£36 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER 
know, is that river in Abyflinia within 300 miles of any 
fea; and, ftill more fo, how it could be in Nubia, and yet in 
Upper Ethiopia. Dongola is, indeed, the capital of Nubia; 
it is upon the Nile in 20° north latitude; but then it cannot 
be in Upper Ethiopia, but certainly in the Lower, and is not 
within a hundred miles of the Red Sea, and certainly not 
the way for a fhip from India to get to Abyflinia, which, 
failing,down the Red Sea, it must have paffed feveral hun- 
dred miles, and gone to the northward: Dongola, befides, 
is in the heart of the great defert of Beja, and cannot, with 
any degree of propriety, be faid to be eafily acceflible to any, 
~ no, not even upon camels, but impoflible to fhipping, as it 
is not within 200 miles of any fea. On the other hand, Dan- 
cali, for which it may have been miftaken, is a {mall king- 
dom on the coaft of the Red Sea, reaching to the frontiers of 
Abyflinia ; and through it the patriarch Mendes entered A- 
byflinia, as has been faid in my hiftory; but then Dancaliis © 
in lat. 12°, it is not in Nubia, nor upon the Nile, nor within 
feveral hundred miles of it, 
Acatn, Lobo has faid, (p. 30. 31.) “that a Portuguefe gal- 
liot was ordered to fet him afhore at Paté, whofe inhabitants 
were man-eaters.” This is a very whimfical choice of a place 
to land flrangers in, among man-eaters. I cannot conceive 
what advantage could be propofed by landing men going 
to Abyflinia fo far to the fouthward, among a people fuch as 
this, who certainly, by their very manners, mutt be at war, 
and unconnected with all their neighbours. And many ages 
have pafled without this reproach having fallen upon the 
inhabitants of the eaft coaft of the peninfula of Africa from 
any authentic teftimony; and I am confident, after the few 
fpecimens juft given of the topographical knowledge of this 
4. author, 
