1826.] [ 523 ] 



MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE, DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN. 



Narrative of Travels and Dis'coveries in 

 Northern and Central Africa, in the years 

 1822, 18:i3, 1824., by Major Denham, 

 Capt. Clappf.hton, and the late Dr. Old- 

 NEY. 1 vol. ito. £i>. 14ns. C<i. — Let iio- 

 botly imagine tliese sbort notices, which we 

 undertake to fiimisJi, can give no satisfactory 

 eonception of a book, or gratify any class of 

 readers. Books multiply too rapidly all to 

 be all read ; and many will be thankful to 

 those who will pick out the two or three grains 

 of wheat from the bushel of chaff, and save 

 them the labour of silting. Here is a formi- 

 dable volume, enough to deter by its size, and 

 more than enough by its price ; which few can 

 afford to buy, and still fewer will be disposed 

 to read ; but about which all have some little 

 curiosity, and would like to indulge it — 

 cheaply and readily. Every body will like 

 to know at least the route the new travellers 

 took — the extent to which they have pene- 

 trated — the ultimate point of their discove- 

 ries — what reports they gather of circumja- 

 cent countries, and what here is still left to 

 explore. This information we can supply 

 in a page or two ; and it is not every body, 

 who will require to know more. 



The government publish ; indeed no 

 private person would incur the risk of so 

 expensive a publication — the sale will never 

 repay the outlay ; and for our parts we see 

 no sort of occasion for such magnificence, 

 except it be an object, in any quarter, to 

 keep the knowledge of even these matters 

 within aristocratic bounds. An interest in 

 the subject of African discoveries has been 

 excited far beyond any importance which 

 common sense will attach to them. There 

 is an ijnmense space of undiscovered coun- 

 try, about which the public have been for 

 years hoping and anticipating, and for years 

 have been baffled. The general rumours 

 that have been collected «'ith respect to the 

 interior indicate a much higher degree of 

 civilization than the state of the coast 

 population would warrant us in expecting. 

 Towns are talked of, of 100,000 or 200,000 

 inhabitants, and of course men cannot 

 congregate so numerously, — their passions 

 and faculties conflicting in daily intercourse, 

 — vi'ithout exciting new wants and vs-ishes, 

 productive at last of great accommodation 

 and luxiu-y. These numbers will no doubt 

 prove to be exaggerated. 



Though we hear in the same lofty terms 

 of Bomou, Houssa, and Soudan, Timbuc- 

 too and the course of the Niger are the 

 grand points of African interest. One 

 European only — we believe by the way he 

 was an American — has communicated any 

 personal knowledge of Timbuctoo, and his 

 scanty communication only whetted the 

 appetite for more. Many have perished 

 in the attempt to reach this new El Dora- 

 do, and many more will perish. Many 



have come within a fe\v hundred miles on 

 the west, and others on the north ; the 

 expedition before us approached it on the 

 cast, and perhaps the next attempt from 

 the south — which is after all the nearest, 

 and apparently the most accessible — will 

 finally gratify our longings ; longings which 

 have perhaps — we affirm it not peremptorily 

 — something childish about them. What 

 is the object of the goveniment ? The im- 

 provement of science, say Mr. Barrow and 

 his little circle. The promotion of com- 

 merce, say the Board of 'I'rade. But what 

 is the point of interest among the many, 

 the idle, the curious? To relieve sus- 

 pense, merely to get at that, at which there 

 seems unusual difficulty in getting. Be 

 these attempts, however, worth the pains, 

 the expense, the peril, the sacrifice — to 

 use the current language — we deteimine 

 not ; we have only to epitomize the book. 



To enter upon any detail is of course 

 impracticable, and the personal adventures 

 of the parties after all are matter of little 

 importance. That they have undergone 

 great fatigues and privations all can well 

 imagine ; that they were sometimes without 

 a bed and a dinner may readily be believed ; 

 but with these sufferings, however afflict- 

 ing to humanity suffering of any kind and 

 in any cause may be, we can sympathize 

 little — with sufferings incurred voluntarily, 

 and with full knowledge of the certainty of 

 their occurrence. People who use the 

 humdrum language of habit and adulation 

 will talk of the noble sacrifice, the gene- 

 rous devotion, the gallant daring of these 

 spirited travellers ; while the truth is, they 

 arc simply men of restless and ambirious 

 spirits with no other career of distinction 

 open before them — men who, if they 

 could have better disposed of themselves 

 would have coiu-se have done so — agents, 

 resolute and active no doubt, but still 

 agents and receiving the renumeration of 

 agents. There is no scarcity of such vo- 

 lunteers for enterprize ; hundreds will 

 promptly encounter the same dangers ; 

 and every year, as it adds to the number 

 of those, who fly from manual labour, 

 and conform with reluctance to settled ha- 

 bits, w ill add to the number of those who 

 are ready for desperate undertakings. 



The present expedition, consisting of 

 Major Denham, Capt. Clapperton, and Dr. 

 Oudney, and a carpenter of the name of 

 Hillman, took a new route, under the aus- 

 pices of the pacha of Tripoli. They start- 

 ed from Tripoli and at Mourzuk joined a 

 company of slave merchants, and crossed 

 the Great Desert, journeying directly south 

 1,200 miles to Boniou, a country, the name 

 of which has long appeared in the map of 

 Africa, btit which is not known to have 

 been trodden by any European foot before. 



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