Aderbissinat, as I have already stated, is on the southern borders of Aïr, and in departing from it on 30th August I bid final farewell to the strange land I had come so far to explore.
In pursuit of my zoological research I calculate my camel-caravan travelled the following distances in Aïr:
| Miles | |
| Aderbissinat to Agades | 93½ |
| Agades to Tasessat, Baguezan Mountains | 79 |
| Tasessat to Timia | 49 |
| Timia to Iferouan | 77 |
| Iferouan to Aguellal | 31 |
| Aguellal to Assodé | 40 |
| Assodé to Timia | 30 |
| Timia to Tasessat via east side of Baguezan | 73 |
| Tasessat to Agades | 79 |
| Agades to Aouderas via Tilisdak river | 62 |
| Aouderas to Agades via east side of Tarrouaji | 93 |
| Agades to Aderbissinat | 93½ |
| Total caravan travel in Aïr | 800 |
| Kano to Aderbissinat | 303 |
| Aderbissinat to Kano | 303 |
| Total travel with camels | 1,406 |
There is one point I would like to refer to before departing from the subject of Aïr. Aïr has been termed in the past on African maps and in textbooks a great “oasis,” a word which I take it means a “fertile place in a sandy desert”; a concise enough explanation, unless one endows it with a wider, less clearly defined latitude. But it appears to me that such a term applied to Aïr, inferring as it does that the country is fertile, is an imposition on the word that is apt to be misleading to anyone who endeavours to conceive, through the medium of description, the real composition of the country. And I hold this belief because during the dry season I cannot imagine a more barren country than Aïr in all the world: mountain after mountain of bare rock and far-reaching lowlands of nothing but dark gravel-covered ground, bleak as a ploughed field in winter time, except for scant rifts of green along shallow sandy river-beds or close under mountain slopes. Without doubt Aïr is bleak almost as the veriest desert: the one a vast lifeless scene of rock and boulder and pebble, the other great wastes of sand. For my own part, therefore, I am happier and much more sure of my ground when, in speaking of the country, I refer to it nominally as “The mountain land of Aïr,” and am sure that at the present time it has no real claim to be termed an “oasis” unless in the height of a good season of rain.
From Aderbissinat I travelled south to Tanout, where I camped in the hope of securing an ostrich, as I had met with no success in hunting for those birds up till that time. Here, however, owing solely to the keenness of the French officer at the Fort, I managed to secure a very fine adult male ostrich, which proved on later examination to be the same species as is found elsewhere in Africa: Struthio camelus camelus. Those birds carry a large quantity of fat, and the task of skinning this specimen, and cleaning and drying the skin free of oily matter with due regard to keeping the rich plumes unsoiled, occupied no less than two days.
Tanout, like everywhere else now, was greatly changed since I had passed north, and I found all the inhabitants in the fields cultivating large areas of millet which had already sprung up almost to man-height. All natives declare it has been a bountiful and wonderful season of rain; which has fallen here earlier than farther north.
North of Tanout the country is uninhabited (except for a few roving Tuaregs) and uncultivated; but on resuming the journey south of this Fort, I thenceforth passed green fields of millet each day.
I need not dwell further on my return journey to Nigeria, via Zinder, for it was henceforth, until our destination was reached, simply routine of continual wearisome grinding travel, while I suffered from fitful attacks of malaria which I had contracted at Aderbissinat.
On 22nd September I re-entered Kano. All that I find recorded in my diary of this, to me, memorable day is: “The trail has ended—the camels have gone and faithful Dogo—and I miss the fretful roar of the beasts, and the soft speech of the Tuaregs, and the glow of the camp-fire. . . . Everyone is most kind in welcoming me safely back.” But it needs no diary to recall the day of my arrival in Kano—when the long trail finished, and riding saddles and pack saddles and a band of sorely tried camels were freed upon the sand from precious loads of specimens which they had carried for many months. That great last day when work was done—the burden and worry of it all thrown to the four winds—the warm handshake of friends awaiting to welcome me in—a day, indeed, rare in a lifetime.
Yes! I was back among my own people at last, had drifted in unannounced like the sandstorms that fitfully bore me company from the north, no one knowing of my coming until a ragged figure was in the streets of the European settlement, where civilisation and railway begin and the desolation of the Sudan ends.