Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/679

 THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 65$

tinder thefe, or fuch-like appellations, they pray to the Nile, or fpirit refiding in that river. The next name it receives " is when defcended into Gojam, where it is called Abay. Foreigners, of all denominations, not acquainted with the language of the country, have, from hearing it was ftiled Ab, Father, by the Agows, or Abai, imagined its name Abawi, a cafe of that noun, which, in their ignorance, they have made to fignify, the Father,.

Ludolf, the only one in the age he lived that had any real knowledge of either the Geez or Amharic, was the firft' to perceive this : he found in neither of thefe languages A- bawi could be a nominative, and confequently could noE be applied to any thing ; and next he as truly found it could not be of the Angular number, and, if fo, could not fignify one river. He flopped, however, as it were, in the very brink of difcovery, for he knew there was no writing or letters in Amharic, which were therefore neceflarily borrowed from the old and written language Geez, fo that all that could be done was, firft, attentively to hear the pro- nunciation of the word in Amharic, and then to write it in Geez characters as nearly conformable to the found as pof- fible. Now, the name of the river in Amharic is Abay, pro- nouncing the y open, or like two (i), and the fenfe of that word fo wrote in Geez, as well as Amharic, is, " the river M that fuddenly fwells, or overflows, periodically with rain ;' 1 than which a more appoiite name could never have been invented.

By the Gongas, on the fouth of the mountains Dyre and. Tegla, who are indigent, the river is called Dahli, and, on the north of thefe mountains, where the great cataracts are by