very where very beautiful, well peopled by
different tribes, copper-coloured, and some of them even fair. Every
where the banks are covered and ornamented with beautiful trees, and
cattle, sheep, goats, elephants, &c., are numerous and abundant. Amongst
the Bhours, they found Indian goods brought from the shores of the
Indian ocean. Day by day, the breadth, depth, and current of the river
were observed and marked. For a considerable distance above Khartoum,
the breadth was from one and a half to one and a quarter mile, the depth
three or four fathoms, and the current about one and a half mile per
hour. Above the parallel of nine degrees, the river takes a remarkable
bend due west for about 90 miles, when it passes through a large lake,
the waters of which emitted an offensive smell, which might proceed from
marshy shores.{A} Above the lake, the breadth decreases to one-third or
one-fourth of a mile, the depth to twelve or thirteen feet, with a
current of one and a half mile per hour, the bottom every where sand,
with numerous islands interspersed in the stream. The mountainous
country around the upper part abounds with iron mines.

Going eastward, we come to the elevated mountainous ranges which give
birth to the Bahr-el-Abiad to the south, the Gochob, the Kibbee, and
their numerous tributary streams to the east and south-east, and the
Toumat, the Yabous, the Maleg, and other rivers which flow north into
the Abay. This vast chain is very elevated, and in many places very
cold, especially to the west of Enarea, and to the west and south of
Kaffa. From the sources of the Kibbee and the Yabous, it stretches
eastwards to Gurague, and thence, still eastward, by the Aroosi, Galla,
and Hurrur or Harrar, to Cape Guardafui, approaching in some places to
within sixty miles or less of the sea of Babel-Mandeb; the elevation to
the east of Berbera decreases to about 5000 feet, and from which
numerous streams flow both to the north and to the south. Eastward of
the meridian of Gurague, a branch from the chain strikes off due north
through Shoa, by Ankobar and Lake Haik, to the northward of which it
separates, and runs one branch N.N.W. to Samen, and another by Angot,
N.E. by east, to the Red Sea, at Assab, and the entrance of the straits
of Babel-mandeb. The whole of this chain is very elevated; near Ankobar
some peaks being 14,000 feet high, and constantly white with snow or
hail; and round the sources of the Tacazze and the Bashilo,