Note 9 — Chapter VI · FROM FAFA TO SAY

I make a special point of the exact situation of Farca. Captain Toutée says in a note to his book on Dahomey, the Niger, and the Tuaregs, that he believed it to be much nearer Timbuktu, but he had not taken any astronomical observations, and he had made a mistake of a day in his journal. This rectification will appear somewhat tardy after the articles published on his return in the newspapers, and in the Bulletin of the Comité de L’Afrique française, which led to its being supposed that Farca is on the outskirts of the last French post in the Sudan. Had this been so, the results of our expedition would have been greatly minimized. Suum cuique.

On the subject of the recognition of the French protectorate by the people of Farca, there must have been, to say the least, a very great error of interpretation. Our readers have been able to discover for themselves that unfortunately French influence does not extend so far. Indeed, the hostile attitude of the people of Sinder, who are the relations and feudal superiors of those of Farca, and who attacked Captain Toutée, would have been enough to prove it without anything else.