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62 simple preface to their book, "that the public would prefer it in that state, however faulty in style, rather than a more elaborate narrative which might gain less in elegance than it would lose in accuracy and vividness of description;" and few readers will doubt the correctness of this advice.

Among the most interesting episodes of their travels were the discoveries which they made of traces of the unfortunate Mungo Park, the manner of whose end was still uncertain. The information which they obtained placed beyond doubt the fact that Park and his companions had perished at Boussa, while attempting to escape in their canoe from an attack of the natives. A tobe or cloak which appeared to have belonged to Park, was seen by them in possession of the king of that country. To rescue Park's journals which must have contained so much which would be of interest to geographical students was their chief object, and in this they seemed at one moment about to be successful. One day the king came to see them followed by a man with a book under his arm, which was said to have been picked up in the Niger after the loss of Park's canoe. It was enveloped in a large cotton cloth, and the travellers' hearts beat high with expectation as the man was slowly unfolding it, for by its size they guessed it to be Park's journal; but to their great disappointment it turned out, on opening it, to be merely an old nautical publication of the last century, with a title page missing, and containing only tables of logarithms. The relic, however, was interesting, for between its leaves they found a few loose notes of very little consequence, but sufficient to prove that these really were relics of their