I felt so much the lack of scenery in my narrative, that I thought it well to group in a few pages the African pictures I have given in the last chapter. My story had too much of the bareness of the Greek stage, and I was conscious that landscape, as well as action, was required to mellow the subject and relieve it from tedium. After our dash through the wilderness, let us return to the slow toil of the caravan.

Four days brought us to Tamisso from our last halt. We camped on the copious brook that ran near the town-walls, and while Ali-Ninpha thought proper to compliment the chief, Mohamedoo, by a formal announcement of our arrival, the caravan made ready for reception by copious, but needed, ablutions of flesh and raiment. The women, especially, were careful in adorning and heightening their charms. Wool was combed to its utmost rigidity; skins were greased till they shone like polished ebony; ankles and arms were restrung with beads; and loins were girded with snowy waist-cloths. Ali-Ninpha knew the pride of his old Mandingo companions, and was satisfied that Mohamedoo would have been mortified had we surprised him within the precincts of his court, squatted, perhaps, on a dirty mat with a female scratching his head! Ali-Ninpha was a prudent gentleman, and knew the difference between the private and public lives of his illustrious countrymen!

In the afternoon our interpreters returned to camp with Mohamedoo’s son, accompanied by a dozen women carrying platters of boiled rice, calabashes filled with delicate sauce, and abundance of ture, or vegetable butter. A beautiful horse was also despatched for my triumphal entry into town.

The food was swallowed with an appetite corresponding to our recent penitential fare; the tents were struck; and the caravan was forthwith advanced towards Tamisso. All the noise we could conveniently make, by way of music, was, of course, duly attempted. Interpreters and guides went ahead, discharging guns. Half a dozen tom-toms were struck with uncommon rapidity and vigor, while the unctuous women set up a chorus of melody that would not have disgraced a band of “Ethiopian Minstrels.”

Half-way to the town our turbulent mob was met by a troop of musicians sent out by the chief to greet us with song and harp. I was quickly surrounded by the singers, who chanted the most fulsome praise of the opulent Mongo, while a court-fool or buffoon insisted on leading my horse, and occasionally wiping my face with his filthy handkerchief!

Presently we reached the gates, thronged by pressing crowds of curious burghers. Men, women, and children, had all come abroad to see the immense Furtoo, or white man, and appeared as much charmed by the spectacle as if I had been a banished patriot. I was forced to dismount at the low wicket, but here the empressement of my inquisitive hosts became so great, that the “nation’s guest” was forced to pause until some amiable bailiffs modified the amazement of their fellow-citizens by staves and whips.

I lost no time in the lull, while relieved from the mob, to pass onward to “the palace” of Mohamedoo, which, like all royal residences in Africa, consisted of a mud-walled quadrangular inclosure, with a small gate, a large court, and a quantity of adobe huts, surrounded by shady verandahs. The furniture, mats, and couches were of cane, while wooden platters, brass kettles, and common wash-basins, were spread out in every direction for show and service.

On a coach, covered with several splendid leopard skins, reclined Mohamedoo, awaiting my arrival with as much stateliness as if he had been a scion of civilized royalty. The chief was a man of sixty at least. His corpulent body was covered with short Turkish trousers, and a large Mandingo shirt profusely embroidered with red and yellow worsted. His bald or shaved head was concealed by a light turban, while a long white beard stood out in relief against his tawny skin, and hung down upon his breast. Ali-Ninpha presented me formally to this personage, who got up, shook hands, “snapped fingers,” and welcomed me thrice. My Fullah chief and Mandingo companion then proceeded to “make their dantica,” or declare the purpose of their visit; but when they announced that I was the guest of the Fullah Ali-Mami, and, accordingly, was entitled to free passage every where without expense, I saw that the countenance of the veteran instantly fell, and that his welcome was dashed by the loss of a heavy duty which he designed exacting for my transit.

The sharp eye of Ali-Ninpha was not slow in detecting Mohamedoo’s displeasure; and, as I had previously prepared him in private, he took an early opportunity to whisper in the old man’s ear, that Don Teodore knew he was compelled to journey through Tamisso, and, of course, had not come empty-handed. My object, he said, in visiting this region and the territory of the Fullah king, was not idle curiosity alone; but that I was prompted by a desire for liberal trade, and especially for the purchase of slaves to load the numerous vessels I had lingering on the coast, with immense cargoes of cloth, muskets, and powder.

The clouds were dispersed as soon as a hint was thrown out about traffic. The old sinner nodded like a mandarin who knew what he was about, and, rising as soon as the adroit whisperer had finished, took me by the hand, and in a loud voice, presented me to the people as his “beloved son!” Besides this, the best house within the royal inclosure was fitted with fresh comforts for my lodging. When the Fullah chief withdrew from the audience, Ali-Ninpha brought in the mistress of Mohamedoo’s harem, who acted as his confidential clerk, and we speedily handed over the six pieces of cotton and an abundant supply of tobacco with which I designed to propitiate her lord and master.

Tired of the dust, crowd, heat, confinement and curiosity of an African town, I was glad to gulp down my supper of broiled chickens and milk, preparatory to a sleepy attack on my couch of rushes spread with mats and skins. Yet, before retiring for the night, I thought it well to refresh my jaded frame by a bath, which the prince had ordered to be prepared in a small court behind my chamber. But I grieve to say, that my modesty was put to a sore trial, when I began to unrobe. Locks and latches are unknown in this free-and-easy region. It had been noised abroad among the dames of the harem, that the Furtoo would probably perform his ablutions before he slept; so that, when I entered the yard, my tub was surrounded by as many inquisitive eyes as the dinner table of Louis the Fourteenth, when sovereigns dined in public. As I could not speak their language, I made all the pantomimic signs of graceful supplication that commonly soften the hearts of the sex on the stage, hoping, by dumb-show, to secure my privacy. But gestures and grimace were unavailing. I then made hold to take off my shirt, leaving my nether garments untouched. Hitherto, the dames had seen only my bronzed face and hands, but when the snowy pallor of my breast and back was unveiled, many of them fled incontinently, shouting to their friends to “come and see the peeled Furtoo!” An ancient crone, the eldest of the crew, ran her hand roughly across the fairest portion of my bosom, and looking at her fingers with disgust, as if I reeked with leprosy, wiped them on the wall. As displeasure seemed to predominate over admiration, I hoped this experiment would have satisfied the inquest, but, as black curiosity exceeds all others, the wenches continued to linger, chatter, grin and feel, until I was forced to disappoint their anxiety for further disclosures, by an abrupt “good night.”

We tarried in Tamisso three days to recruit, during which I was liberally entertained on the prince’s hospitable mat, where African stews of relishing flavor, and tender fowls smothered in snowy rice, regaled me at least twice in every twenty-four hours. Mohamedoo fed me with an European silver spoon, which, he said, came from among the effects of a traveller who, many years before, died far in the interior. In all his life, he had seen but four of our race within the walls of Tamisso. Their names escaped his memory; but the last, he declared, was a poor and clever youth, probably from Senegal, who followed a powerful caravan, and “read the Koran like a mufti.”

Tamisso was entirely surrounded by a tall double fence of pointed posts. The space betwixt the inclosures, which were about seven feet apart, was thickly planted with smaller spear-headed staves, hardened by fire. If the first fence was leaped by assailants, they met a cruel reception from those impaling sentinels. Three gates afforded admission to different sections of the town, but the passage through them consisted of zig-zags, with loopholes cut judiciously in the angles, so as to command every point of access to the narrow streets of the suburbs.

The parting between Mohamedoo and myself was friendly in the extreme. Provisions for four days were distributed by the prince to the caravan, and he promised that my return should be welcomed by an abundant supply of slaves.