Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 1.djvu/624

500 but recollect, that when it was known in England that I had presented this book to the library of the King of France, without staying a few days, to give me time to reach London, when our learned countrymen might have had an opportunity of perusing at leisure another copy of this book, Doctor Woide set out for Paris, with letters from the Secretary of State to Lord Stormont, Ambassador at that court, desiring him to assist the doctor in procuring access to my present, by permission from his Most Christian Majesty. This he accordingly obtained, and a translation of the work was brought over; but, I know not why, it has no where appeared. I fancy Dr Woide was not much more pleased with the conduct of the giants than I was.

conclude with one particular, which is a curious one: The Synaxar (what the Catholics call their Flos Sanctorum, or the lives and miracles of their saints), giving the history of the Abyssinian conversion to Christianity in the year 333, says, that when Frumentius and Œdesius were introduced to the king, who was a minor, they found him reading the Psalms of David.

book, or that of Enoch, does by no means prove that they were at that time Jews. For these two were in as great authority among the Pagans, who professed Sabaism, the first religion of the East, and especially of the Shepherds, as among the Jews. These being continued also in the same letter and character among the Abyssinians from the beginning, convinces me that there has not been any other writing in this country, or the south of Arabia, since that which rose from the Hieroglyphics.

Rh