172 ABYSSINIA. 



radius, Mr. Bruce found the exact latitude of the principal fountain of 

 the Nile to be 10 deg. 59 min. 25 sec. though the Jesuits have sup- 

 posed it 12 deg. N. by a random guess. The longitude he ascer- 

 tained to be 36 deg. 55 min. 30 sec. east of the meridian of Greenwich. 



The great cataract of Alata (for we shall omit describing those of 

 inferior note) Mr. Bruce tells us, was the most magnificent sight he 

 had ever beheld. The height has been rather exaggerated. The 

 missionaries say the fall is about sixteen ells, or fifty feet. The 

 measuring is, indeed, very difficult ; but, by the position of long 

 sticks, and poles of different lengths, at different heights of the rock 

 from the water'e edge, Mr. Bruce thinks he may venture to say that 

 it is nearer forty feet than any other measure. The river had been 

 considerably increased by rains, and fell in one sheet of water, with- 

 out any interval, above half an English mile in breadth, with a force 

 and a noise that was truly terrible, and which stunned, and made him 

 for a time perfectly dizzy. A thick fume or haze covered the fall all 

 round, and hung over the course of the slream, both above and below, 

 marking its track, though the water is not seen. The river, though 

 swelled with rain, preserved its natural clearness, and fell, as far as 

 he could discern, into a deep pool, or bason, in the solid rock, which 

 was full, and in twenty different eddies to the very foot of the preci- 

 pice ; the stream, when it fell, seeming part of it to run back with 

 great fury upon the rock, as well as forward in the line of its course, 

 raising a wave, or violent ebullition, by chasing against each other. 



We shall here subjoin a summary of the account our author gives 

 of the causes of the inundation of the Nile. 



The sun being nearly stationary for some days in the tropic of Ca- 

 pricorn, the air there becomes so much rarefied, that the heavier 

 winds, charged with watery particles, rush in upon it from the Atlantic 

 on the west, and from the Indian ocean on the east. Having thus ga- 

 thered such a quantity of vapours as it were to a focus, the sun now 

 puts them in motion, and drawing them after it in its rapid progress 

 northward, on the 7th of January, for two years together, seemed to 

 havo extended its power to the atmosphere of Gondar, when, for the 

 first time, there appeared in the sky white, dappled, thin clouds, the 

 sun being then distant 34 deg. from the zenith, without any one cloudy 

 or dark speck having been seen for several months before. Advancing 

 to the line with increased velocity, and describing larger spirals, the 

 sun brings on a few drops of rain at Gondar the 1st of March, being 

 then distant 5 deg. from the zenith ; these are greedily absorbed by 

 the thirsty soil ; and this seems to be the farthest extent of the sun's 

 influence capable of causing rain, which then only falls in large drops, 

 and lasts but a few minutes : the rainy season, however, begins most 

 seriously upon its arrival at the zenith of every place, and these rains 

 continue constant and increasing after he has passed it, in his progress 

 northward. 



In April, all the rivers in Amhara, Begemder, and Lasta, are first 

 discoloured, and then beginning to swell, join the Nile in the several 

 parts of its course nearest them ; the river then, from the height of its 

 angle of inclination, forces itself through the stagnant lake without 

 mixing with it. In the beginning of May hundreds of streams pour 

 themselves from Gojam, Damot, Maitsha, and Dembea, into the lake 

 Tzana, which had become low by intense evaporation, but now begins 

 to fill insensibly, and contributes a large quantity of water to the Nile, 

 before it falls down the cataract of Alata. In the beginning of June, 



