We commenced the descent toward the river: the valley was a succession of gullies and ravines, of landslips and watercourses. The entire hollow, of miles in width, had evidently been the work of the river. How many ages had the…
This was an admirable place for the hunters. They desired me to lie down, and they crept into the jungle out of view of the river. I presently observed them stealthily descending the dry bed about two hundred paces above…
The Faky receives his patients. No. 1 arrives, a barren woman who requests some medicine that will promote the blessing of childbirth. No. 2, a man who was strong in his youth, but from excessive dissipation has become useless. No.…
Infectious disorders, such as plague, cholera, small-pox, etc., may be generally tracked throughout their gradations from their original nests. Those nests are in the East, where the heat of the climate acting upon the filth of semi-savage communities engenders pestilence.…
We were ferried across to the main shore, and my wife and I, in our respective angareps, were carried by the natives for about three miles. Arriving at a deserted village, half of which was in ashes, having been burned…
It is impossible to describe the triumph of that moment. Here was the reward for all our labor–for the years of tenacity with which we had toiled through Africa. England had won the sources of the Nile! Long before I…
The chief of Ellyria now came to inspect my luggage, and demanded fifteen heavy copper bracelets and a large quantity of beads. The bracelets most in demand are simple rings of copper five-eighths of an inch thick and weighing about…
In our present weak state another year of Central Africa without quinine appeared to warrant death. It was a race against time; all was untrodden ground before us, and the distance quite uncertain. I trembled for my wife, and weighed…
The following dialogue passed between us after the usual Arab mode of greeting. I said: “Ibrahim, why should we be enemies in the midst of this hostile country? We believe in the same God; why should we quarrel in this…
Innumerable flies appeared, including the tsetse, and in a few weeks the donkeys had no hair left, either on their ears or legs. They drooped and died one by one. It was in vain that I erected sheds and lighted…