INTRODUCTION. vii 



course of a great river, which was still left undecided in 

 our times, the authority of an English traveller, from per- 

 sonal inspection, set this question for ever at rest, by de- 

 terminino- the direction of the stream to be from west to east. 

 That part, therefore, of the problem Avhich relates to the 

 origin and the direction of the early course of this cele- 

 brated river, has been completely solved ; but another and 

 no less interesting part still continues to be wrapt up in 

 ra3'stery — where is its termination? As ancient authorities 

 had pointed out the li ue direction of the stream, it was but 

 fair to allow them credit for a knowledge of its termination. 

 In the examination of this part of the question, by the 

 first geographer of tlie age, either in this or any other 

 countrj^the authorities of the Arabian writers are w'cighed 

 and compared with the geography of Ptolemy ; and after 

 a close and accurate investioation of the various state- 

 ments of ancient and modern authorities, and a train of 

 reasoning clear and argumentative, the result of tlie en- 

 quiry appears to be, that the Niger loses itself in the ex- 

 tensive lakes or swamps of Wangara; an hypothesis which 

 was supposed to have the merit of falling in pretty nearly 

 with the termination of that river, as assigned to it by 

 Ptolemy in what he called the Libya pains, which lake, 

 however, Ptolemy only says, is formed by the Niger. 

 In addition to this coincidence, there were also negative 

 proofs of the disappearance of the Niger in the interior 

 regions of Africa. Jt could not, for instance, be a branch 

 of the Egyptian Nile, as the Arabs generally c<mtend, for 

 the two reasons adduced by Major i\ennell : first, because 

 of the difference of level ; the Nile, according to Bruce's 

 measurement by the barometer, passing over a country 



