appointment, from the strongest testimonials in his favour which I had received from Professor Jameson, whose acquirements in natural history stand so deservedly high in public estimation, as to entitle any recommendation from him to immediate attention. Unfortunately, however, for this branch o f science, Doctor Oudney, at a very early stage o f their journey, caught a severe cold, which fell on his lungs, and which rendered him, on their arrival in Bornou, nearly incapable o f any exertion. It will be seen from Major Denham’s Narrative, how frequently and how seriously, not to say alarmingly, ill, he became from the first moment o f their arrival in Bornou. In a letter addressed to Mr. Wilmot Horton, o f the date o f the 12th September, 1823, Doctor Oudney says, “ I send you a simple itinerary from Fezzan h ere; that to the river Shary, and the borders o f Soudan, and my remarks on Bornou, I must leave till another time. I cannot write lon g ; one day's labour in that way makes me ill for a week.'’ No account o f these journeys to the river Shary, and the borders o f Soudan, appear among his papers; nor any materials respecting them, beyond what are contained in a very general account o f the proceedings o f the Mission, in an official letter addressed to the Secretary o f State. The papers, delivered to me by Captain Clapperton, consisted of on account of an excursion, jointly performed by these gentlemen, from Mourzuk to Ghraat, the first town in the Tuarick country:—some remarks on the journey across the Great Desert, which appear not to have been written out fa ir :—and the rest, o f mere scraps of vocabularies, rude sketches o f the human face, detached and incomplete registers of the state o f the temperature, and a number o f letters to and from the Consul at Tripoli, respecting the pecuniary and other affairs o f the mission, wholly uninteresting, and of which no use whatever could be made. The Journey to Ghraat above mentioned, I have caused to be printed at the end of the introductory Chapter, with which it appears to be partly connected, omitting some trifling details, o f no interest whatever ; and I requested Major Denham to add a few foot-notes, chiefly geological, to his own Journal across the Great Desert. It seems to have been well known to the party that Doctor Oudney could not possibly survive the journey into Soudan ; and, indeed, he was well aware o f it himself j but his zeal to accomplish all that could be done, would not suffer him to remain behind. I t was that zeal which led him to undertake the journey to Ghraat, which not a little increased his disorder; for, to say the truth, he evidently was labouring, while in England, under a pectoral complaint; but when I told him so, and strongly advised him not to think o f proceeding (as I had before done to his unfortunate predecessor Ritchie), he, like the latter, persisted that, being a medical man, he best knew his oWn constitution, and that a warm climate would best agree with it. Neither o f them, however, seem to have calculated on the degree o f fatigue, and the sudden changes o f temperature, to which they were necessarily to be exposed. With every disadvantage of collecting, preserving, and bringing home from so great a distance, and over so dreary a desert o f twelve hundred miles, specimens o f natural history, it will be seen, by reference to the Appendix, that this department o f science has not been neglected. JOHN BARROW. mmm • ii. «.lil 1 oitt mmi J a < fl&fuMWK ii (tdwf ifaiA* .dt'trs JOURNAL A N E X C U R S I O N , SECTION I. FROM KOUKA TO MURMUR, WHERE D R, OUDNEY D IED . F r o m our first arrival in Bornou, we intended to avail ourselves of the earliest opportunity of exploring Soudan. Our preparations being at length completed, and the sheikh having consented to our departure, although with some degree of reluctance, Dr. Oudney, notwithstanding the infirm state of his health, and myself, were ready to set out on the 14th December, 1823. Accordingly we sent off our camels and servants in the morning, and went in person to take leave of the sheikh. On this occasion we found him in an inner apartment, attended by two or three servants only. He asked us, as he had often done before, if, in the course of our travels, we proposed going to Nyffee. We answered, yes, if the road was open. He replied, it was a great distance; and he feared we were not likely to return to b
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