Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/281

Rh niacon, who was suspected to be friendly to the Ashantees, he compelled that prince to place his troops under the British command.

On the fall of Sir Charles McCarthy, which took place in 1824, lieutenant-colonel Chisholm, on whom the command of the Gold coast devolved, sent the subject of our memoir to England, to acquaint government more fully than could otherwise be done, of the state of the country, and the circumstances of the war. He arrived in England in August, and immediately afterwards obtained a leave of absence to visit Scotland for the recovery of his health, which had been seriously affected by so many months of constant and extreme exposure in Africa. In Scotland, however, he did not continue long. In October he returned to London, and an opportunity having unexpectedly presented itself to him, of proceeding under lord Bathurst's auspices, in the discovery of the course and termination of the Niger, an opportunity which he had long and anxiously desired, he gladly embraced it. It being arranged, that he should accompany the caravan from Tripoli to Timbuctoo, in the ensuing summer, it became necessary that he should depart early in the year from that father land, which, alas! he was destined never to revisit.

Our traveller, now promoted to a majority, left London for Tripoli, in the month of February, 1825. While in the latter city he had occasion to have frequent intercourse with the British consul, Mr Warrington; a close intimacy was formed between them, and the bond was strengthened by the major's marrying Emma Maria, the daughter of the consul. This event was celebrated on the 14th of July, 1825; and two days after the marriage the major proceeded on his pilgrimage to Timbuctoo.

He left Tripoli in company with the sheik Babani, whom he afterwards discovered to be no less a personage than the governor of Ghadamis. The sheik engaged to conduct him to Timbuctoo in ten weeks; the wife and the family of Babani resided there. The travellers proceeded with their kqffila by the route of Beneoleed, the passage by the Gharan mountains being rendered unsafe, in consequence of the turbulence of a rebellious chief in that district. On the 21st of August the party reached Shate, and on the 13th of September, after a tedious and circuitous journey of nearly a thousand miles, they arrived at Ghadamis. Already had the major experienced much to vex and annoy him; his barometer had been broken; his hygrometers had been rendered useless by evaporation; the tubes of most of his thermometers had been snapt by the warping of the ivory; his glasses had been dimmed by the friction of the sand; his chronometer had stopped (in all likelihood from the insinuation of sandy particles); and in addition to this lengthened list of mishaps, his rifle stock had been broken by the tread of an elephant.

Our traveller left Ghadamis, where he was treated with the utmost kindness and hospitality, on the 27th of October; and on the 3rd of December he arrived at Ensala, a town on the eastern frontier of the province of Tuat, belonging to the Tuaric, and said to be thirty-five days' journey from Timbuctoo. Here as in Ghadamis, he experienced the kindest reception, and he did all he could to repay it, by administering of his medicines to the diseased.

From Ensala he wrote the last letter to his relations in Scotland, which they ever received from him. As it is a document of great interest, and, in some passages, highly characteristic of the writer, we shall present a considerable extract:

"Ensala in Tuat, December 8, 1825.

"I arrived here in the afternoon of the 2nd instant; and the curiosity which my appearance among these people has excited, is not yet nearly allayed, insomuch that I am beset duriiig