At another place one of the male slaves in the caravan was found to be too exhausted to proceed further in spite of the usual physical stimulants. A townsman was found willing to exchange him for a young girl. No hint was given her of her approaching doom till the last moment. Along with her companions she had come to see the caravan depart, when all at once her master seized her by the hand and delivered her to the slave dealer. “Never was a face of serenity more suddenly changed into one of the deepest distress. The terror she manifested on having the load put upon her head and the rope round her neck, and the sorrow with which she bade adieu to her companions, were truly affecting.”
Incidents like these were what chiefly characterised Park’s journey to the Gambia. At times the curious as well as the horrible side of African life peeped out to entertain him, as, for instance, when one of the slatees, on returning for the first time to his native place after an absence of three years, was met at the threshold of his door by his bride-elect, who presented him with a calabash of water in which to wash his hands. This done, “the girl, with a tear of joy sparkling in her eye, drank the water,” in token of her fidelity and attachment.
Another of the slatees turned out to be an African Enoch Arden. For eight long years he had stayed away from his wife, during which time she heard nothing from him. Concluding after three years that he was either dead or not likely to return, she seemingly without reluctance gave her heart and hand to another, by whom she had two children. The first husband now claimed her as his. The other objected on the ground that a three years’ absence annulled a marriage. For four days a public palaver was held to settle this knotty point, ending in the decision that the husbands had equal rights, and that the wife had best settle the matter by making her own choice. The lady asked time to consider, but Park could perceive that not love but wealth would gain the day.
On the 20th of May the caravan entered the Tenda Wilderness, where for two days they traversed dense woods. With what pleasure must Park have noticed that the country shelved towards the south-west--that in fact he had entered the basin of the Gambia. At sunset of the first day a pool was reached after a very hot and trying march. To avoid the burning heats of the day a night march was determined on. At eleven o’clock the slaves were released from their irons and driven forward in close order, as much to prevent them escaping as to save them from wild beasts. In this fashion they travelled till daybreak, after a rest continuing the march to Tambakunda, the place almost reached by Jobson nearly 170 years before, and which he believed to be Timbuktu itself.