41^ THEORIES RESPECTING THE NIGER. 
There is no lake or other receptacle in the whole 
line of stream, except that of Nigritia (Nigrites 
Palus), for the Libya Palus is represented as situ- 
ated in one of its tributaries. As it is placed 
very near the western extremity, the greater por- 
tion, in order to find in it a receptacle, must flow 
westward. This is corroborated by the expres- 
sion, that the Niger forms (to/s/) the Nigrites 
Palus. The opposite branch, flowing into it from 
the west, must in this view be very much under- 
rated ; which may be easily accounted for from 
its remote situation, and the line of communica- 
tion by which Ptolemy obtained his knowledge of 
this part of Africa. 
The next geographical system was that of the 
Arabians, in whose opinion, with regard to the 
course of this river, there is nothing dubious or 
equivocal. They all identify it with the Nile, but 
only in its source and earliest course, borrowed 
apparently from Ptolemy. But they conceive 
that, at a particular point, this primary Nile sepa- 
rates into two branches, or Niles ; of which one, 
the Nile of Egypt, flows northward through Nubia, 
and falls into the Mediterranean ; the other, the 
Nile of the Negroes, takes its course westward, 
and traverses the vast range of central Africa. 
According to Abulfeda and Edrisi, the most emi- 
nent Arabian geographers, it continues to flow 
