’s principal lieutenant, had established on the Upper 
Niger. 
The centre of Bilali's operations, the large village of Erimankono, 
was occupied by Captain Briquelot, who established there a post; and, 
in order to prevent any renewal of offensive movements on the part of 
the enemy, other military stations were likewise established in the 
basin of the Niger, at Farannah (a village situated at the confluence 
of the river of Erimankono and the Niger), and at Mafendi-Cabaya, a 
village which lies in the triangle formed by the two superior branches 
of the Niger, viz., the Falico and the Tembi. In the few maps (which, 
indeed, are not precisely accurate) which we have of this region, this 
territory seems to be a dependency of that province of Kouranko which 
Samory had conquered some years ago, and which extends beyond the 
watershed of the Atlantic streams belonging to the British colony of 
Sierra Leone as well as into the basin of the Upper Niger, which forms 
an integral portion of the French Soudan. 
In fact, in order to keep a better surveillance over the caravans going 
from the regions still occupied by Samory to the commercial centres of 
Sierra Leone, and likewise to prevent, should any such case occur, the 
import of arms and ammunition, it was resolved to establish an ad¬ 
vanced post further to the south than that at Mafendi-Cabaya, which 
could then be disestablished. 
The operations so far effected in French territory had resulted in the 
complete dislocation of Samory's bands of Sofas. Some warriors pass¬ 
ing the French lines had been able to rejoin the Almamy^s contingents 
