of the colonial possessions cannot be compared with the actual surrey by Mr. Barlow. To the north of the Green river the map of the French author seems imaginary, as he is a stranger to the Damaras, though he insert the Copper Mountains.*

His Orange River flows from north-east to south-west, the reverse of the truth: and beyond the Great Nemakas he places a stream called the River of Fish, with the tribes of Kabobikas and Housouanas under the Tropic. The camelopardalis he found in latitude 27°, he rhinoceros in 25. Perhaps there may be jealousy on one side, as well as exaggeration on the other.

The Nemakas are mentioned by Dapper and Ogilby who add the Hous akas, certainly the Housouanas of Vailant; but as some modern philosophers never read, they of course make many discoveries. The same learned author. First journey, ii. 145, quotes Pliny and Herodotus, for some account of the Hottentots! There is no danger from learning; but that from reasoning ignorance is very great. The ancient philosophers were men of learning; the modern too often men of consummate ignorance; and we all know and feel the evil effects of the ignorance of Rousseau, to instance a solitary example.

THE EASTERN COAST.

NATAL.—DELAGOA.—MOCARANGA.—M6ZAMBIC, ScC—ADEL.

ON leaving the colonial possessions, in this direction, first appear the Kaffers, or properly Koussis, and the Tambookies, beyond whom there is deep obscurity. What is called the coast of Natal is followed by the bay of Delagoa. Further to the north, and opposite to the large isle of Madagascar, are Sabia, Sofala, and Mocaranga, regions better known from Portuguese narratives. The coasts of Mozambico and Zanguebar, on the last of which is the city of Melinda visited by Vasco de Gama, are succeeded by the desert and obscure coasts of Ajan and Adel; the last bordering on Abyssinia, and completing the circuit of Africa.

Delagoa. Of the bay of Delagoa, and the adjacent country, an account has recently been given; and it is frequently visited by vessels employed in the southern whale fishery. One of the chief rivers which enters the bay is the Mafumo: and the natives on the northern and southern banks follow distinct customs, the men on the former wearing singular helmets of straw. On the southern side are fourteen chiefs, subject to a king called Capelleh, whose dominions extend about 200 miles inland, and about 100 on the sea shore, computed by the natives in days' journies of twenty miles each. Cattle and poultry are abundant, and may be purchased for a trifle; the favourite articles being blue linens, old cloths, brass rings, copper wire, large glass beads, tobacco, pipes, &c. The fish are numerous and excellent; and turtle is taken on Deer Island. The soil a rich black mould, sown with rice or maize in December or January; the dry season lasting from April till October. There are many fruit trees and useful plants, particularly the sugar cane; but no horses, asses, nor buffaloes. The wild animals are the tyger, rhinoceros, antelope, hare, rabbit, wild hog, with Guinea hens, partridges, quails, wild geese, ducks, and some small singing birds. The natives are Kaffers, that is pagans, of a bright black colour, tall and stout, go nearly naked, and are tatooed. They are a good humoured and harmless people, and fond of excursions on the river, there being what is called a king of the water, only yielding in power to Capelleh. Like the rest of Africa, the country is not populous; and Mr. White supposes that the inhabitants around this large bay may be from six to ten thousand.

* White's Journal of a Voyage from Madras, &c. 1800, 4tc. '

VOL. II.

MOCARANGA. The most civilized and powerful kingdom seems to be that of Mocaranga, absurdly called Monomotapa,* which has been styled an extensive empire, while the whole of Africa would not form an empire, equal to the Russian, and would certainly be found inferior ih population. The soil of this country as said to be fertile, though the plains be exposed to great heat; while the mountains called Lupata, or the Spine of the World, form a great chain stretching from n<*th to south covered with perpetual snow. The people are almost naked: and, like those of the western coast, superstitiously afraid of magical charms. According to the doubtful accounts of this country, the king, on days of ceremony, wears a little spade hanging by his side, as an emblem of cultivation. The children of the great are retained at court as hostages: and the king sends annually an officer to the provinces, when the people testify their fidelity by extinguishing their fires, and kindling others from the officer's torch. There are several queens, one of whom was protectress of the Portuguese, and another of the Moors. The emperor's guard is said to consist of women lightly armed. The Portuguese have here two fortresses, and another station near the mountains of Fura, which

This is the appellation of the monarchs, not of the kingdom. The Cuama or Zambezi, a large river, encircles the kingdom on the west and north, the larger or western part is styled Mocaranga, the eastern Botonga. See D'Anville's map of Africa, 1749. Sofala and Sabia arc considered as parts of this monarchy. The king's residence was at Zimbao, about 240 miles inland. The accounts of Mocaranga are very imperfect when compared even with those of Congo, being derived from the general Portuguese historians, Barros and Faria, with Marmol, Linschoten and Osorio. Vincent Le Blanc is not a credible traveller, but his story of Alfondi is well told. See Modern Universal Historv, vol. xv. edit. 1760. The remarkable history of Zinga, queen of Angola, is from Cavazzi.

M. le Grand, in his dissertations annexed to Lobo's voyage to Abyssinia, has extracted an account of Mocaranga, &c. from the Ethiopia Oriental of John dos Santos, a Dominican, printed at Evora, 1609. The great river Zambezi is said by the natives to rise in a vast lake, and to receive its name from a village not far from its source. It is very rapid, and in some places a league in breadth at thirty leagues distance from the sea it divides into two brandies called Luabo (the Suabo is a river which falls into the Zambezi), and the Guilimane, or river cf Welcome Tokens, because Vasco de Gama there erected a stone pillar. The Delta consists cf five mouths; but the Luabo is the chief stream, and is navigated as fur as the kingdom of Sicambc, above Teté, where there is a cataract of stupendous he.ght; and rocky rapids fur twenty leagues to the kingdom cf Ghicoua, and the silver mines. The Zambezi inundates the country like the Nile: but in the month of April. From Massapa in Mocaranga, which is the chief kingdom of the Monomotaps or Emperor, great quantities of gold are brought, being found in the neighbourhood of the vast mountain Fura or Afura; where it is said, that there are ruins of edifices built with stone and lime, while even the modern palaces are only constructed of wood and clay, covered with briars. Fura is 200 leagues from the sea. The forest of Thcbc, on a river of the same name, affords trees of wonderful beaut) and magnitude. Amber is said to abound on the coast (ambergis !) and there is a fishery for pearls near the islands of Bocicas. Dos Santos argues that this was the Ophir of the ancients. As to Tarsbish, the word in Scripture sometimes merely implies the ocean, Atlantic or Indian; bat in other passages seems as clearly to denote Tartetsus near Cadiz in Spain.

are said to abound in gold. It is to be regretted, that they do not publish accounts of their African settlements, which would be extremely interesting in the obscure geography of that continent; but they are of all nations the most illiterate, and the most determined enemies of their own celebrity.

The Moors or Arabs are established in considerable numbers on the coasts of Ajan and Zanguebar, and seem to have invented the term of Kafraria, for in the Arabic Kufre signifies an unbeliever; whence the appellation, as being wholly vague and uncertain, should be dismissed from geography.*

Mozambic. The kingdom of Mozambic or Mozambico is considered as subject to the Portuguese, who had a considerable town of the same name, situated in an isle, the governor being dependent on the viceroy of Goat Zanguebar is said to be a marshy and unhealthy country, but abundant in elephants: it is chiefly inhabited by the Mocuas, partly pagans partly mahometans. The little kingdom of Qujloa is also dependent on the Portuguese, with that of Mombaza, from which they were expelled in 1631, but regained their possessions in 1729. Melinda, a mahometan state, is also partly dependent on the Portuguese, who have a fortress in the city, and several churches. The coast of Ajan is chiefly Mahometan; and carries on a considerable trade in ivory, ambergris, and gold. Brava, a little aristocracy, pays tribute to the Portuguese, who have not been able to encroach on Magadasho, or on the kingdom of Adel, which last was dependent on Abyssinia, and is said to be a fertile country. This state was founded by a mahometan prince, at the beginning of the sixteenth century; the capital being Azagurel, standing on an eminence near the river Hawash, which comes from Abyssinia; and Zeila, on the Arabian gulf, is a considerable port.

It is probable there may be recent Arabian descriptions of Africa, which ought to be sedulously inquired after, as the Moors are intimately acquainted with the greater part of that continent. The Kaffers, so called in the south, ought to be distinguished by their native name Koussi, Barlow, 219; and they cannot even pronounce the word Kaffar.

Dapper says that this town was even supplied with rice, wheat, and other provisions from Goa.

THIS noble island is about 840 geographical miles in length, by about 220 of medial breadth, being esteemed one of the largest in the world, though seemingly exceeded by Papua, and still more by New Holland, if the latter must be classed among islands. It seems to have been unknown to the ancients, for Ptolemy's geography of eastern Africa appears to terminate with the isle of Pemba, probably his Menuthias, he being a stranger to the islands of Zanzibar and Monfia, with the islands of Comoro. His Cape Prasum is probably some head-land, a litttle further to the south, discovered at a distance by some ship navigating these seas. However this be, the first certain mention of Madagascar is by Marco Polo, in the thirteenth century, who describes it by its present name, having received his knowledge from the Arabs.* Among other singularities, he mentions that large bird which is called rue by the Arabs, and by the moderns the condor. It would seem that the Mahometan religion had made some progress: but the discoveries of the Arabs in Asia and Africa form an important object in geography, which deserves to be investigated by some writer eminently versed in oriental lore.

This island appears to have escaped the notice of Gama, who coasted along the African shore; and is said to have been discovered in 1506, by Lorenzo Almida, whence perhaps it is called the isle of St. Lawrence. The French navigators in the reign of Henry IV, called it Isle Dauphin; and the latter ingenious people having repeatedly settled here, it becomes perspicuous from the accounts of their writers, while the Portuguese settlements remain in comparative darkness. Rochonf informs us that this island may contain about two hundred millions of acres of excellent land, watered by rivers and rivulets, from a long chain of mountains passing in the direction of the island, and separating the eastern from the western coast, but approaching nearer to the former. The two highest mountains are Vigagora in the north and Botistmeni in the south. The scenery is strikingly grand and picturesque, diversified with precipices, cataracts, and immense forests.

Lib. iii. cap. 39.

† Voyage to Madagascar, 1792, 8vo.