44 



FIFTEENTH AND LAST ORDINARY MEETING. 



Royal Institution. — May viSth, 1855. 



JOSEPH DICKINSON, M.D., F.R.S., &c., President, in the Chair. 



Mr. Hutchinson, who had given on a previous occasion some 

 interesting details of the exploring voyage of the "Pleiad," exhibited a 

 number of African curiosities, and at tlie request of the President 

 communicated intelligence respecting the Filatahs inhabiting that 

 coimtry. The following is an account of the origin of the expedition, 

 and of that people : 



ON THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE FILATAHS, 



AS ASCERTAINED BY THE RECENT TsHADDA-BlNXIE EXPLORATION. 



By THOMAS J. HUTCHINSON, Esq. 



At the end of the year 1849, Mr. Richardson, an Englishman, who 

 had been previously known by his exploration of part of the Northern 

 Sahara, from Tripoli to Ghadamis, Ghat, and Murzuk, was joined by 

 two Germans, Drs. Barth and Overweg, in a political and commercial 

 expedition he was about to undertake to Central Africa, under the 

 sanction of Her Majesty's Government. Their route was made from 

 Tripoli through the Sahara to Damergu, on the borders of' Sudan, and 

 a frontier kingdom to Bomu, whence they travelled in different direc- 

 tions ; Mr. Richardson proceeding to Ungurutua in Bomu, Dr. Barth 

 by Katshna and Kano, and Dr. Overweg by a circuitous westerly route 

 through Guber and Mariadi, making arrangements to have Ivuka, the 

 capital of Boruu, the place of their rendezvous. All three never met 

 again ; for Mr. Richardson died at Ungurutua on the 4th of March, 

 1851, twenty days before the news of the melancholy incident reached 

 Dr. Barth, who was proceeding to Kuka, where he met Dr. Overweg. 

 From this they went in company to Kanem, to the north of Lake 

 Tshad, which Dr. Overweg had already circumnavigated, and on whose 

 waters he had launched a boat named " The Lord Palmerston," at 

 Maduari, east of Kuka, the very place where he expired on the 17th of 

 September, 1852. Dr. Barth has since been joined by Dr. Vogel, and 

 the news of his safety, communicated lately by Her Majesty's Consul at 



