6 
PLAN OF THE 
the difcovery of particular parts of Africa : for Dr. Sparman's 
Narrative has furnifhed important information, to which will 
foon be added that of Mr. Patterfon, whofe account of his 
Travels and Obfervations in the Southern Parts of Africa is 
already in the Prefs ; and if a defcription of the ftill more ex- 
tended Travels of Colonel Gordon, the prefent Commander 
of the Dutch Troops at the Cape of Good Hope, fliould be 
given to the Public, the fouthern extremity of the African 
peninfula may perhaps be juftly confidered as explored. Mr. 
Bruce alfo, it is faid, is preparing for the Prefs an account of 
the knowledge which he has obtained on the eaftern fide of that 
quarter of th« globe^ 
But notwithftanding tlie progrefs of difcovery on the coafts 
and borders of that vaft continent, the map of its Interior is 
ftlll but a wide extended blank, on which the Geographer, on 
the authority of Leo Africanus, and of the Xeriff Edrifli the 
Nubian Author, has traced, with a hefitating hand, a few 
names of unexplored rivers and of uncertain nati<)ns. 
The courfe of the Niger, the places of its rife and termi- 
nation, and even its exijftence as a feparate ftream, are ftill 
undetermined. Nor has our knowledge of the Senegal and 
Gambia 
