which was formerly noted for the export of gum arabic, and on the shores of the bay formed by Cape Blanco is Port Etienne, a fishing station provided with jetties and guarded by a military post. These last-named ports are in the Territory of Mauretania, but are most conveniently mentioned here.) On the river Senegal are the towns of Richard-toll (Richard's garden), Dagana and Bakel, all three founded by the French government in 1821. Carabane, Zighinchor and Sedhiu are settlements on the Casamance river. St Louis, Dakar, Goree and Rufisque are communes, with a franchise exercised by natives and Europeans alike. The total white population of the four towns is about 5000.
Agriculture and Trade.—Senegal’s chief commercial product is the ground-nut, which, since 1888, has yielded about 30,000 tons a year. Millet, the staple food of the native population, maize and rice occupy about two-thirds of the cultivated land. Acacia gum is gathered by the Moors in the northern region; the kola nut is cultivated and rubber is collected in the district of Casamance, which projects between Portuguese Guinea and British Gambia. There are large herds of cattle and flocks of sheep and goats, besides numerous camels, asses and horses. Gold, iron, quicksilver and copper are found. The natives carry on weaving, pottery, brick making, and manufacture trinkets. Cotton goods (chiefly from England) form the most important articles of import, and after them come kola nuts (mainly from Sierra Leone), rice, wines and spirits, tobacco, implements, sugar, coal and fancy goods; the exports are mostly ground-nuts; rubber (much of which comes from the Niger regions), gum and gold coming next in value. The imports and exports of Senegal are not shown separately, the figures for Upper Senegal and Niger being included. The average annual value for the five years ending 1905 was £3,100,000. By 1910 the value had risen to nearly £4,000,000. France takes 75% of the exports; Belgium, the Netherlands and Denmark the bulk of the remainder. In value ground-nuts form four-fifths of the exports.
Communications.—A railway, 163 m. long, goes from Dakar to St Louis, from which point the Senegal river is navigable by steamer from August to November, both inclusive, for about 500 m., the navigable reach terminating at Kayes, whence a railway runs to the Niger. Direct communication between Dakar and the Niger is afforded by a railway starting from Thies, a station on the way to St Louis, and ending at Kayes. The construction of this line began in 1907. Telegraph lines connect the colony with all other parts of French West Africa. Dakar is in direct cable communication with Brest, and another cable connects St Louis with Cadiz. Steamship communication between Europe and Dakar and Rufisque is maintained by several French, British and German lines. Over 50% of the shipping is French, Great Britain coming second.
II. Upper Senegal and Niger
This colony is bounded N. by the Saharan territories dependent on Algeria, W. by Senegal and the Territory of Mauretania, S. by the French colonies of Guinea and the Ivory Coast, the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast (British), Togoland (German) and Dahomey (French). The Military Territory dependent on the colony extends E. of the Niger to the Lake Chad territory of French Congo, being bounded S. by Nigeria (British). The colony and its dependent territory thus form the link connecting all the possessions of France in north, west and central Africa. Their area is estimated at 210,000 sq. m., with a population of some 3,000,000. Those tribes living north and east of the Niger are mainly of Berber (Tuareg) stock; the inhabitants of the Niger bend are chiefly Negroids, such as the Mandingo, with Fula in certain districts.
The colony, as a whole, consists of a great plateau of granite and sandstone, rarely more than 1600 ft. high, and in its N.W. part, the Kaarta, all but desert. Hydrographically the western portion belongs to the basin of the Senegal, the central to that of the Niger. At Mopti, 200 m. S.W. of Timbuktu, the Niger receives the Mahel Balevel, which rises in about 9½° N. and with its tributaries drains a very large area. In its lower courses its divergent channels, uniting with offshoots from the Niger, form in the flood season an immense lake. This region—apparently the Wangara country of Idrisi—is sometimes called Bambara, the name of the chief race inhabiting it. The lakes or widening of the Niger itself occupy vast areas; Lake Debo, the Lake of Horo, the Lake of Dauna, Lake Faguibini are all to the south or west of Timbuktu, and are permanent. The greater part of the colony lies within the bend of the Niger, but westward it includes both banks of the Senegal as far as the Faleme confluence. It also extends north of the Niger so as to include the fertile land on the borders of the Sahara. On the S.W. and S. the country is somewhat mountainous and the general trend of the land and the course of the rivers is south to north. East of the Niger the conditions are mostly Saharan, but there is a belt of fairly fertile country, bordering northern Nigeria and extending to Lake Chad. This region includes the state of Zinder (q.v.) and the oases of Air or Asben and Bilma (q.v.). The country west of the Niger contains patches of forest, but it consists mainly of open land well adapted to agriculture and stock-raising. The fauna includes the lion, elephant, hippopotamus, wild boar, panther and various kinds of antelope. The climate is tropical, but, apart from the districts inundated by the Niger floods, dry and not unhealthy.
The Protected States.—Of the native states included in the colony Bambuk lies between the Senegal and the Faleme and Bafing. It is traversed from N .W. to S.E. by the steep and wall-like range of the Tamba-Ura Mountains. The soil in a large part of the country is of remarkable fertility; rice, maize, millet, melons, manioc, grapes, bananas and other fruits grow abundantly; the forests are rich in a variety of valuable trees; and extensive stretches are covered with abundant pasturage of the long guinea-grass. The inhabitants, a branch of the Mandingo race, own large herds of cattle and sheep. The reports which reached Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries of a country in Upper Senegal rich in gold referred to this district, where both alluvial and quartz deposits have been found, though the stories of “hills of gold” remain unverified. In all the protected states the native rulers retain a considerable degree of authority and native law is administered.
Towns.—The principal towns in the colony are, in Upper Senegal, Kayes, Bafulabé and Kita; in the Niger regions Sikaso, the centre of the rubber trade; Bamako,[1] the seat of government; Kulikoro, Segu, Sansandig, Bambara, Jenné (q.v.) and Timbuktu (q.v.). Nioro is the capital of the Kaarta country; between it and Timbuktu are Gumbu and Sokolo; Gao (q.v.), Zinder or Sinder (not to be confounded with the Zinder mentioned above), Sansanne Hausa, Niamey and Say are towns on the Niger below Timbuktu, Say (q.v.) being an entrepôt for the trade of the east Nigerian regions. In the centre of the Niger bend is the important city of Wagadugu, the capital of Mossi, a negroid and pagan state dating from the 14th century. Satadugu is on the upper course of the Faleme. Sati and Leo are towns just north of the British Gold Coast hinterland.
Of these towns Kayes is situated on the Senegal at the point of which that river ceases to be navigable from the sea—a distance of 460 m. from St Louis. Bamako, chosen in 1904 as the capital of the colony, is on the upper Niger at the head of its navigable waters and is in railway communication with Kayes. Segu, where Mungo Park first reached the Niger, is regarded as the capital of Bambara rather than the town of Bambara, which is on a backwater of the Niger some 100 m. S. of Timbuktu. Before the French occupation the possessor of Segu was the ruler of the surrounding country; and the town was the headquarters of the emirs Omar and Ahmadu (see below, History). Sansandig stands on the north bank of the Niger below Segu. It was visited by Mungo Park in 1796, and Lieut. E. Mage and Dr Quintin, French officers, witnessed the stand it made in 1865 against a siege by Ahmadu, sultan of Segu, from whom it had revolted. Before its conquest by the Tuareg in the first half of the 19th century Sansandig was an important mart, owing to its position at the upper end of the stretch of the Niger navigable for large vessels all the year round. After its occupation by France in 1900 its commercial importance gradually returned. It possesses good anchorage and landing places.
Communications.—There is regular communication by rail and river between Dakar, the principal port of Senegal, and Timbuktu, the journey occupying ten to twelve days. A railway linking the Senegal and Niger rivers starts at Kayes on the Senegal, passes S.W. through Bafulabé and Kita, whence it goes E. to Bamako on the Niger, and follows the left bank of that river to Kulikoro, the terminus, from which point the Niger is navigable down stream all the year round for a distance of 900 m., while from Bamako the Niger is navigable up stream to Kurussa, a distance of 225 m., for the greater part of the year. The Senegal-Niger railway is 347 m. long, and occupied twenty-four years in construction, owing to bad management and periods of retrogressive policy in Paris. The total cost was upwards of £3,500,000. Construction of the line was sanctioned in 1880; by 1882, when £700,000 had been spent, but 10 m. of rails had been laid. The 33rd mile was reached at a cost of £7,252 per mile for actual construction. Notwithstanding this heavy expense the line was condemned as hopelessly defective. In 1888 it reached Bafulabé (82 m.) when work was suspended, not to be vigorously resumed until 1898. The entire line was opened for traffic in 1905. Steamers ply on the Niger between Kabara, the port of Timbuktu, and Kulikoro and Bamako. Good roads connect Mossi
- ↑ For a monograph on Bamako see Quest. dipl. et col. (1907), pp. 561-576.
