Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/644

 62© TRAVELS TO DISCOVER

about, a ftone-caft weft from the firft: the inhabitants fay- that this whole mountain is full of water, and add, that the whole plain about the fountain is floating and un- fteady, a certain mark that there is water concealed un- der it ; for which reafon, the water does not overflow at the fountain, but forces itfelf with great violence out at the foot of the mountain. The inhabitants, together with the emperor, who was then prefent with his army, maintain that that year it trembled little on account of the drought, but other years, that it trembled and overflowed fo as that it could fcarce be approached without danger. The breadth of the circumference may be about the call of a fling: be- low the top of this mountain the people live about a league diitant from the fountain to the weft ; and this place is call- ed Geefh, and the fountain feems to be a cannon-fhot di- ftant from Geefh ; moreover, the field where the fountain is, is upon all fides difficult of accefs, except on the north fide, where it may be afcended with eafe,"

I shall make only a few obfervations upon this defcrip- tion, fufficient to fliew that it cannot be that of Paez, or any man who had ever been in Abyflinia : there is no fuch place known as Sabala ; he mould have called itSacala: in the E- thiopic language Sacala means the higheft ridge of land, where the water falls down equally on both fides, from eaft and weft, or from north and fouth. So the fharp roofs of our houfes, or tops of our tents, in that manner are called Sacala, becaufe the water runs down equally on oppofite fides ; fo does it in the higheft lands in every country, and fo here in Sacala, where the Nile runs to the north, but feveral ftreams, which form the rivers Lac and 1 emfi, fall down the cliff, or precipice, and proceed fouthward in

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