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A CONCISE VIEW of the Country along the Line of the 



Zaire, — its Natural History and Inhabitants, — collected 



from the preceding Narratives, and from the Observations 



of the Naturalists and Officers employed on the Expedition. 



THE RIVER. — If, from the lamentable and almost 

 unaccountable mortality which brougiit to an untimely 

 termination this ill-fated expedition, the grand problem re- 

 specting the identity of the Niger and the Zaire still remains 

 to be solved ; we have at least, by means of it, acquired 

 a more certain and distinct knowledge of the direction and 

 magnitude of the latter river, in its passage through the 

 kingdom of Congo, as well as a more extended and correct 

 notion of the nature of the country, of its inhabitants and 

 productions, than had hitherto been supplied in the ac- 

 counts (and they are the only ones) of the early Catholic 

 missionaries. 



It now appears, that although this great river, which has 

 been named promiscuously the Congo, the Zaire, and the 

 Barbela (but which ought, as Captain Tuckey learned, to be 

 called Moienzi Enzaddi, " the Great River," or " the river 

 which absorbs all other rivers,") falls short, in some 

 respects, of the magnificent character given to the lower 

 part of its course ; yet in others, it has been much under- 

 rated. Its great velocity, for instance, its perpetual stale 

 of being flooded, and its effectual resistance of the tide, 

 are exaggerations ; but in regard to its depth at the point 



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