ZANZIBAR. 



27 



altered to Gardefan, the Straits of Burial. 1 "We 

 were in the depths of the 'dries/ as they are 

 called in West Africa, in the local midwinter, 

 yet this land was gorgeous in its vestment when 

 others would be hybernating in more than semi- 

 nudity. 



Truly prepossessing was our first view of the 

 then mysterious island of Zanzibar, set off by 

 the dome of distant hills, like solidified air, that 



1 De Barros by a slip of the pen writes (Decades i. 5, 9) 

 Guadrafu. I should explain the corrupted ' G-uardafui ' not 

 as usual by ' Cabo d'Orfui,' but as a European version of 

 Jurd Hafun, — highland or crest of Hafun. Jurd, in Arabic, 

 means the mountain-top, opposed to the Wusut, shoulders or 

 half-way slopes, and to the Sahl, or low lands. The modern 

 Arabic name of the ancient Aromata Promontarium is Ra'as 

 Asir, the captive headland, a term especially applied to the 

 projection of land, some 2000 feet high, which, viewed from the 

 south, extends farthest seaward to the north-east, as I saw when 

 sailing from Zanzibar to Aden. Hafun, supposed to be the 

 Mosyllum Promontorium of Pliny and the Opone of Ptolemy, 

 the Khakhui of El Idrisi ; the Jafuni of El Masudi; the 

 Carfuna of other Arab geographers, and the Orfui of the 

 moderns, means the surrounded, i.e. by water, because almost 

 an island. Lieutenant Crittenden, I.N. (Aden, April 10, 

 1848. Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society), de- 

 scribes it as a headland of lime and sandstone nearly square, 

 and 600 to 700 feet high. He remarks that after the Elephas 

 Mons it is the only point on the coast concerning which there 

 can be no mistake. The sites are thus — 



Ras Asir (Guardafui) North Easternmost point of Africa N. lat. 11° 60' 0"Raper(ll° 4' 4"Norris) 

 Has Hafun, Easternmost point of Africa N. lat. 10° 26' 48" „ (10° 27' 48" „ ) 



Difference ■ 1* 23' 52" 1° 13' 16" 



Lieutenant Carle6s, I.N., makes the difference of meridian arc 0° 4' 50" 



