The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile And Explorations of the Nile Sources by Sir Samuel W. Baker









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On the following morning we were welcomed by the entire European
population of Khartoum, to whom are due my warmest - Page 333
The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile And Explorations of the Nile Sources by Sir Samuel W. Baker - Page 333 of 343 - First - Home

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On The Following Morning We Were Welcomed By The Entire European Population Of Khartoum, To Whom Are Due My Warmest Thanks For Many Kind Attentions.

We were kindly offered a house by Monsieur Lombrosio, the manager of the Khartoum branch of the "Oriental and Egyptian Trading Company."

I now heard the distressing news of the death of my poor friend Speke. I could not realize the truth of this melancholy report until I read the details of his fatal accident in the appendix of a French translation of his work. It was but a sad consolation that I could confirm his discoveries, and bear witness to the tenacity and perseverance with which he had led his party through the untrodden path of Africa to the first Nile source. This being the close of the expedition, I wish it to be distinctly understood how thoroughly I support the credit of Speke and Grant for their discovery of the first and most elevated source of the Nile in the great Victoria N'yanza.

Although I call the river between the two lakes the "Somerset," as it was named by Speke upon the map he gave to me, I must repeat that it is positively the Victoria Nile, and the name "Somerset" is only used to distinguish it, in my description, from the entire Nile that issues from the Albert N'yanza.

Whether the volume of water added by the latter lake be greater than that supplied by the Victoria, the fact remains unaltered: the Victoria is the highest and first-discovered source; the Albert is the second source, but the ENTIRE RESERVOIR of the Nile waters. I use the term SOURCE as applying to each reservoir as a head or main starting-point of the river. I am quite aware that it is a debated point among geographers, whether a lake can be called a SOURCE, as it owes its origin to one or many rivers; but, as the innumerable torrents of the mountainous regions of Central Africa pour into these great reservoirs, it would be impossible to give preference to any individual stream. Such a theory would become a source of great confusion, and the Nile sources might remain forever undecided; a thousand future travellers might return, each with his particular source in his portfolio, some stream of insignificant magnitude being pushed forward as the true origin of the Nile.

I found few letters awaiting me at Khartoum: all the European population of the place had long ago given us up for lost. It was my wish to start without delay direct for England, but there were extraordinary difficulties in this wretched country of the Soudan. A drought of two years had created a famine throughout the land, attended by a cattle and camel plague, that had destroyed so many camels that all commerce was stagnated. No merchandise could be transported from Khartoum; thus no purchases could be made by the traders in the interior: the country, always wretched, was ruined. The plague, or a malignant typhus, had run riot in Khartoum:

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