never in the Moors. There was no flinching in the man, who, when
robbed of his horse, stripped to the shirt in a forest and left upon
a lion's track, looked down with a botanist's eye on the beauty of a
tiny moss at his feet, drew comfort from it, and laboured on with
quiet faith in God. The same eye was as quick to recognise the
diverse characters of men. In Mungo Park shrewd humour and right
feeling went together. Whatever he had to say he said clearly and
simply; and it went straight home. He had the good fortune to be
born before "picturesque writing" was invented. When we return to
the Gambia with Mungo Park under the same escort with a coffle of
slaves on their way to be shipped for the use of Christians, from
the strength of his unlaboured narrative we get clear knowledge
unclouded by a rainbow mist of words. He is of one blood with the
sailors in whom Hakluyt delighted.



CHAPTER XVI--VILLAGES ON THE NIGER--DETERMINES TO GO NO FARTHER
EASTWARD



Being, in the manner that has been related, compelled to leave Sego,
I was conducted the same evening to a village about seven miles to
the eastward, with some of the inhabitants of which my guide was
acquainted, and by whom we were well received. {1} He was very
friendly and communicative, and spoke highly of the hospitality of
his countrymen, but withal told me that if Jenne was the place of my
destination, which he seemed to have hitherto doubted, I had
undertaken an enterprise of greater danger than probably I was