Niger

Koorabarri brooded upon the matter, a kindly
ruler vexed by war and greater matters, but still
willing to help this freakish traveller. One route
remained open, he said—from Kaarta into the
kingdom of Ludamar, a principality of the c Moors
Mungo might take that, and have a guide ; but it
was a route by no means free from danger.
Mungo thanked him : he would journey into
Ludamar.
They fell to lighter conversation then, the Daisy
asking how the riverine states had treated him in
his journey up from Gambia ; and, doubtlessly
moved to the joke by Mungo’s solemn countenance,
feigned to believe him a raiding slaver who would
return to the coast with a great train of captives !
No doubt the court grinned suitably.
But the interlude was brief. A messenger arrived
with a foam-spattered horse and disturbing news.
The Bambarran army had marched through
Fooladoo and was on the road to Kaarta.
Mungo returned through the town to his lodging
—a town much be-mosqued and crowded with the
Kaartan army, negroes with great cutlasses, with
muskets, with antique weapons long ante-dating
both. The Daisy sent Mungo a sheep for his supper,
and while they dressed it the evening prayers were
announced from the mosques not by the call of a
muezzin but by blowing a wailing blast through
great horns made of elephants’ tusks—a melodious
sound, melancholy and strangely close to the sound
made by the human voice. So dusk came down
105