Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/662

 &?8 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER

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And about twenty feet diftant from the firft, to the S. S. W. is the third fource, its mouth being fomething more than two feet large, and it is five feet eight inches deep. Both thefe lafl fountains Hand in the middle of fmall altars, made, like the former, of firm fod, but neither of them above three feet diameter, and having a foot of lefs elevation than the firft. The altar in this third fource feemed almofl riiflblved by the water, which in both flood nearly up to the brim ; at the foot of each appeared a clear and brifk running rill ; thefe uniting joined the water in the trench of the firft altar, and then proceeded directly out, I fup- pofe, at the point of the triangle, pointing eaftward, in a quantity that would have filled a pipe of about two inches diameter.

The water from thefe fountains is very light and good, and perfectly taftelefs ; it was at this time mofl intenfely cold, though expofed to the mid-day fun without fhelter 4 there being no trees nor bufhes nearer it than the cliff of Ceefh on its fouth fide, and the trees that furround Saint Michael Geefh on the north, which, at\iording to the cuftom of Abyffinia, is, like other churches, planted in the midft of a grove.

On Monday the 5th of November, the day after my ar- rival at Geefh, the weather perfectly clear, cloudlefs, and nearly calm, in all refpects well adapted to obfervation, being extremely anxious to afcertain, beyond the power of controverfy, the precife fpot on the globe that this foun- tain had fo long occupied unknown, I pitched my tent on the north edge of the cliff, immediately above the prieft's houfe, having verified the inilrumcnt with all the care pof- 2 fible