Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/654

 630 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER

noufs, called Takaki. Some of thefe miferable wretches, were brought to the count, and a treaty made, that all thefe men of the two villages were to am It him in his re- em- barkation, after he had got his barge round the cataract ; and among thefe barbarians he would have loll his life.

The count, befides his wife, had brought with him his lieutenant, Mr Norden, a Dane, who Was to ferve him as draughtfman; but neither the count, countefs, nor lieuten- ant underilood one word of the languages. There are always (happily for travellers) wife and honeft men among the French and Venetian merchants at Cairo, who, feeing the obftinacy of the count, perfuaded him that it was more mi- litary, and more in the ftilc of an admiral, to detach Nor- den, his inferior officer, to reconnoitre Ibrim, Deir, arid the cataract of Jan Adel, as alfo to renew his treaty with the Kennoufs at Succoot and Afel Dimmo.

Norden accordingly failed in the common embarkations ufed upon the Nile ; the voyage is in every body's hands. It has certainly a conliderable deal of merit, but is full of fquabbles and lightings with boat-men and porters, which might as well have been left out, as they lead to no inftruc- tion, but ferve only to difcourage travellers, for they were chiefly owing to ignorance of language. It was with the utmolt difficulty, and after many difailers, that Norden ar- rived at Syene, and the lirfl cataract ; after which greater and greater were encountered before he reached Ibrim, where the Kafcheff put him in prifon, robbed him of what he had in the boat, and Scarcely fullered him to return to Cairo without cutting his throat, which, for a confiderable time, he and his foldiers had determined to do.

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