Page:First Footsteps in East Africa, 1894 - Volume 1.djvu/29

Rh letter bearing date the 28th April, 1854, was forwarded from Bombay with a warm recommendation. Lieut. Herne of the 1st Bombay European Regiment of Fusileers, an officer skilful in surveying, photography, and mechanics, together with the writer, obtained leave, pending the reference, and a free passage to Aden in Arabia. On the 23rd August a favourable reply was despatched by the Court of Directors.

Meanwhile the most painful of events had modified the original plan. The third member of the Expedition, Assistant Surgeon J. Ellerton Stocks, whose brilliant attainments as a botanist, whose long and enterprising journeys, and whose eminently practical bent of mind had twice recommended him for the honours and trials of African exploration, died suddenly of apoplexy in the prime of life. Deeply did his friends lament him for many reasons: a universal favourite, he left in the social circle a void never to be filled up, and they mourned the more that Fate had not granted him the time, as it had given him the will and the power, to trace a deeper and more enduring mark upon the iron tablets of Fame.

No longer hoping to carry out his first project, the writer determined to make the geography and commerce of the Somali country his principal objects. He therefore applied to the Bombay Government for the assistance of Lieut. William Stroyan, I. N., an officer distinguished by his surveys on the coast of Western India, in Sind, and on the Panjab Rivers. It was not without difficulty that such valuable services were spared for the deadly purpose of penetrating into Eastern Africa. All obstacles, however, were removed by their ceaseless and energetic efforts, who had fostered the author's plans, and early in the autumn of 1854, Lieut. Stroyan received leave to join the Expedition. At the same time, Lieut. J. H. Speke, of the 46th Regiment Bengal N. I., who had spent many years collecting the Fauna of Thibet and