132 OUTFIT — INSTRUMENTS. 



much use. The sextant and ai'tificial horizon, thermo- 

 meter, and compasses were carried apart. My ammuni- 

 tion was distributed in portions through the whole lug- 

 gage; so that, if an accident should befall one part, we 

 could still have others to fall back upon. Our chief hopes 

 for food were upon that; but, in case of failure, I took 

 about twenty pounds of beads, worth forty shillings, which 

 still remained in the stock I brought from Cape Town, a 

 email gypsy tent, just sufficient to sleep in, a sheep-skin 

 mantle as a blanket, and a horse-rug as a bed. As 1 had 

 always found that the art of successful travel consisted in 

 taking as few " impediments" as possible, and not for- 

 getting to carry my wits about me, the outfit was rather 

 spare, and intended to be still more so when we should 

 come to leave the canoes. Some would consider it inju- 

 dicious to adopt this plan; but I had a secret conviction 

 that, if I did not succeed, it would not be for want of the 

 " knick-knacks" advertised as indispensable for travellers, 

 but from want of " pluck," or because a large array of 

 baggage excited the cupidity of the tribes through whose 

 country we wished to pass. 



The instruments I carried, though few, were the best of 

 their kind. A sextant, by the famed makers Troughton 

 and Sims, of Fleet Street ; a chronometer watch, with a 

 stop to the seconds-haud, — an admirable contrivance for 

 enabling a. person to take the exact time of observations, 

 it was constructed by Dent, of the Strand, (61,) for the 

 .Royal Geographical Society, and selected for the service 

 by the President, Admiral Smythe, to whose judgment and 

 kindness I am in this and other matters deeply indebted. 

 It was pronounced by Mr. Maelear to equal most chrono- 

 meters in performance. For these excellent instruments 1 

 have much pleasure in recording my obligations to my 

 good friend Colonel Steel, and at the same time to Mr. 

 Maclcar for much of my ability to use them. Besides 

 these, I had a thermometer byDollond; a compass from 

 the Cape Observatory, and a small pocket one in addition ; 



