THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY. 7 



This is happier and truer to antiquity than 

 the doubts of Jose Basilio da Gama : — 



' — the sombre range 

 Virginal, ne'er by foot of man profaned, 

 Where rise Kile's fountains, if such fountains be.' 



O Uruguay, Canto v. 



I consulted my excellent friend the late Dr 

 Barth, of Timbuktu, about following the foot- 

 steps of pilot Diogenes the Fortunate. He re- 

 plied in a kind and encouraging letter, hinting, 

 however, that no prudent man would pledge 

 himself to discover the Nile sources. The Royal 

 Geographical Society benevolently listened once 

 more to my desire of penetrating into the heart 

 of the Dark Continent. An Expeditionary Com- 

 mittee was formed by Sir Roderick I. Murchison, 

 the late Bear-admiral Beechey (then President 

 of the Society), Colonel Sykes, Chairman of the 

 Court of Directors of the Hon. East Indian 

 Company, Mr Monckton Milnes (Lord Hough- 

 ton), Mr Erancis Galton, the South African tra- 

 veller, and Mr John Arrowsmith. I did not 

 hear, strange to say, till many years had passed, 



those mighty waters whence the rivers trend, 

 then, O dire Chance ! Fortune hard and sore ! 

 of all their fatal labours view the end — 

 that lies self-victimed in his natal land, 

 this lives afar on friendless foreign strand.' 



