212 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
quest for gold mines, arrived at Shendy. lie then went 
with Letorzec to determine the position of the junction 
of the Atbara with the Nile ; and at Assour, not far 
from 17° N. lat., he discovered the ruins of an extensive 
ancient town. It was Meroe. Pressing on in a southerly 
direction between the 15th and 16th decrees of N. lat., 
Cailliaud next identified the mouth of the Bahr-el- 
Abiad, or White Nile, visited the ruins of Saba, the 
mouth of the Rahad, the ancient Astosaba, Sennaar, the 
river Gologo, the Fazocle country, and the Toumat, a 
tributary of the Nile, finally reaching the Singue country 
between the two branches of the river. Cailliaud was 
the first explorer to penetrate from the north so near 
to the equator; Browne had turned back at 16° 10', 
Bruce at 11°. 
The two Frenchmen had preluded their discoveries 
by an excursion to the oasis of Siwali. At the end of 
1819 they left Fayum with a few companions, and 
entered the Libyan desert. In fifteen days, and after a 
brush with the Arabs, they reached Siwah, having on 
their way taken measurements of every part of the 
temple of Jupiter Ammon, and determined, as Browne 
had done, its exact geographical position. A little later 
a military expedition was sent to this same oasis, in 
which Drovetti collected new and very valuable docu¬ 
ments supplementing those obtained by Cailliaud and 
Letorzec. They afterwards visited successively the 
oasis of Falafre, never before explored by a European, 
that of Dakel, and Kliargh, the chief place of the Theban 
oasis. 
A few years later Edward Riippell devoted seven 
or eight years to the exploration of Nubia, Sennaar, 
Kordofan, and Abyssinia; in 1824 he ascended the 
White Nile for more than sixty leagues above its mouth. 
Lastly, in 1836 to 1838, Joseph Russegger, superin¬ 
tendent of the Austrian mines, visited the lower portion 
of the course of the Bahr-el-Abiad. This official journey 
was followed by the important and successful surveys 
afterwards made by order of Mehemet Ali in the same 
regions. 
