360 Dr. Beke's Summarfj of recent Nilotic Discoveiy. 



lished some important general results*. Dr. A. Genth appeal's 

 also to have formed several of the salts of the new base deseribed 

 in this paper, but his analytical results diflfer entirely from minef. 

 It is in such circumstances that the present contribution is 

 offered towards the advancement of our knowledge respecting 

 the salts of cobalt. 



University College, 



August 29, 1851. 



XXXVIII. A Summary of recent Nilotic Discovery, 

 By Charles T. Beke, Ph.D., F.S.A. ^c.X 

 ^M!^ the Meeting of the British Association at Southampton, 

 -tV. in September 1846, I had the honour of explaining to the 

 Section of Geology and Physical Geography my views respecting 

 the physical configuration of the Table-land of Abessinia§ ; and 

 at the Meeting at Swansea, in August 1848, 1 enunciated before 

 the same Section my hypothesis as to the sources of the Nile in 

 the Mountains of the Moon||. I may be allowed here briefly 

 to recapitulate the main results of those two communications. 



The table-land of Eastern Africa, instead of consisting, as was 

 generally supposed, of a succession of terraces rising one above 

 the other, the lowest being towards the Red Sea and the highest 

 in Enarea, is an elevated region of irregular surface, having its 

 line of greatest elevation towards the sea-coast, whence the 

 general level gradually falls westward towards the valley of the 

 Nile ; the water-parting between the streams tributary to that 

 gi-eat river and those flowing towards the Red Sea and the 

 Indian Ocean, being along the extreme eastern limit of the table- 

 land. 



The eastern flank of this table-land is abrupt and precipitous, 

 the greater portion of the ascent to the height of 8000 or 9000 

 feet (the average elevation of its eastern edge) being within the 

 horizontal distance of a veiy few miles ; so that persons ap- 

 proaching it from the coast can only regard it as a lofty range 



* Comptes Rendus, April 7, 1851, and May 26, 1851. 



t Chemical Gazette, 1851, p. 286. [The priority of discovery of this 

 new class of salts belongs, not to M. Fretny, but to Dr. Genth, whose re- 

 searches were published early in 1850; but unfortunately in a jouinal, the 

 circulation of which appears to be confined to the German physicians of the 

 United States.— W. F.J 



X Communicated by the Author, having been read before the Section of 

 Geography and Ethnology of the British Association for the Advancement 

 of Science, at the Meeting at Ipswich, on the 4th of July 1851. 



§ See Report of the British Association for 1846, Report of the Sec- 

 tions, pp. 70-/2 ; and Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, vol. xvii. 

 p. 76 et seq. 



II See Report of the British Association for 1848, Report of the Sections, 

 PJ>' 63j64; and Edinb. New PLiv.. Jouin., vol. xlv. p. 221 etseq. 



iixfoa 



