EXPLORATION. 29 



In our days geographical results are so carefully recorded that there can be 

 no doubt as to the routes followed by travellers in the interior, and we are enabled 

 at least roughly, to trace the network of the itineraries by which our knowledge 

 of the continent has been enlarged. During the last hundred years — that is, since 

 the foundation in 1788 of the English Society for the exploration of Africa, whose 

 first heroes and victims were Mungo Park and Hornemann — the whole continent 

 has been several times crossed from sea to sea. Livingstone, Cameron, Stanley, 

 Serpa Pinto, Massari, Wissmann, Buonfanti, have all performed this exploit, while 

 scores of other less distinguished explorers have penetrated in some directions 

 thousands of miles from the seaboard. Nor is mere distance always a measure of 

 the importance of these expeditions, and many trips of short duration deserve to 

 find a place in the records of African discovery. Sufficient data have already 

 been obtained to prepare complete maps of certain coastlands, such as the Cape, 

 the Nile Delta, Tunis, Algeria, while the list of positions astronomically determined 

 comprises several thousand names, and is daily increasing. Scarcely a week passes 

 without bringing the news of some fresh geographical conquest. The routes of 

 explorers are so interlaced, and overlap each other at so many points, that few 

 blank spaces of great extent remain to be filled up ; and even in the unexplored 

 regions enough is known of the general trend of rivers, valleys, and mountain 

 ranges to at least facilitate the work of future expeditions. 



At present the greatest extent of terra incognita lies parallel with the equator 

 north of the Ogowe and Congo, stretching from the Crystal Mountains and those 

 of Mfumbiro and Gambaragara, between the Nile and Congo basins. It comprises 

 an area of at least 400,000 square miles, or about the thirtieth part of the whole 

 continent. But it is already being approached from several points around its peri- 

 phery, and so recently as December, 1883, the last link was completed of the 

 permanent stations reaching by the Congo route from the Atlantic to the Indian 

 Ocean. The continent is now traversed from shore to shore by a continuous line 

 of exploration. 



The whole of Africa might perhaps have already been discovered had all 

 the white explorers made the way easy for their successors by considerate treat- 

 ment of the natives. By their humane conduct men like Speke, Livingstone, 

 Barth, Piaggia, Gessi, Schweinfurth, Emin-Bey, ward off dangers from those 

 following in their footsteps; but, on the other hand, many needless obstacles have 

 been created by the threats and violence of less sympathetic pioneers. At the 

 same time it must be confessed that whatever policy they may adopt, all alike are 

 mistrusted by the aborigines, who have too often good reason for regarding them 

 as forerunners of warlike expeditions. Thus even the best of Europeans are in 

 some respects necessarily considered as hostile, their very success inviting the 

 presence of less scrupulous followers. How often must the humane explorer, 

 while accepting the hospitality of some native chief, reflect with feelings akin to 

 remorse on the future which he is preparing for his generous hosts ! However 

 imintentionally, he leads the way for the trader and the soldier, thereby insuring 

 the ruin of his friendly entertainers. To justify himself in his own eyes, he is 



