THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 779 
confift of furs, cotton, filk, and woollen cloths, which are 
ftuffs the moft retentive of the infection, no accident hap- 
pens to thofe who wear them from this their happy con- 
fidence. 
- Tsuarr here fum up all thatI have to fay relating to the 
river Nile, with a tradition handed down to us by Herodo- 
tus, the father of ancient hiftory, upon which moderns lefs 
inftructed have grafted a number of errors. Herodotus * 
fays, that he was informed by the fecretary of Minerva’s 
treafury, that one half of the water of the Nile flowed due 
north into Egypt, while the other half took an oppofite 
courfe, and flowed directly fouth into Ethiopia. 
Tue fecretary was probably of that country himfelf, and 
feems by, his dbfervation to have known more of it than all 
the aneients together. In fact, we have feen that, between 
‘43° and 14°N. latitude, the Nile, with all its tributary ftreams, 
which have their rife and courfe within the tropical rains, 
falls down into the flat country, (the kingdom of Sennaar), 
which is more than a mile lower than the high country in 
Abyfiinia, and thence, with a little inclination, itruns into 
Egypt. ° 
AGAIN, in lat. 9° in the kingdom of Gingero, the Zebeé 
runs fouth, or fouth-eaft, into the inner Ethiopia, as do alfo 
many other rivers, and, as I have heard from the natives of 
that country, empty themfelves into a lake, as thofe on the 
north of the Line do-into the lake Tzana; thence diftribute 
: their 
* Herod. lib. ii. p. 98. fed. 28. 
