144 Letters, Extracts, Notices, ^c. 



cumstances, and the many and varied duties which his high 

 position compelled him to fulfil.'^ * 



To show Emin's grateful appreciation of a slight service 

 and his style of correspondence, we may venture to add here 

 a copy of a letter addressed by him to the Editor of this 

 Journal from Wadelai in 1887. The original is well and 

 plainly written in a very minute hand^ and is, of itself, quite 

 sufficient to prove the extraordinary abilities of a man who 

 had " learned his English in Central Africa." 



"Wadelai, the 13th April, 1887. 



"Dear Sir, 



" By Mr. Mackay's kindness I had, a few days ago, 

 a copy of ' the Times/ in which your letter, dated 29th Oc- 

 tober, 1886, in my behalf, appeared. 



" Although, as a working naturalist, I had always the 

 greatest admiration for you, the master of our science, you 

 have now laid me under such personal obligations that I 

 fear I never may be able to acknowledge them sufficiently. 

 Unknown to you, lost and forgotten even by my few friends, 

 I had no reason whatever to believe me remembered by you. 

 So greater likewise my gratitude for your generous inter- 

 ference, so hearty my thankfulness for your disinterested 

 advocacy of my and my people's relief. I, nevertheless, 

 believe it my duty to tell you plainly that I am not at all 

 willing to leave my men. They stood to me in hard and 

 bloody times, so it would become me very ill to leave them 

 now that a dawn of hope appears. I did not work twelve 

 long years here for running away as soon as an occasion 

 offers itself. What Gordon trusted to me, land and people, 

 I shall hold them to the last. Let England put matters right 

 in Uganda, and open us a sure road — that is all we want for 

 the moment. 



"That, besides my official work, I always shall do my best 

 for observing and collecting, I need not tell you. A lot of 

 natural-history collections, amongst them many new species 



* See the preface to ' Emin Pasha in Central Africa ' (London, 1888), 

 and the German edition, 'Emin Pascha' (Loipsic), of the same date. 



