xii INTRODUCTION. 



resistance." From the following description it is pretty 

 evident that Purchas must have been in possession of this 

 rare book from which the above account is taken ; though 

 he has not profited by the information it contains respect- 

 ino; the different sources of the Nile and the Zaire, " for 

 the Portuguese," says this chronicle, " and the fathers of 

 our society who traversed the whole empire of Upper 

 Ethiopia, (which we call Preste Joao) have clearly proved 

 that the Nile does not take its rise in this lake Zembre, 

 and that those authors are mistaken who give it that 

 source." Purchas, however, seems to have no scruples 

 about the truth of what amounts nearly to a physical im- 

 possibility, — the flowing of two rivers in opposite direc- 

 tions out of the same lake. " The Zaire," says this 

 quaint M^riter, " is of such force that no ship can get in 

 against the current but neer to the shore ; yea, it prevails 

 against the ocean's saltnesse threescore, and as some say, 

 fourscore miles within the sea before his proud waves 

 yeeld their full homage, and receive that salt temper in 

 token of subjection. Such is the haughty spirit of that 

 stream, overrunning the low countries as it passeth, and 

 swollen with conceit of daily conquests and daily supplies, 

 ■which, in armies of showers are, by the clouds, sent to 

 his succour, runnes now in a furious rage, thinking even 

 to swallow the ocean, which before he never saw, with 

 lis mouth wide gaping eight and twentce miles, as Lopez 

 affirmeth, in the opening ; but meeting with a more giant- 

 like enemie which lies lurking under the cliftes to receive his 

 assault, is presently swallowed in that wider wombe, yet 

 so, as always being conquered, he never gives over, but 

 in an eternall quarrel, with deepe and indented frownes in 



