ances of certain rocks, and other characteristic features of nature, which are but little varied. Their total ignorance of the compass is a great disadvantage to those rangers of the deserts; and their knowledge of the fixed stars is very imperfect. But, although they are little acquainted with the names of the constellations, they distinguish such as may guide their course in the night. Their deviations from the true line, however, are not unfrequent. The caravan which our author accompanied from Egypt to Dar Fur, a distance of not less than 1200 British miles, was three times totally at a loss for the road, although some of the people had ten or twelve times performed that journey. The people of some of the caravans take a small stock of dried meat: others content themselves with a leather bag of flour, another of hard baked bread, a leathern vessel of honey or treacle, and another of butter, the quantity of each being proportioned to the length of the journey. Water is also an indispensable article, and is carried in leather bags, seasoned with tar or oil, in order to prevent evaporation; but from the tar, the mud, and the excessive heat, it is often extremely nauseous. These journeys are performed chiefly with camels, which are above all other animals patient of hunger and thirst. The caravan consists of no determinate number; that with which Mr. Browne travelled was composed of about 500. Sometimes they do not exceed 200, and sometimes they amount to 2000, and carry away 1000 head of slaves. Besides their abstemious mode of living, the excessive heats, and other hardships to which those traders are exposed, they frequently run the risk of being attacked by the roving Arabs of the desert, who make robbery their profession. But Mr. Browne thinks the danger arising from the winds and moving sands greatly exaggerated, and entirely explodes the idea of caravans and armies being overwhelmed by their operation. He judiciously supposes, that if such assemblages of people have been buried in the sands, it can only have happened after want of water, the influence of a hot wind, or other causes had deprived them of the power of motion. The number of men and animals which may have perished * Browne's Trav. p. 283-285. † See Browne on that subject, ubi supra, p. 280, 281, 282. through such causes, and afterwards been found covered with sand, might induce succeeding travellers to believe that they had been overwhelmed in their march, and thus give rise to those marvellous narrations. From what has already been said, it appears, however, that the real hardships and dangers are sufficiently serious, without enumerating such as are imaginary, and, together with the extent of those inland peregrinations, form a scene of trade and travelling very different from any thing that Europe exhibits.* The interior of southern Africa, from Dar Fur, Seennaar, and Abyssinia, to the country of the Hottentots, is entirely a "terra incognita" the geography of which is almost as little known as that of the lunar regions. The want of inland seas and rivers, a defect still more conspicuous in Africa than in Asia, has, together with the extensive sandy deserts, deprived the different parts of this vast continent of the means of easy communication, shut up the interior countries from all intercourse with civilized nations, and perpetuated the barbarism of their sequestered tribes. If imagination might be permitted to figure to itself the beneficial consequences that might have resulted from a large central sea, with extensive branches, or gulfs, the receptacles of navigable rivers, occupying the place of the sandy deserts, reasonable conjecture would scarcely hesitate to conclude that the geographical circumstances of Africa have greatly contributed to its moral barbarism. The prevalent religions of Africa, with the single exception of Abyssinia, are Mahomedanism and idolatry. The former seems to extend over all the northern countries as far as the Niger, and the intolerant fanaticism of its professors, together with their commercial jealousies, concur with physical circumstances in preventing the progress of European discovery. The various forms, under which paganism exhibits itself in the southern regions, are subjects too minute and unimportant for moral discussion. Extravagant rites and absurd ideas, among which may be reckoned a general belief in the * From Assiut to Darfur the distance is not less than 1000 British miles; from Tunis to Tombuctoo it exceeds 1300 British miles. Many of the other routes are also of great length. See D'Anville's map and the map given in Browne's Travels. power of witchcraft, are the general characteristics. A more important subject of physical investigation is the black complexion, which, with several variations of feature, occupies a wide extent of latitude quite across the continent. But an attempt to explain this phænomenon would require a dissertation too long for admission in this place, and at last could not reach beyond conjecture. The horrid system of the slave trade, under the oppression of which the Africans have so long and so severely groaned, will be noticed in speaking of those parts which are more particularly the theatre of this unnatural traffic. EGYPT. CHAP. I. Situation.....Extent.....Boundaries.....Face of the Country......Mountains..... Rivers......Canals..... Lakes..........Mineralogy.....Mineral Waters......Soil.... Climate..... Vegetable Productions.....Zoology.....Natural Curiosities.... Antiquities and Artificial Curiosities. EGYPT, extending from near the tropic of Cancer to about 32° north latitude, and from 28° to 36° east longitude, is about 500 geographical miles in length from north to south, and 250 in breadth from east to west. This extent, however, is merely nominal, the habitable part of the upper Egypt being only a narrow vale, running through, the whole length scarcely ever excceding twenty-five miles, and often not more than nine miles in breadth, which, together with the Delta, does not form an area of more than 18,900, or at the highest computation to 20,250 square miles.* All the rest of the country, except those small and insulated spots in the western deserts called Oasis, consists only of barren sands, almost totally destitute of vegetation and water. The boundaries of Egypt are the Mediterranean on the north, the Red Sea on the east, and on the south and the west the deserts of Nubia and Africa. The Oasis of Sieva is generally supposed to be the place where stood the celebrated temple of Jupiter Ammon. This fertile spot, in the midst of a barren desert, is about six miles * D'Anville Mem. sur l'Egypte, p. 24. Pauw's Recherches, tom. Savary computes the cultivated part of Egypt at 19,000 square miles, 8,000 for the Delta, and 11,000 for Upper Egypt, tom. 1 and 2. long and four and a half in breadth. A great proportion of it is covered with date trees, and it produces rice, wheat, and a variety of fruits. The climate is hot, the water bad, and the air apparently unhealthful, as strangers are often affected with agues and malignant fevers. The inhabitants of the town, and Oasis of Sieva, are governed by Sheiks elected by the people, and possessing very little authority. This sequestered spot, notwithstanding its contracted limits, is frequently the seat of factions and of intestine war.* Mr. Browne here discovered a building, consisting of a single apartment thirty-two feet in length, eighteen in breadth, and fifteen feet high, built of massy stones of the same kind as those of the pyramids, and covered originally with six large and solid blocks, reaching from one wall to the other. The walls are adorned with emblematical figures and hieroglyphical characters, and the building does not appear to have ever been much larger than at present. Although Sieva seems exactly to correspond with the supposed situation of the temple of Jupiter Ammon, and although this edifice is evidently Egyptian, and of great antiquity, Mr. Browne appears to doubt of its being the remains of that celebrated fanc.† M. Rennell, however, after a minute investigation of the subject, does not hesitate to believe that Sieva is the true Oasis of Ammon, and the structure observed by Mr. Browne a fragment of the temple.t Face of the country.-The face of the habitable part of Egypt is uniformly level. The Delta and the district around. Alexandria, the former celebrated for its fertility and its inundated meadows and fields, the latter remarkable for its sandy sterility, present an uniform plain of vast extent, while the narrowness of the vale above Cairo pervaded by the Nile, and bounded on each side by precipitous rocks or sandy mountains, affords a greater variety of scenery. The appearance of Egypt during the inundation, has, in general, been too poetically delineated, the picture being applicable only to certain parts of the Delta. In general the country is irrigated by means of canals and machines. * See Browne's description of the Oasis of Sieva, Trav. p. 25, &c. + Browne's Trav. p. 30, 31. Rennell's Geog. of Herodot, sect. 21. |