53 o; T R A ,V E L S TO DISCOVER 



Tins prince did not adopt the wild idea of turning the 

 courfe of the Nile out of its prefent channel ; upon the pof- 

 fibility or impofhbility of which, the argument (fo warmly 

 and fo long agitated) always mofl improperly turns. His 

 idea was to famifh Egypt : and, as the fertility of that coun- 

 try depends not upon the ordinary flream,. but the extraor- 

 dinary increafe of it by the tropical rains, he is faid to- 

 have founds by an- exact furvey arid calculation, that there 

 ran on the fummit, or higheft part of the country, feveral 

 rivers which could be intercepted by mines, and their flream 

 directed into the low country fouthward, inflead of joining 

 the Nile, augmenting it and running northward* By this, 

 he found he mould be able fo to difappoint its increafe, that 

 it never would rife to a height proper to fit Egypt for culti- 

 vation. And thus far he was warranted in his ideas of fuc- 

 ceeding (as I have been informed by the people of that 

 country), that he did interfect and carry into the Indian Q- 

 cean, two very large rivers, which have ever fince flowed 

 that way, and he was carrying a level to the lake Zawaia, 

 where many rivers empty themfelves in the beginning of 

 the rains, which would have effectually diverted the courfe 

 of them all, and could not but in fome degree diminilh the. 

 current below. 



Death, the ordinary enemy of all thefe ftupendous Her* 

 culean undertakings, interpofed too here, and put a flop to 

 this enterprise of Lalibala. But Amha Yafous, prince of 

 Shoa (in whofe country part of thefe immenfe works were) 

 a young man of great underftanding, and with whom 1 li- 

 ved feverai months in the mofl intimate friendfliip at Gon- 

 dar, affured me that they were vifible to this day; and that 

 they were of a kind whofe ufe could not be miftaken; that 



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