To James Grey Jackson, Esq
Edinburgh, May 3. 1818.
Sir,
I have lately been favoured with two communications from you:—the one a letter to Mr. Napier, editor of the Encyclopædia Britannica, on the subject of the article Africa, of which I was the author, and which Mr. Napier, therefore, put into my hands; the other, a letter direct to myself, on the subject of my edition of “Leyden’s Discoveries in Africa.” I fully intended to have answered them before now, but the pressure of other business, with the wish to bestow upon them the leisurely consideration which they merited, has hitherto prevented me. I feel much gratified by the favourable opinion which you express of what I have done on this subject, and much obliged to you for your communications, and offers of further information. I experienced very much the disadvantage arising from a want of knowledge of the languages of North Africa, with which you appear to have a very extensive acquaintance. Indeed, several of the etymologies which you have given, are very interesting. I was particularly pleased to receive that of the term Ba Sea Feena, though I cannot conceal that it tends to strengthen the doubts which I have entertained of its applying to the sea on the Gold Coast. The distance, the direction southwards, the Christians, the motion one way and another, and even the ships, are all circumstances which would agree. There are arguments, however, against it; and it is certain that Park did not so understand it. Do you think there is any chance that the Bahr Soudan could be the Gulf of Guinea?
If you are acquainted with any circumstances which could tend to confirm or refute the narrative of Sidi Hamet, as given by Riley, or throw light upon Riley’s general credibility; or if you have ever heard any report of such a city as Wassanah, I should feel particularly obliged to you for communicating such information: and whenever I find myself at a loss, I shall gladly avail myself of the liberality with which you show yourself disposed to impart the knowledge of which you have become possessed.
I shall communicate this letter to Mr. Napier; and it is but fair to mention, that, from the circumstances already stated, I am solely responsible for the too long delay which has taken place in answering your letter to him, as well as that to myself.
Hugh Murray.
On the Niger and the Nile.
London, 7th April, 1820.
In the 25th number of the Quarterly Review, (article Park’s Travels,) the hypothesis there laid down as almost indisputable, is the non-continuity of the two Niles of Africa, or (according to the European phraseology of the day) of the Niger and the Nile.
This hypothesis founded on the opinion of Major Rennel, carries with it no evidence whatever, but the speculative theory of that learned geographer. The identity or connection of the two Niles, and the consequent water communication between 312 Cairo and Timbuctoo receives (supposing the Quarterly Review to be correct), as our intelligence respecting Africa increases, additional confirmation: and even the Quarterly Reviewer, who denominated the opinion recorded by me, the gossipping stories of Negroes, (vide Quarterly Review, No. 25, p. 140.) now favours this opinion!
The Quarterly Reviewer appreciates Burckhardt’s information on this subject, and depreciates mine, although both are derived from the same sources of 313 intelligence, and confirm one another: the reviewer says, Mr. Burckhardt has revived a question of older date; viz. “that the Niger of Sudan and the Nile of Egypt are one and the same river: this general testimony to a physical fact can be shaken only by direct proof to the contrary.”
This is all very well: I do not object to the Quarterly Reviewer giving up an opinion which he finds no longer tenable; but when I see in the same review (No. 44, p. 481.) the following words,—“we give no credit whatever to the report received by Mr. Jackson, of a person (several Negroes 314, it should be) having performed a voyage by water from Timbuctoo to Cairo,” I cannot but observe with astonishment, that the Reviewer believes Burckhardt’s report, that they are the same river, when, at the same time he does not believe mine.
Is there not an inconsistency here, somewhat incompatible with the impartiality which ought to regulate the works of criticism? I will not for a moment suppose it to have proceeded from a spirit of animosity, which I feel myself unconscious of deserving. But the reviewer further says, the objection to the identity of the Niger and the Nile, is grounded on the incongruity of their periodical inundations, or on the rise and fall of the former river not corresponding with that of the latter. I do not comprehend whence the Quarterly Reviewer has derived this information; I have always understood the direct contrary, which I have declared in the enlarged editions of my account of Marocco, page 304, which has been confirmed by a most intelligent African traveller, Ali Bey, (for which see his travels, page 220.)
I may be allowed to observe, that although the Quarterly Reviewer has changed his opinion on this matter, I have invariably maintained mine, founded as it is on the concurrent testimony of the best informed and most intelligent native African travellers, and I still assert, on the same foundation, the identity of the two Niles, and their continuity of waters.
I have further to remark what will most probably ere long prove correct; viz. that the Bahar Abiad 315, that is to say, the river that passes through the country of Negroes, between Senaar and Donga, is an erroneous appellation, originating in the general ignorance among European travellers of the African Arabic, and that the proper name of this river is Bahar Abeed, which is another term for the river called the Nile-el-Abeed, which passes south of Timbuctoo towards the east (called by Europeans the Niger).
It therefore appears to me, and I really think it must appear to every unbiassed investigator of African geography, that every iota of African discovery, made successively, by Hornemann 316, Burckhardt, and others, tends to confirm my water communication between Timbuctoo and Cairo, and the theorists and speculators in African geography, who have heaped hypothesis upon hypothesis, error upon error, who have raised splendid fabrics upon pillars of ice, will ere long close their book, and be compelled, by the force of truth and experience, to admit the fact stated about twelve years ago by me in my account of Marocco, &c. viz. that the Nile of Sudan and the Nile of Egypt are identified by a continuity of waters, and that a water communication is provided by these two great rivers from Timbuctoo to Cairo; and moreover, that the general African opinion, that the Neel-el-Abeed (Niger) discharges itself into the (Bahar el Mâleh) Salt Sea, signifies neither more nor less than that it discharges itself at the Delta in Egypt, into the Mediterranean Sea!
James Grey Jackson.
Notes
312 Vide Jackson’s enlarged Account of Marocco, p. 310.
313 i.e. Intelligence from natives of Africa.
314 Vide Jackson’s enlarged Account of Marocco, p. 312.
315 Bahar Abiad signifies White River; Bahar Abeed signifies River of Negroes.
316 Vide my letter in Monthly Magazine on this subject for March, 1817, p. 124.