[Footnote 15:  The Koran, Chapter 66, verse 17. (Note by M. Leroux.)]

“There we wove beautiful garlands with mimosa, the pink flowers of the caper bush and white cockles.  Then we threw them in the green water to ward off evil spirits; and we laughed like mad things when a great snorting hippopotamus raised his swollen head and we bombarded him in glee until he had to plunge back again with a tremendous splash.

“That was in the mornings.  Then there fell on Gao the deathlike lull of the red siesta.  When that was finished, we came back to the edge of the river to see the enormous crocodiles with bronze goggle-eyes creep along little by little, among the clouds of mosquitoes and day-flies on the banks, and work their way traitorously into the yellow ooze of the mud flats.

“Then we bombarded them, as we had done the hippopotamus in the morning; and to fete the sun setting behind the black branches of the douldouls, we made a circle, stamping our feet, then clapping our hands, as we sang the Sonrhai hymn.

“Such were the ordinary occupations of free little girls.  But you must not think that we were only frivolous; and I will tell you, if you like, how I, who am talking to you, I saved a French chieftain who must be vastly greater than yourself, to judge by the number of gold ribbons he had on his white sleeves.”

“Tell me, little Tanit-Zerga,” I said, my eyes elsewhere.

“You have no right to smile,” she said a little aggrieved, “and to pay no attention to me.  But never mind!  It is for myself that I tell these things, for the sake of recollection.  Above Gao, the Niger makes a bend.  There is a little promontory in the river, thickly covered with large gum trees.  It was an evening in August and the sun was sinking.  Not a bird in the forest but had gone to rest, motionless until the morning.  Suddenly we heard an unfamiliar noise in the west, boum-boum, boum-boum, boum-baraboum, boum-boum, growing louder—­boum-boum, boum-baraboum—­and, suddenly, there was a great flight of water birds, aigrettes, pelicans, wild ducks and teal, which scattered over the gum trees, followed by a column of black smoke, which was scarcely flurried by the breeze that was springing up.

“It was a gunboat, turning the point, sending out a wake that shook the overhanging bushes on each side of the river.  One could see that the red, white and blue flag on the stern had drooped till it was dragging in the water, so heavy was the evening.

“She stopped at the little point of land.  A small boat was let down, manned by two native soldiers who rowed, and three chiefs who soon leapt ashore.

“The oldest, a French marabout, with a great white burnous, who knew our language marvelously, asked to speak to Sheik Sonni-Azkia.  When my father advanced and told him that it was he, the marabout told him that the commandant of the Club at Timbuctoo was very angry, that a mile from there the gunboat had run on an invisible pile of logs, that she had sprung a leak and that she could not so continue her voyage towards Ansango.