AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
AS TOLD BY ITS EXPLODERS. 
CHAPTER I. 
Earliest Explorers. 
It seems at first thought strange that Africa, which is 
really a part of the Old World Continent, joined on to 
Asia, and known to Europe from the remotest period, 
should have been left unexplored, except along its 
coasts, until about a century ago ; and that most of its 
interior should have remained a great blank until 
fifty years since. But the surprise vanishes when we 
read the narratives of its most recent explorers; when 
we read of the scores of daring men who have entered 
it only to die; when we read of the terrible hard¬ 
ships endured by such heroes as Park, Livingstone, 
Cameron, Stanley, Thomson. Africa is unique among all 
the continents, the only one to be compared to it being 
Australia. The exploration of the great southern 
continent, with its immense deserts and its dearth of 
water, has cost many lives and much suffering; but in 
this respect it is not to be compared to Africa. The 
Dark Continent has desert areas as large as the whole 
of Australia ; in many places there is as great a dearth 
of water ; but, above all, the great bulk of the continent 
lies within the tropics, where the heat is such as to 
paralyse the energies of the white man ; while most of 
its coast and many of its river-valleys are the home of 
deadly malaria. All this has combined to prevent the 
white man from penetrating into the continent. It 
has only been when all the other continents were ex¬ 
plored, and to a large extent occupied by Europeans 
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