letffed, the Author deems it of sufficient importance to make known to the
public the extent to which discoveries have already been pushed into the
southern part o f the continent of Africa ; and from the intelligence which
conta'ne^ respecting the civilized Barroloos, he cannot suppress
a hopRthat the African Association will be induced to prosecute their dis-
pOverkjpin Southern as well as Northern Africa, especially as the pos-
sessidji o f the Cape holds out such great facilities for the undertaking.
Here t^pre are no inhuman and unrelenting Moors to oppose and harass
the p ro gre^ of the traveller; he can here proceed without molestation
over wide tnfkless plains as secure as they are solitary, and pass with equal
security through a succession of mild and harmless inhabitants. And
though Southerrr'A-frica boasts not of a Niger, it has its Gariep or Grange
River, whose majft|ude and known length of course are sufficiently remarkable
to make source of the one an object of interest as well as
the vent of the other. - But, what is of much greater importance to humanity,
the traveller will here la v e the satisfaction to find that, in the
interior and central p a ij of the southern continent, a state of slavery is
not the, predestined an^inevitable lot of the native African. He may here
likewise promise to hfnself a constant succession of new objects, in every
branch of natural history. It was a common observation among the
Romans, which t l% borrowed from the Greeks, that “ Africa always
“ affords something new the justness of which, as the late journey suffi-
ciently proves, h o i* good in our own times. In fact, the geography, the natural
productions, tend the various tribes of natives inhabiting the interior
parts of this great Antincnt may yet be considered as unknown ; and consequently
a wide fidl,d is here presented-for the researches of the inquisitive
and philosophical traveller. Little was it suspected that at no greater
distance from the south’erp angle of Africa (which has now been colonized
near two hundred years) than, seven hundred miles, and not more than
three hundred miles from the skirts of the Cape settlement, a tribe of
natives should for the first time have been discovered (for nothing was
known of them but from vague report) within the last five years:_a
people living together in large societies in peace, security, and happiness;
whose chief place of residence formed a town, embracing a population »of
nearly fifteen thousand souls! Still less did our travellers expect to sea r
of other societies dwelling in towns many times the extent of that which
they saw with their own eyes, at the distance only of a few days’ jbWrney
beyond the spot to which they themselves had proceeded. Thes<| facts
being now established, the Author cannot forbear repeating how strqngly
he entertains a hope that the African Association will feel an im^stible
impulse to open an intercourse with the Barroloos, and not JJ&se the favourable
opportunity which now presents itself of extending oqr knowledge
of Southern Africa.
The Author deems it unnecessary to say any thin|#especting the Engravings
which illustrate and embellish his book. works of art they
speak for themselves ; and he has only to o b s e r v e , t h e y are faithful
representations of those objects which they profess to describe.