Nearly equal to one hundred and ninety-eight
pounds sterling; and as Kamalia is but a small town, and not much
resorted to by the trading Moors, this quantity must have borne a
very small proportion to the gold collected at Kancaba, Kankaree,
and some other large towns. The value of salt in this part of
Africa is very great. One slab, about two feet and a half in
length, fourteen inches in breadth, and two inches in thickness,
will sometimes sell for about two pounds ten shillings sterling; and
from one pound fifteen shillings to two pounds may be considered as
the common price. Four of these slabs are considered as a load for
an ass, and six for a bullock. The value of European merchandise in
Manding varies very much according to the supply from the coast, or
the dread of war in the country; but the return for such articles is
commonly made in slaves. The price of a prime slave, when I was at
Kamalia, was from twelve to nine minkallies, and European
commodities had then nearly the following value:-
18 gun-flints,
48 leaves of tobacco, } one
20 charges of gunpowder, } minkalli.
A cutlass, }
A musket, from three to four minkallies.
The produce of the country and the different necessaries of life,
when exchanged for gold, sold as follows:-
Common provisions for one day, the weight of one teeleekissi (a
black bean, six of which make the weight of one minkalli); a
chicken, one teeleekissi; a sheep, three teeleekissi; a bullock, one
minkalli; a horse, from ten to seventeen minkallies.
The negroes weigh the gold in small balances, which they always
carry about them. They make no difference, in point of value,
between gold dust and wrought gold. In bartering one article for
another, the person who receives the gold always weighs it with his
own teeleekissi. These beans are sometimes fraudulently soaked in
shea-butter to make them heavy, and I once saw a pebble ground
exactly into the form of one of them; but such practices are not
very common.
Having now related the substance of what occurs to my recollection
concerning the African mode of obtaining gold from the earth, and
its value in barter, I proceed to the next article of which I
proposed to treat - namely, ivory.
Nothing creates a greater surprise among the negroes on the sea-
coast than the eagerness displayed by the European traders to
procure elephants' teeth, it being exceedingly difficult to make
them comprehend to what use it is applied. Although they are shown
knives with ivory handles, combs and toys of the same material, and
are convinced that the ivory thus manufactured was originally parts
of a tooth, they are not satisfied.
