6 
SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
tremity, or interior ; when, for upwards of three 
centuries, onr owtL ships have now sailed round 
its shores, and yet our modern acquaintance with 
its coast is still, at the best, yery inaccurate 
and incomplete, and our ignorance of its yast 
interior, profound. Neither commerce, stimu- 
lated by the grasping avarice of man, nor yet 
religion, impelled by her warmest zeal, have 
done more than to send a few to traverse, for a 
few hundreds of miles, beyond our immediate 
colonies. Nor has science or curiosity, ambi- 
tion or speculation, aided much towards explor- 
ing its unknown plains. And thus time has 
travelled on to this, the nineteenth century, and 
we are yet, comparatively speaking, resting in 
ignorance of the resources, and even the geo- 
graphy, of this vast continent. 
A few noble pioneers, indeed, we do number — 
men who have laid down their lives in trying 
to increase the store of our African geographical 
knowledge. Mr. Park, and his enterprising 
son, a Houghton, a Eoentzen, and a Cochelet, 
have each fallen victims in this noble cause; as 
well as a Laing, who penetrated to the centre 
of the land, there only to meet with a tragical 
death. Others too, more fortunate than they 
were, have lived and returned to tell their tales, 
and add, thereby, to our store of information. 
But beginning with the Portuguese discoveries, 
