Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 3.djvu/205

 of their power was Murgula, capital of Birgo, the capture of which place cost the French a large number of men.

Bafulabé, last station on the Senegal proper, and first in French Sudan, stands at an altitude of 450 feet over against the Bafing-Bakhoy confluence, where it was founded in 1879 to support the military operations about to be undertaken in the direction of the Niger. It has already become a commercial centre, round which have sprung up seven flourishing villages, with gardens and banana plantations. In 1881 the station of Badumé was established on the Bakhoy, some 60 miles above Bafulabé, and the fortress of Kita was erected in the Fula-dugu country, midway between Bafulabé and the Niger. In 1883 the Niger itself was reached, and the erection begun of the fort of Bamaku, followed in 1884 and 1885 by two new fortified stations between Kita and Bamaku, Kundu on the northern and Niagassola

on the southern route. Thus there is nowhere a gap of more than 70 miles between the French garrisons in this region, where the commercial and strategical centre is the post of Makadiambugudi, encircled by fourteen Bambara villages which take the collective name of Kita. This station lies at the converging point of the main routes, at the entrance of a gorge commanded on the west by a mass of reddish sandstone with steep escarpments over 2,000 feet above sea-level and 850 above the surrounding plain. East of Kita are seen the ruins of Bangassi, the old capital of Fula-dugu, visited by Mungo Park.

The Bafing basin, south-east of Bambúk, is the least-known region in Senegambia. We possess no clear idea of the relative importance of the towns reported by the natives, such, for instance, as Dinguiray, capital of the Toucouleur state, vassal of Segu, which Omar Al Haji is said to have rendered impregnable to the