ed romance and
simplicity, picturesqueness and primitiveness of Oriental life, has a
peculiar charm. So, too, in the romance of Eastern travel, with its
surprises and adventures, its strong lights and profound shadows, it
finds an exciting contrast to that commonplace routine of existence,
that daily round of conventionalities, which is imposed upon them by the
social tyranny of the West. Fettered as women are in highly civilized
countries by restraints, obligations, and responsibilities, which are
too often arbitrary and artificial, their impatience of them is not
difficult to be understood; and it is natural enough that when the
opportunity offers, they should hail even a temporary emancipation. No
doubt it is this motive which, in different ways, has influenced the
courageous ladies, whose names in the present century have been so
brilliantly inscribed on the record of Eastern travel; such as Lady
Hester Stanhope, Lady Duff Gordon, Lady Baker, Miss Edwards, and Lady
Blunt. And this motive it was, strengthened by a naturally adventurous
disposition, which induced Mademoiselle Alexina Tinne--of whose career
we are now about to speak--to incur the perils of African exploration.

"Visitors to Algiers some years ago, will remember the air of mystery
hanging about a certain yacht lying off the harbour. Rumour spread all
kinds of glowing reports about the mistress of its motley crew,
Europeans, negroes, and stately Nubians. Some said it was an Oriental
princess; one invented a love affair to account for the lonely
wanderings of this female Odysseus; another hinted darkly at some
political mission from far-off Mussulman courts to the chiefs of the
Sahara. The bare truth, when at last it was made known, was almost as
marvellous as anything fiction could invent on behalf of its owner. The
yacht, indeed, belonged to a lady, young, beautiful, and possessed of
queenly fortune, whose existence, almost from childhood, had been spent
in the East; who had already accomplished several voyages of discovery
in Central Africa; and who, undaunted by the mishaps of former pioneers
in the same direction, now projected an undertaking, which, if carried
out successfully, would place her in the foremost rank of African
explorers."

Alexina, or Alexandrina Tinne, was born at the Hague in 1835 (or,
according to some authorities, 1839). Her father was a Dutch merchant,
who, after acquiring a large fortune in Demerara, was naturalized in
England