46 
MEMOIR OF BRUCE. 
tions respecting the soundings, currents, bearings of 
the different islands, and geographical position of 
the principal points and harbours. His remarks 
-were chiefly nautical, but his collections of marine 
productions, and his observations on the natural 
history of the Red Sea were very extensive, although 
not detailed at length in his travels, or even in his 
private journals. 
After a long series of disasters and adventures, 
this enterprising traveller had at last reached the 
land where lay the far-famed object of his researches, 
“ the coy fountains of the Nile.” As it is to this 
point chiefly that our attention in the present bio- 
graphical sketch is directed, we shall pass with 
very few remarks those parts of his narrative that 
refer to the ancient history, as well as the civil and 
ecclesiastical state of the country. 
The kingdom of Ilabbesh (the old name of Abys- 
sinia) is reckoned in superficial extent about the 
size of Great Britain. That sequestered region, 
intersected with ranges or chains of high mountains 
and low cultivated valleys, is traversed by hot 
poisonous winds, and deserts of moving sand. The 
ferocious manners of the people are more dangerous 
to the traveller than the fervid climate they inhabit. 
On the south it is surrounded by the various tribes 
of the Galla nations ; the Shangalla (the ancient 
Cushites or Ethiopians) lie on the northern boundary, 
forming, as it were, a string to the bow of the Galla 
territory, which almost encompasses the kingdom 
in the opposite direction. 
