TIIE RIVER ATBARA. 
[chap. I. 
() 
Alexandria, about 840 geographical miles of latitude, 
and, including the westerly bend of the Nile, its bed 
will be about eleven hundred miles in length, from 
the mouth of its last tributary the Atbara until it 
meets the sea. Thus, eleven hundred miles of absorp¬ 
tion and evaporation through sandy deserts and the 
delta must be sustained by the river between the 
Atbara junction and the Mediterranean: accordingly 
there is an immense loss of water ; and the grandest 
volume of the Nile must be just below the Atbara 
junction. 
It is not my intention in the present work to enter 
into the details of my first year’s exploration on the 
Abyssinian frontier ; that being so extensive and so 
completely isolated from the grand White Nile expedi¬ 
tion, that an amalgamation of the two would create 
confusion. I shall therefore reserve the exploration of 
the Abyssinian tributaries for a future publication, and 
confine my present description of the Abyssinian rivers 
to a general outline of the Atbara and Blue Nile, 
showing the origin of their floods and their effect upon 
the inundations in Lower Egypt. 
I followed the banks of the Atbara to the junction 
of the Settite or Taccazy river: I then followed the 
latter grand stream into the Abyssinian mountains in 
the Base country. From thence I crossed over to the 
