I hope that what I have now said will be thought sufficient to convince all impartial readers, that these celebrated sources have, as it were, by a fatality, remained to our days as unknown as they were to antiquity, no good or genuine voucher having yet been produced capable of proving that they were before discovered, or seen by the curious eye of any traveller, from earliest ages to this day; and it is with confidence I propose to my reader, that he will consider me as still standing at these fountains, and patiently hear from me the recital of the origin, course, names, and circumstances of this the most famous river in the world, which he will in vain seek from books, or from any other human authority whatever, and which, by the care and attention I have paid to the subject, will, I hope, be found satisfactory here:—
The Agows of Damot pay divine honour to the Nile; they worship the river, and thousands of cattle have been offered, and still are offered, to the spirit supposed to reside at its source. They are divided into clans, or tribes; and it is worthy of observation, that it is said there never was a feud, or hereditary animosity between any two of these clans; or, if the seeds of any such were sown, they did not vegetate longer than till the next general convocation of all the tribes, who meet annually at the source of the river, to which they sacrifice, calling it by the name of the God of Peace. One of the least considerable of these clans, for power and number, has still the preference among its brethren, from the circumstance that, in its territory, and near the miserable village that gives it name, are situated the much sought-for springs from which the Nile rises.
Geesh, however, though not farther distant from these than 600 yards, is not in sight of the sources of the Nile. The country, upon the same plane with the fountains, terminates in a cliff about 300 yards deep down to the plain of Assoa, which flat country continues in the same subaltern degree of elevation, till it meets the Nile again about seventy miles southward, after it has made the circuit of the provinces of Gojam and Damot. This cliff seems purposely fashioned into many shelves or stages, each of which is occupied by a cluster of houses seldom above eight or ten in number; some above, some below, some along the side of each other, but chiefly occupying the space, or two-thirds of the middle of the cliff, that is, none of them nearer to the top of the cliff, nor to the plain of Assoa below, than a distance equal to that proportion of the whole. The reason of choosing this situation is the fear of the Galla, who have often invaded that part of Abyssinia, and have even exterminated some clans of Agows entirely.
In the middle of this cliff, in a direction straight north towards the fountains, is a prodigious cave, whether the work of nature or of art, I cannot determine; in it are many bye-paths, so that it is very difficult for a stranger to extricate himself; it is a natural labyrinth, large enough to contain the inhabitants of the village, and their cattle; there are likewise two or three lesser ones, which I did not see; in this large one, I tired myself part of several days, endeavouring to reach as far northward as possible, but the air, when I had advanced something above one hundred yards, seemed to threaten to extinguish my candle by its dampness; and the people were besides not at all disposed to gratify my curiosity farther, after assuring me that there was nothing at the end more remarkable than I then saw, which I have reason to believe was the case.
The face of this cliff, which fronts to the south, has a most picturesque appearance from the plain of Assoa below, parts of the houses at every stage appearing, through the thickets of trees and bushes with which the whole face of the cliff is thickly covered; impenetrable fences of the very worst kind of thorn, hide the mouths of the caverns above mentioned, even from sight; there is no other communication with the houses either from above or below, but by narrow-winding sheep-paths, which through these thorns are very difficult to be discerned, for all are allowed to be overgrown with the utmost wildness, as a part of their defence; lofty and large trees (most of them of the thorny kind) tower high up above the edge of the cliff, and seem to be a fence against people falling down into the plain; these are all at their proper season covered with flowers of different sorts and colours, so are the bushes below on the face of the cliff: every thorn in Abyssinia indeed bears a beautiful flower; a small atonement for the evils they occasion.
From the edge of the cliff of Geesh above where the village is situated, the ground slopes with a very easy descent due north, and lands you at the edge of a triangular marsh above eighty-six yards broad, in the line of the fountains, and two hundred and eighty-six yards two feet from the edge of the cliff above the house of the priest of the river, where I resided: this triangle, supposing it a right one, will measure one hundred and ninety-six yards in its length, or in the perpendicular; I mean it did so on the 6th of November 1770; doubtless, like other marshes, in the middle of the dry season, and of the rains, it will vary its dimensions. I suppose that this perpendicular represents the north of the marsh, and immediately from the brink of it the ground rises in a rather steep bank, and forms a round hill not a hundred yards high, upon the top of which is placed the church of St Michael Geesh; I did not measure this distance, but am sure it is very little less than five hundred yards from the church to the middle fountain. On the east the ground descends likewise with a very easy tho’ perceptible slope from the large village of Sacala, which gives its name to that territory; it is distant six miles from the source, but, to sight, seems scarcely to be two.
I shall suppose the sharp point of the triangle composed of the hypothenuse and the perpendicular, to point like the needle of a compass to Sacala, and the line of the hypothenuse to represent the south side of the marsh near the village Geesh. The base, or line, uniting the west end of the hypothenuse, and forming the right angle with the other side, I suppose to be the edge of the marsh formed by the bottom of the mountain of Geesh, and from this west side of it rises this high and beautiful mountain, quite detached from others, like a pyramid, which it resembles in its elegant and regular form. It is about 4870 feet high measured in the slope; for near one half way the ascent is very easy and gradual. The base being of a remarkable breadth, it then becomes exceedingly steep, but all the way covered with good earth, producing fine grass and clover, interspersed with wild flowers.
Upon the rock in the middle of this plain, the Agows used to pile up the bones of the beasts killed in sacrifice, mixing them with billets of wood, after which they set them on fire. This is now discontinued, or rather transferred to another place near the church, as they are at present indulged in the full enjoyment of their idolatrous rites, both under Fasil and Michael.
In the middle of this marsh (that is about forty yards from each side of it) and something less from the bottom of the mountain of Geesh, arises a hillock of a circular form, about three feet from the surface of the marsh itself, though apparently founded much deeper in it. The diameter of this is something short of twelve feet, it is surrounded by a shallow trench, which collects the water and voids it eastward; it is firmly built with sod or earthen turf, brought from the sides, and constantly kept in repair, and this is the altar upon which all their religious ceremonies are performed. In the middle of this altar is a hole, obviously made, or at least enlarged by the hand of man. It is kept clear of grass, or other aquatic plants, and the water in it is perfectly pure and limpid, but has no ebullition or motion of any kind discernible upon its surface. This mouth, or opening of the source, is some parts of an inch less than three feet diameter, and the water stood at that time the 5th of November, about two inches from the lip or brim, nor did it either increase or diminish during all the time of my stay at Geesh though we made plentiful use of it.
Upon putting down the shaft of my lance at six feet four inches, I found a very feeble resistance, as if from weak rushes or grass, and about six inches deeper I found my lance had entered into soft earth, but met with no stones or gravel; this was confirmed by another experiment, made on the 9th with a heavy plummet and line besmeared with soap, the bottom of which brought up at the above depth only black earth, such as the marsh itself and its sides are composed of.
Ten feet distant from the first of these springs, a little to the west of south, is the second fountain, about eleven inches in diameter, but this is eight feet, three inches deep. And about twenty feet distant from the first, to the S. S. W. is the third source, its mouth being something more than two feet large, and it is five feet eight inches deep. Both these last fountains stand in the middle of small altars, made, like the former, of firm sod, but neither of them above three feet diameter, and having a foot of less elevation than the first. The altar in this third source seemed almost dissolved by the water, which in both flood nearly up to the brim; at the foot of each appeared a clear and brisk running rill; these uniting joined the water in the trench of the first altar, and then proceeded directly out, I suppose, at the point of the triangle, pointing eastward, in a quantity that would have filled a pipe of about two inches diameter.
The water from these fountains is very light and good, and perfectly tasteless; it was at this time most intensely cold, though exposed to the mid-day sun without shelter, there being no trees nor bushes nearer it than the cliff of Geesh on its south side, and the trees that surround Saint Michael Geesh on the north, which, according to the custom of Abyssinia, is, like other churches, planted in the midst of a grove.
On Monday the 5th of November, the day after my arrival at Geesh, the weather perfectly clear, cloudless, and nearly calm, in all respects well adapted to observation, being extremely anxious to ascertain, beyond the power of controversy, the precise spot on the globe that this fountain had so long occupied unknown, I pitched my tent on the north edge of the cliff, immediately above the priest’s house, having verified the instrument with all the care possible, both at the zenith and horizon. With a brass quadrant of three feet radius, by one meridian altitude of the sun’s upper limb, all necessary æquations and deductions considered, I determined the latitude of the place of observation to be 10° 59´ 11´´; and by another observation of the same kind made on the 6th, 10° 59´ 8´´; after which, by a medium of thirty-three observations of stars, the largest and nearest, the first vertical, I found the latitude to be 10° 59´ 10´´; a mean of which being 10° 59´ 9½´´, say 10° 59´ 10´´; and if we should be so unnecessarily scrupulous as to add 15´´ for the measured distance the place of the tent was south of the altar, then we shall have 10° 59´ 25´´ in round numbers, for the exact latitude of the principal fountain of the Nile, though the Jesuits have supposed it, 12° N. by a random guess; but this being nearly the latitude of Gondar, the capital from which they set out, shews plainly they knew not the precise latitude of either of these places.
On the 7th of November I was fortunate enough to be in time for the observation of an immersion of the first satellite of Jupiter, the last visible here before that planet’s conjunction with the sun. My situation was very unfavourable, my view of the heavens being every way interrupted by a thick grove of bamboo canes, with high and shady trees growing upon the head of the precipice. Jupiter was low, and the prodigious mass of that beautiful mountain of Geesh, bade fair to hide him before our business was done; I was therefore obliged to remove my telescope up to the edge of the cliff, after which, the weather being perfectly favourable, I had as fair and distinct a view of the planet as I could desire, and from that observation I did conclude unalterably the longitude of the chief fountain of the Nile to be 36° 55´ 30´´ east of the meridian of Greenwich.
The night of the 4th, that very night of my arrival, melancholy reflections upon my present state, the doubtfulness of my return in safety, were I permitted to make the attempt, and the fears that even this would be refused, according to the rule observed in Abyssinia with all travellers who have once entered the kingdom; the consciousness of the pain that I was then occasioning to many worthy individuals, expecting daily that information concerning my situation which it was not in my power to give them; some other thoughts, perhaps, still nearer the heart than those, crowded upon my mind, and forbade all approach of sleep.
I was, at that very moment, in possession of what had, for many years, been the principal object of my ambition and wishes: indifference, which from the usual infirmity of human nature follows, at least for a time, complete enjoyment, had taken place of it. The marsh, and the fountains, upon comparison with the rise of many of our rivers, became now a trifling object in my sight. I remembered that magnificent scene in my own native country, where the Tweed, Clyde, and Annan rise in one hill; three rivers, as I now thought, not inferior to the Nile in beauty, preferable to it in the cultivation of those countries through which they flow; superior, vastly superior to it in the virtues and qualities of the inhabitants, and in the beauty of its flocks; crowding its pastures in peace, without fear of violence from man or beast. I had seen the rise of the Rhine and Rhone, and the more magnificent sources of the Soane; I began, in my sorrow, to treat the inquiry about the source of the Nile as a violent effort of a distempered fancy:—
Grief or despondency now rolling upon me like a torrent; relaxed, not refreshed, by unquiet and imperfect sleep, I started from my bed in the utmost agony; I went to the door of my tent; every thing was still; the Nile, at whose head I stood, was not capable either to promote or to interrupt my slumbers, but the coolness and serenity of the night braced my nerves, and chased away those phantoms that, while in bed, had oppressed and tormented me.
It was true, that numerous dangers, hardships, and sorrows had beset me through this half of my excursion; but it was still as true, that another Guide, more powerful than my own courage, health, or understanding, if any of these can be called man’s own, had uniformly protected me in all that tedious half; I found my confidence not abated, that still the same Guide was able to conduct me to my now wished-for home: I immediately resumed my former fortitude, considered the Nile indeed as no more than rising from springs, as all other rivers do, but widely different in this, that it was the palm for three thousand years held out to all the nations in the world as a detur dignissimo, which, in my cool hours, I had thought was worth the attempting at the risk of my life, which I had long either resolved to lose, or lay this discovery, a trophy in which I could have no competitor, for the honour of my country, at the feet of my sovereign, whose servant I was.
I had procured from the English ships, while at Jidda, some quick-silver, perfectly pure, and heavier than the common sort; warming therefore the tube gently at the fire, I filled it with this quick-silver, and, to my great surprise, found that it stood at the height of 22 English inches: suspecting that some air might have insinuated itself into the tube, I laid it by in a warm part of the tent, covered till morning, and returning to bed, slept there profoundly till six, when, satisfied the whole was in perfect order, I found it to stand at 22 English inches; neither did it vary sensibly from that height any of the following days I staid at Geesh and thence I inferred, that, at the sources of the Nile, I was then more than two miles above the level of the sea; a prodigious height, to enjoy a sky perpetually clear, as also a hot sun never over-cast for a moment with clouds from rising to setting.
On the 6th of November, at a quarter past five in the morning, Fahrenheit’s thermometer stood at 44°, at noon 96°, and at sun-set 46°. It was, as to sense, cold at night, and still more so an hour before sun-rise.
The Nile, keeping nearly in the middle of the marsh, runs east for thirty yards, with a very little increase of stream, but perfectly visible, till met by the grassy brink of the land declining from Sacala. This turns it round gradually to the N. E. and then due north; and, in the two miles it flows in that direction, the river receives many small contributions from springs that rise in the banks on each side of it: there are two, particularly one on the hill at the back of St Michael Geesh, the other a little lower than it on the other side, on the ground declining from Sacala, These last-mentioned springs are more than double its quantity; and being arrived under the hill whereon stands the church of Saint Michael Sacala, about two miles from its source, it there becomes a stream that would turn a common mill, shallow, clear, and running over a rocky bottom about three yards wide: this must be understood to be variable according to the season; and the present observations are applicable to the 5th of November, when the rains had ceased for several weeks. There is the ford which we passed going to Geesh, and we crossed it the day of our arrival, in the time of my conversation with Woldo about the sash.
Nothing can be more beautiful than this spot; the small rising hills about us were all thick-covered with verdure, especially with clover, the largest and finest I ever saw; the tops of the heights crowned with trees of a prodigious size; the stream, at the banks of which we were sitting, was limpid and pure as the finest crystal; the ford, covered thick with a bushy kind of tree that seemed to affect to grow to no height, but thick with foliage and young blanches, rather to court the surface of the water, whilst it bore, in prodigious quantities, a beautiful yellow flower, not unlike a single wild rose of that colour, but without thorns; and, indeed, upon examination, we found that it was not a species of the rose, but of hypericum.
From the source to this beautiful ford, below the church of St Michael Geesh, I enjoyed my second victory over this coy river, after the first obtained at the fountains themselves. What might still be said of the world in general no longer applied to me:—
And again,
Here, at the ford, after having stepped over it fifty times, I observed it no larger than a common mill stream. The Nile, from this ford, turns to the westward, and, after running over loose stones occasionally, in that direction, about four miles farther, the angle of inclination increasing greatly, broken water, and a fall commences of about six feet, and thus it gets rid of the mountainous place of its nativity, and issues into the plain of Goutto, where is its first cataract; for, as I have said before, I don’t account the broken water, or little falls, cataracts, which are not at all visible in the height of the rains.
Arrived in the plain of Goutto, the river seems to have lost all its violence, and scarcely is seen to flow, but, at the same time, it there makes so many sharp, unnatural windings, that it differs from any other river I ever saw, making above twenty sharp angular peninsulas in the course of five miles, through a bare, marshy plain of clay, quite destitute of trees, and exceedingly inconvenient and unpleasant to travel. After passing this plain, it turns due north, receives the tribute of many small streams, the Gometti, the Googueri, and the Kebezza, which descend from the mountains of Aformasha; and, united, fall into the Nile about twenty miles below its source; it begins here to run rapidly, and again receives a number of beautiful rivulets, which have their rise in the heights of Litchambara, the semi-circular range of mountains that pass behind, and seem to inclose Aformasha: These are the Caccino, the Carnachiuli, the Googueri, the Iworra, the Jeddeli, and the Minch, all which, running into the Davola, join the Nile something less than a mile west of the church of Abbo.
It is now become a considerable stream; its banks high and broken, covered with old timber trees for the space of about three miles; it inclines to the north-east, and winds exceedingly, and is then joined by the small river Diwa from the east. It then makes a semi-circle, and receives Dee-ohha, turns sharply to the east, and falls down its second cataract at Kerr. About three miles below this cataract, the large, pleasant, and limpid Jemma pays its tribute to the Nile. Though its course is now mostly north, through Maitsha on the east, and Aroossi and Sankraber on the west, it still is inclining toward the lake Tzana, and, after receiving the rivers Boha and Amlac Ohha, small streams from the west, and the Assar, Aroossi, and Kelti, large rivers from the east, it crosses the south end of the lake Tzana for about seven leagues, preserving the colour of its stream distinct from that of the lake, till it issues out at the west side of it in the territory of Dara, where there is a ford, though very deep and dangerous, immediately where it first resumes the appearance of a river.
The deep stream is here exceedingly rapid; the banks in the course of a few miles become very high, and are covered with a verdure, abundant and varied beyond all description: passing afterwards below Dara, it bounds that narrow stripe of flat country which is called Foggora, confined between the lake and the mountains of Begemder, till it arrives at its third cataract of Alata, a small village of Mahometans, on the east side of the river, and there exhibits a scene that requires more fancy, and the description of a more poetical pen than mine, although the impression the sight of it made upon me will certainly never be removed but with life.
The course of the river is now S. E.; in that direction it washes the western part of Begemder and Amhara on the right; the river then incloses the province of Gojam, so that, in the circle that it makes in returning towards its source, that province remains always on the right.
From both sides, the Nile receives a number of tributary streams, the Muga, Gammala, Abea, Aswari, and Mashillo, from the mountains of Gojam; and the Bashilo, Boha, and Geeshem from those of Begemder and Amhara; it then passes below Walaka. The river now has a course near the southward, passes Upper and Lower Shoa. From these countries, on the east of the Nile, come the great rivers Samba, Jemma, Roma, with some others, and the Temsi, Gult, and Tzul from the high country of the Agows, and Amid Amid to the northward. From Shoa the Nile winds to the S. W. to the W. N. W. nearly inclosing all the south of Gojam. Immediately adjoining to it, turning still more northerly, is the province of Bizamo, bordering on the river Yabous, which, coming from the southward, and terminating this province, falls into the Nile.
The Nile, now turned almost due north, approaches its source so as to be distant from it only about 62 miles; it is here very deep and rapid, and is only fordable at certain seasons of the year. The Galla, however, when they invade Abyssinia, cross it at all times without difficulty, either by swimming, or on goats skins blown up like bladders: other means of passing are in small rafts, placed upon two skins filled with wind; or, twisting their hands round the horse’s tail, they are drawn over by them; this last is the way that the women, who follow the armies of Abyssinia, cross unfordable rivers, a case that always occurs in late campaigns. Crocodiles abound exceedingly in this part of the Nile; but the people, who live on the banks of the river, have or pretend to have charms which defend them from the most voracious of these animals.
Adjoining to the Gongas, and bounding them on the north, arises a vast chain of very high mountains; the south side of this is inhabited by tribes of Gongas and others, but on the north-east side, nearest Abyssinia, is a nation of perfect blacks, called Guba. The Nile seems to have forced its way through a gap in this prodigious barrier, and falls down a cataract of about 280 feet. This is immediately followed by two others in the same ridge of mountains, both very considerable, if not compared with the first. This high ridge runs west far into the continent of Africa, where it is called Dyre and Tegla; the east end (that is east of the Nile) joins the mountainous country of Kuara, and is there called the Mountains of Pazuclo. These mountains, as far as I could learn, are all very fully inhabited throughout by many powerful clans, or nations, mostly Pagans. It is, however, a country the least known of any in Africa, but a very large quantity of gold is brought from thence, as well as many slaves; the gold is washed down by the torrents in the time of the tropical rains, and, upon these ceasing, they search after that metal found in small pellets entangled among roots, branches, tufts of grass, hollows, or in any thing that can imprison and detain it. This is the fine gold of Sennaar, called Tibbar.
The Nile now runs close by Sennaar, in a direction nearly north and south; it then turns sharply toward the east, is brim-full and vastly pleasant in the fair season, being indeed the only ornament of this bare and flat, though cultivated country. From Sennaar it passes many large towns inhabited by Arabs, all of them white people. The Nile then passes Gerri, and runs N. E. to join the Tacazzè, passing in its way a large and populous town called Chendi, probably the ancient metropolis of Candace130.
If we are not to reject entirely the authority of ancient history, the island of Meroë, so famous in the first ages, must be found somewhere between the source of the Nile and this point, where the two rivers unite; for of the Nile we are certain, and it seems very clear that the Atbara is the Astaboras of the ancients. Pliny131 says, it is the stream which incloses the left side of Meroë as the Nile does the right; and we must consider him to be looking southward from Alexandria, when he uses the otherwise equivocal terms of right and left, and, after this junction of these two rivers, the Nile receives or unites itself with no other till it falls into the sea at Alexandria.
Much inquiry has been made about this island, once a most distinguished spot on our globe, the cradle of science and philosophy, which spread itself from this to enlighten other nations, we are now full of uncertainty, searching in a desert for the place of its existence; such is the miserable instability of all human excellence. Nothing but confusion has followed this inquiry, because they who were engaged in it rather substituted vain systematical prejudices of their own, than set themselves to consider those lights which were immediately before them.
The Jesuits, and a French writer, who is a constant champion of their errors, have fixed the peninsula of Gojam to be the Meroë of the ancients. M. le Grande (the compiler alluded to) having in vain endeavoured to answer the objections against Gojam being Meroë, at last declares, in a kind of literary passion, that the ancients have spoken so differently about Meroë, that Gojam is as likely to be the place as any other.
I have a proper esteem for the merit of M. le Grande, where he forms his conjectures from his own opinion, and I have also a due deference to that learned Order the Jesuits; it is to their labours, that learning in general, and geography in particular, has been more indebted than to those of any other set of men whatever. Yet still I can never believe, either that Gojam is Meroë, or that there is any difficulty in finding its true situation, or that the ancients have written confusedly about it. On the contrary, I find it described by its latitude, its distance from places known, the produce of its soil, colour of its inhabitants, and several other circumstances which peculiarly belong to it, with greater accuracy and precision than many other disputed situations.
I shall begin by giving my reasons why Gojam is not Meroë: and, first, Diodorus132 tells us, this island had its name from a sister of Cambyses, king of Persia, who died there in the expedition that prince had undertaken against Ethiopia. Now, Cambyses’s army perished in the desert immediately to the southward, after he had passed Meroë, consequently he never was in Gojam, nor within 200 miles of it; his mother, therefore, could not have died there, nor would his army have perished with hunger if he had arrived in Gojam, or near it, for he would then have been in one of the most plentiful countries in the world.
The next reason to prove that Gojam is not Meroë, is, that that island was inclosed between the Astaboras and the Nile, but Gojam is surrounded entirely by the Nile; there is no other river than it that can, or ever did, pass for the Astaboras, whose situation was distant, and which, retaining its ancient name, cannot be mistaken, for it is at this day called Atbara. Again, as the ancients knew Meroë, if Gojam had been Meroë, they must have known the fountains of the Nile; and this we are sure they did not.
On the other hand, Pliny says, Meroë, the most considerable of all the islands of the Nile, is called Astaboras, from the name of its left channel—“Circa clarissimam earum Meroën, Astabores lævo alveo dictus;133” which, cannot describe any other place than the confluence of those two rivers, the Nile and Atbara. The same author says farther, that the sun is vertical twice a year, once when proceeding northward he enters into the 18th degree, Taurus, and after returning southward into the 14th degree of the Lion.——Lucan says the same:—
Now Gojam, being in lat. 10°, could never answer this description.
But there are in these lines two circumstances which are peculiar to the peninsula of Atbara, or Meroë, and described as such by the poet. The first is, the inhabitants of Meroë were black, such were the Gymnosophists, the first philosophers and inhabitants of this island, and such they have ever been down to the Saracen conquest. On the other hand, nobody will pretend to say that the people of Gojam are black; they are long-haired, and of as fair a complexion as other Abyssinians; nor was it ever supposed that they had philosophers or science among them before the Jesuits arrived in the country.
The next circumstance, peculiar to Meroë, is, that the ebony-tree grew there, which is spread all over the peninsula of Atbara, and out of it this tree is not found, (as far as I know) unless a few trees in the province of Kuara, in the low and northernmost part of it; a country, for its intolerable heat, not inferior to that of Atbara, and contiguous to it; but in Gojam, a country deluged with six months rain, this tree would not grow; though so much farther south it is near two English miles higher than Atbara, and is therefore too cold. Such are my reasons for believing that Gojam cannot be Meroë. In my return through the desert I shall confirm this, by proving that Atbara is Meroë, and that we are to look for it about lat. 16° 29´, near the end of the tropical rains.
The Nile, now united with the Astaboras, takes its course straight north for more than two degrees of the meridian; it then makes a very unexpected turn W. by S. considerably more than that space in longitude, winding very little till it arrives at Korti, the first town in the Barabra, or kingdom of Dongola. The river by this time, with three sides, inclosed the great deserts of Bahiouda the road through this from Dereira to Korti (before it was cut off by the Arabs, as it now continues to be) made the fourth side of the square which bound this desert; by this route it was that Poncet and the unfortunate M. du Roule went to Abyssinia.
From Korti the Nile runs almost S. W. where it passes Dongola, a country of the Shepherds, called also Beja, the capital of Barabra, and comes to Moscho, a considerable town, and welcome place of refreshment to the weary traveller, when the caravans were suffered to pass from Egypt into Ethiopia, who, after traversing the dreary desert of Selima for near 500 miles, found himself at Moscho, in repose, in the enjoyment of plenty of fresh water, long ago become to him an indulgence more delicious than ever he had before conceived. From Moscho the Nile turns gradually to the N. E. and in lat. 22° 15´ it meets with a chain of mountains, and throws itself over them down a cataract called Jan Adel, which is its seventh cataract; and, continuing still N. E. it passes Ibrim and Deir, two small garrisons belonging to Egypt. The fall of the Nile in the country of Kennouss, which forms the 8th cataract, and its course through Egypt, are already described in my voyage up the river.
It is not to be wondered, that, in the long course the Nile makes from its source to the sea, it should have acquired a different name in every territory, where a different language was spoken; but there is one thing remarkable, that though the name in sound and in letters is really different, yet the signification is the same, and has an obvious reference to the dog-star.
Among the Agow, a barbarous and idolatrous nation, it is called Gzeir, Geesa134, Seir; the first of these names signifying God; it is also called Abba, or Ab, Father; and by many other terms which I cannot write in the language of that nation, whilst, with a fervent and unfeigned devotion, under these, or such-like appellations, they pray to the Nile, or spirit residing in that river. The next name it receives is when descended into Gojam, where it is called Abay. Foreigners, of all denominations, not acquainted with the language of the country, have, from hearing it was stiled Ab, Father, by the Agows, or Abai, imagined its name Abawi, a case of that noun, which, in their ignorance, they have made to signify, the Father.
Ludolf, the only one in the age he lived that had any real knowledge of either the Geez or Amharic, was the first to perceive this: he found in neither of these languages Abawi could be a nominative, and consequently could not be applied to any thing; and next he as truly found it could not be of the singular number, and, if so, could not signify one river. He stopped, however, as it were, in the very brink of discovery, for he knew there was no writing or letters in Amharic, which were therefore necessarily borrowed from the old and written language Geez, so that all that could be done was, first, attentively to hear the pronunciation of the word in Amharic, and then to write it in Geez characters as nearly conformable to the sound as possible. Now, the name of the river in Amharic is Abay, pronouncing the y open, or like two (i), and the sense of that word so wrote in Geez, as well as Amharic, is, “the river that suddenly swells, or overflows, periodically with rain;” than which a more apposite name could never have been invented.
By the Gongas, on the south of the mountains Dyre and Tegla, who are indigenæ, the river is called Dahli, and, on the north of these mountains, where the great cataracts are by the Guba, Nuba, and Shangalla, it is stiled Kowass, both which names signify a watching dog, the latrator anubis, or, the dog-star. In the plain country, between Fazuclo and Sennaar, it is called Nil, which signifies blue; and the Arabs interpret it by the word Azergue, which it keeps as far as Halfaia, or near it, where it joins the White River.
The next name by which the Nile went was Siris: Pliny tells us it was called Siris both before and after it came into Beja. “Nec ante Nilus, quam se totum aquis concordibus rursus junxit. Sic quoque etiamnum Siris, ut ante nominatus per aliquot millia, et in totum Homero Egyptus, aliisque Triton135.” This name the Greeks thought was given to it, because of its black colour during the inundation, which mistake presently produced confusion; and we find, according to this idea, the compiler of the Old Testament, (I should suppose Esdras, after the captivity) has translated Siris, the black river, by the Hebrew, Shihor; but nobody ever saw the Nile black when it overflowed; and it would be a very strong figure to call it so in Egypt, where it is always white during the whole of the inundation. Had Esdras, or whoever it was that followed the Greek interpretation of Siris, viz. black, inquired in Beja what was the origin of this name, they would have there learned it imported the River of the Dog-star, on whose vertical appearance this Nile, or Siris, overflows; and this idolatrous worship, paid to the Nile, was probably part of the reason of the question the prophet Jeremiah asks136, “And what hast thou to do in Egypt, to drink the water of Seir? or the water profaned by idolatrous rites?”
As for the first, it is only the translation of the word Bahar, applied to the Nile. The inhabitants of the Barabra, to this day, call it Bahar el Nil, or, the Sea of the Nile, in contradistinction to the Red Sea, which they know by no other name but Bahar el Melech, the Salt Sea. The junction of the three great rivers; the Nile, flowing on the west of Meroë; the Tacazzé, which washes the east side, and joins the Nile at Maggiran, in lat. 17°; and the Mareb, which falls into this last, something above this junction—gives the name of Triton to the Nile.
More doubt has been raised as to the third name, Ægyptus, which it obtains in Homer, and which, I apprehend, was a very ancient name given it even in Ethiopia. The generality, nay, all interpreters, I may say, imagine, as in that of Siris, that this name was given it in relation to its colour, viz. black; but with this I cannot agree; Egypt, in the Ethiopic, is called y Gipt, Agar; and, an inhabitant of the country, Gypt, for precisely so it is pronounced, which means the country of ditches, or canals, drawn from the Nile on both sides at right angles with the river; nothing, surely is more obvious than to write y Gipt, so pronouncing Egypt, and, with its termination, us, or os, Egyptus. The Nile is also called Kronides, Jupiter; as also several other names; but these are rather the epithets of poets, relative and transitory, not the permanent appellation of the river.
I would pass over another name, that of Geon, which some of the fathers of the church have fondly given it, pretending it was one of the rivers that came from the terrestrial paradise, and encompassed the whole land of Cush, whilst, for this purpose, they bring it two thousand miles by a series of miracles, as it were, under the earth and under the sea: To do what? to surround the whole land of Cush. And does it surround it, or does it surround any land whatever? This, and some similar wonders told by St Augustine, have been eagerly catched at, and quoted by unbelieving sceptics; meaning to insinuate, that no better, in other respects, was the authority of these fathers when they explain and defend the truths of Christianity. For my own part, though perfectly a friend to free and temperate inquiry, these injudicious arguments which I need not quote, have little weight with me. St Augustine, when explaining those truths, was undoubtedly under the direction of that spirit which could not lie, and was promised to the priesthood while occupied in their master’s commission the propagation of Christian knowledge; but when, from vanity and human frailty, he attempted to establish things he had nothing to do with, speaking no longer by commandment, he reasoned like a mere man, misled by vanity and too great confidence in his own understanding.
We come now to investigate the reason of the inundation of the Nile, which, being once explained, I cannot help thinking that all further inquiries concerning this subject are superfluous.
It is an observation that holds good through all the works of Providence, That although God, in the beginning, gave an instance of his almighty power, by creating the world with one single fiat, yet, in the laws he has laid down for the maintaining order and regularity in the details of his creation, he has invariably produced all these effects by the least degree of power possible, and by those means that seem most obvious to human conception. But it seemed, however, not according to the tenor of his ways and wisdom, to create a country like Egypt, without springs, or even dews, and subject it to a nearly vertical sun, that he might save it by so extraordinary an intervention as was the annual inundation, and make it the most fertile spot of the universe.
This violent effort seemed to be too great, above all proportion, for the end for which it was intended, and the cause was therefore thought to merit the application of the sublimest philosophy; and accordingly, as Diodorus Siculus137 tells us, it became the study of the most learned men of the first ages, the principal of whom, with their opinions, he quotes, and at the same time alledges the reason why they were not universally received. The first is Thales of Miletum, one of the seven sages, who assigns for the cause the Etesian winds, which blowing, all the hot season, from the Mediterranean, in contrary direction to the stream of the river, force the Nile to accumulate, by obstructing its flowing to the sea, occasion it to rise above its banks, and consequently to overflow the country.
But to this it was answered, That, were this the cause, all rivers running in a northern direction, to the sea, would be subject to the same accident; and this it was known they were not. And we may further add, that were this really the cause, the inundation of the Nile would be very irregular; for the winds at this season often blow from the south-west for two or three days together, and then the inundation would be interrupted. To this it must be added, that a very considerable part of Egypt, and that the most fertile, the Delta, is under the dominion of variable winds, which last long, from one point, at no time.
I shall trespass upon my reader’s patience, on this head, by no more than one additional observation. If the Etesian winds, by opposing the stream, occasioned the inundation, they could effect this no longer than they continued to blow. Now, it was an observation we made when on the Nile, and it was almost without exception, that as often as the Etesian winds blew throughout the day, the night was either calm, or the wind blew gently from the south or east, so that it is morally impossible the river could have overflowed at all, without a much more powerful and constant agent than the Etesian winds:—