a large diagram, comprising a section of Eastern
Africa, extending from the equator to the fourteenth
degree of south latitude, and from Zanzibar sixteen
degrees inland, which had been constructed by two
reverend gentlemen, Messrs Erhardt and Eebmann,
missionaries of the Church Mission Society of London,
a short time previously, when carrying on their duties
at Zanzibar. In this section-map, swallowing up about
half of the whole area of the ground included in it, there
figured a lake of such portenous size and such unseemly
shape, representing a gigantic slug, or, perhaps, even
closer still, the ugly salamander, that everybody who
looked at it incredulously laughed and shook his head.
I t was, indeed, phenomenon enough in these days to
excite anybody’s curiosity! A single sheet of sweet
water, upwards of eight hundred miles long by three
hundred broad, quite equal in size to, if not larger
than, the great salt Caspian.
Now, to the honour of Admiral Sir George Back be
it said, a Fellow of the Eoyal Geographical Society,
and an old explorer himself in the Arctic regions, that
he had determined in his mind that this great mystery
should be solved, and that an insight should be gained
into those interesting regions, concerning which conjectures
and speculations had been rife, and which had
caused so many hot debates for so many ages past
amongst all the first geographers of the day; debates
which, hitherto, nobody hadbeenfound energetic enough
to set at rest by actual inspection of the country.
Casting about for a man fitted to carry out his
plans, the Admiral hit upon Captain Burton, who had
recently returned from Constantinople, where he had
been engaged with the Bashi-Bazuks; and it was thus,
through Sir George’s influence in the Eoyal Geographical
Society, that Captain Burton had now been
appointed to the command of this expedition.
A difference now arose about the Government
¿62000 in aid of the expedition. The Foreign Office
had paid their ¿61000, but the India House thought
Captain Burton’s pay ought to be considered their
share. Finding this was the case I objected to go, as
I did not wish, for one reason, to put myself under
any money obligations to Captain Burton; and, for another
reason, I thought I had paid enough for a public
cause in the Somali country, without having gained
any advantage to myself. Captain Burton, however,
knew nothing of astronomical surveying, of physical
geography, or of collecting specimens of natural history,
so he pressed me again to go with him, and even
induced the President of the Eoyal Geographical Society
to say there need be no fear of money if we only
succeeded. I then consented to go, determining in
my own mind, somehow or other, to have my old
plans, formed in India, of completing my museum,
carried into effect, even if, after all, the funds of the
expedition did not suffice. Captain Burton now gave
me a cheque for my passage out of the public funds ;*
but my incorporation with the expedition was not
quite so easy as had been expected ; for the Government
in India at this time were using every endeav-
* The cheque, I found, after my arrival in England, was not credited
in my account, so I had, after all, to pay my own passage.