James Bruce was born at Kinnaird, near Falkirk, in Stirlingshire, on
the 14th of December, 1730, and, in 1738, was placed under the care of
his uncle, a barrister in London, who sent him, in January, 1742, to
school, at Harrow. Here he so successfully prosecuted his studies,
that Dr. Cox, the head-master, said of him, in a letter to a friend,
‘When you write to Mr. Bruce’s father about his son, you cannot say
too much; for he is as promising a young man as ever I had under my
care; and, for his years, I never saw his fellow.’ From Harrow, he
went, for a few months, to a private academy, where he renewed his
classical studies, and acquired a knowledge of French, drawing,
arithmetic and geometry. In the November of 1747, he entered the
University of Edinburgh, with the intention of studying the law;
which, at his father’s desire, he had determined on adopting as his
profession. Disinclination, however, and ill-health, induced him, in
the spring of 1748, to relinquish for ever the sedentary labors of a
law student; and being threatened with consumption, he retired to
Scotland, where he remained till 1753. In the July of that year, he
went to London, with the intention of embarking for the East Indies,
where he purposed settling as a free trader, under the patronage of
the Company, to whom he had already prepared a petition. An
attachment, however, frustrated this design; and, in February, 1754,
he married a Miss Allan, daughter of a deceased wine-merchant; and,
for a short time, held a share in the business. This he relinquished
on the death of his wife, which happened in Paris, eight months after
her marriage; and such was the bigotry of the catholics towards
protestants, that he was compelled to inter her at midnight, and to
steal a grave in the burying ground assigned to the English embassy.
After this event, he again turned his attention to literature, and
acquired a knowledge of the Spanish and Portuguese tongues, as well as
the art of drawing; all of which studies he pursued with a view to
their utility in the future travels that he secretly contemplated. At
the commencement of the vintage season, in July, 1757, he embarked for
the continent; and, after landing at Corunna, traversed Spain and
Portugal, where he sojourned till the end of the year, devoting much
attention to the social and political state of those countries. At the
beginning of 1758, he passed over the Pyrenees to France; thence down
the Rhine into Germany and the Netherlands, whence he was recalled to
England, in July, by a letter announcing the death of his father.
Whilst at Brussels, having taken the part of a young stranger,
insulted in his presence, he was challenged to fight a duel, in which
he severely wounded his antagonist, and was obliged to fly the city.
The death of his father entitled him to an inheritance which afforded
him ample means of efficiently and uninterruptedly pursuing the
studies which were necessary to the success of his designs; and, by
the year 1761, he had collected most of the Dutch and Italian books on
the subject of oriental literature. He had also made great progress in
the Arabic and Ethiopic languages, to the study of which was owing his
determination to explore the sources of the Nile.
About this time, a rupture being anticipated between England and
Spain, he visited Mr. Wood, the under-secretary of state, whom he
requested to lay before the minister, Mr. Pitt, a plan he had
concerted, when abroad, of an expedition against the latter country,
by attacking Gallicia, in Ferrol. After much negotiation, his
suggestion was adopted by the ministry, but it was subsequently
abandoned, owing to the Portuguese ambassador having represented the
great danger that would result to his country from such an expedition.
Chagrined at the failure of his military project, he meditated
returning to Scotland, where the recent discovery of some valuable
mines on his estate would have enabled him to live with comfort and
independence, when he received a message from Lord Halifax, requesting
to see him before he left London. His lordship ridiculed the idea of
Bruce’s retirement; and, after hinting to him the encouragement which
the king would bestow on enterprise and discovery, suggested Africa to
him, as a fit region for the exercise of both; and, as a further
inducement to his visiting that country, offered him the situation of
consul-general at Algiers, with leave to appoint a vice-consul in his
absence. He promised him, in addition, the rewards stipulated in the
affair of Ferrol, and advancement to a higher diplomatic station, if
he made wide incursions into the former country.
He at length acceded to the proposal of Lord Halifax, and, in June,
1762, having previously been introduced to the king, set out for
Africa. He reached that country on the 20th of March, 1763; when such
was his knowledge of the Arabic, that he was able to fulfill his
consular duties without the aid of an interpreter. On his way thither,
he passed through the principal cities of Italy, where he made several
sketches of its temples and ruins; and, it appears from his
manuscripts, that he also intended writing a dissertation on the
ancient and modern state of Rome. Shortly after his arrival at
Algiers, a dispute occurred between him and the dey, concerning
Mediterranean passes, for carrying which in a form differing from that
originally prescribed, several British vessels were seized and
destroyed; of which, having first remonstrated with the dey, he
immediately wrote to inform government. The ministry, however, who had
been secretly prejudiced against him, by a party hostile to him at
Algiers, treated his communication very lightly; and, in May, 1765,
being recalled to England, he was compelled, either to abandon the
principal design of his residence in Barbary, or to make his intended
excursions as a private individual. After some consideration, he
adopted the latter alternative; and, on the 25th of August, sailed for
Tunis, stopping, on his way thither, at Utica and Carthage, the ruins
of which cities he stayed some time to examine, making drawings of the
most important parts, in which he was assisted by a young Bolognese
artist, whom he had brought with him from Italy. In one of his
incursions into the interior of the country, he discovered Cirta, the
capital of Syphax, whence he returned to Tunis, and started thence for
Tripoli, by way of Gabs and Gerba. On entering the desert which
borders the latter town, he was attacked by the Arabs, and compelled
to return to Tunis, where he remained till August, 1766, when he
crossed the desert in safety, and arrived at Tripoli. He next
proceeded, across the Gulf of Sydra, to Bengazi and Ptolometa, and
shortly afterwards, set sail for Crete, when a shipwreck drove him
again upon the African shore, with the loss of every thing but his
drawings and books, which he had fortunately despatched from Tripoli
to Smyrna. From Begazi, the place of his shipwreck, and where he was
cruelly treated, he escaped, by a French vessel, to Canea, where he
was detained by an intermittent fever, till the end of April, 1767,
when he proceeded, by way of Rhodes, to Sidon.
On the 16th of September he commenced his journey to Balbec, which he
reached on the 19th of the same month; and, having returned to
Tripoli, set out, in a few weeks, for Palmyra. After making several
drawings, which, as well as those of Balbec, he afterwards presented
to the king, he traveled along the coast to Latakia, Antioch, and
Aleppo, where he was attacked by a fever, from which he with great
difficulty recovered. About this time, meditating the discovery of the
source of the Nile, he left Aleppo for Alexandria, where he arrived on
the 20th of June, 1768. From hence he proceeded by land to Rosetta,
where he embarked on the Nile for Cairo. After impressing the bey of
the city with an idea of his skill in medicine and prophecy, he sailed
to Syene, visiting, in his way thither, the ruins of Thebes; and, on
the 19th of February, 1769, set out from Kenne, through the Thebaid
desert, to Cosseir, on the Red Sea; and from thence proceeded to Tor
and Jidda, where he landed on the 5th of May. After making several
excursions in Arabia Felix, he quitted Loheia, on the 3d of September,
for Masuah; where on his arrival, he was detained for some weeks, by
the treachery and avarice of the governor of that place, who attempted
to murder him, in consequence of his refusal to make him an enormous
present. In February, 1770, he entered Gondar, the capital of
Abyssinia, the ras of which city appointed him gentleman-usher of the
king’s bed-chamber, commander of the household cavalry, and governor
of a province.
On the 27th of October, after having taken an active part, in the
councils of the sovereign, and effected several cures of persons about
the court attacked with the small-pox, he left the capital, and set
out in search of the source of the Nile, which he discovered at
Saccala, on the 14th of the following November. The joy he felt on the
occasion is thus described by himself: ‘It is easier to guess than to
describe the situation of my mind at that moment; standing in that
spot which had baffled the genius, history, and inquiry of both
ancients and moderns, for the course of nearly three thousand years.
Kings had attempted this discovery at the head of armies, and each
expedition was distinguished from the last only by the difference of
the numbers which had perished, and agreed alone in the disappointment
which had uniformly, and without exception, followed them all. Fame,
riches, and honor, had been held out, for a series of ages, to every
individual of the myriads those princes commanded, without having
produced one man capable of gratifying the curiosity of his sovereign,
or wiping off the stain upon the enterprise and abilities of mankind,
or adding this desideratum for the encouragement of geography. Though
a mere private Briton, I triumphed here in my own mind over kings and
their armies; and every comparison was leading the nearer to
presumption, when the place itself where I stood, the object of my
vain glory, suggested what depressed my short-lived triumphs. I was
but a few minutes arrived at the source of the Nile, though numberless
dangers and sufferings, the least of which would have overwhelmed me,
but for the continual goodness and protection of Providence; I was,
however, then but half through my journey, and all those dangers which
I had already passed, awaited me again on my return. I found a
despondency gaining ground fast upon me, and blasting the crown of
laurels I had too rashly woven for myself.’
After returning to Gondar, our traveler found much difficulty in
obtaining permission to proceed on his way homewards; it being a rule
with the inhabitants never to allow a stranger to quit Abyssinia. A
civil war breaking out in the country about the period of his intended
departure, he was compelled to remain in it till the December of the
following year, and took part in one of their battles, in which his
valiant conduct was such that the king presented him with a rich suit
of apparel, and a gold chain of immense value. At length, at the end
of 1771, he set out from Gondar, and in the February of the following
year, arrived at Senaar, where he remained two months, suffering under
the most inhospitable treatment, and deceived in his supplies of money
which compelled him to sell the gold chain he had been presented with.
He then proceeded by Chiendi, and Gooz, through the Nubian desert, and
on the 29th of November, reached Assouan, on the Nile, after a most
dreadful and dangerous journey, in the course of which he lost all his
camels and baggage, and twice laid himself down in the expectation of
death. Having procured, however, fresh camels, he returned to the
desert and recovered most part of his baggage, with which, on the 10th
of January, he arrived at Cairo: where, ingratiating himself with the
bey, he obtained permission for English commanders to bring their
vessels and merchandise to Suez, as well as to Jidda, an advantage no
other European nation had before been able to acquire. In the
beginning of March he arrived at Alexandria, whence he sailed to
Marseilles; where he landed about the end of the month, suffering
under great agony from a disease called the Guinea worm, which totally
disabled him from walking, and had nearly proved fatal to him during
his voyage. Notwithstanding, however, the perils he underwent, and the
barbarities he witnessed in the course of his travels, and
particularly at Abyssinia, yet even that country he left with some
regret, and would often recall, with a feeling almost of tenderness,
the kindnesses he had received there, especially from the ras’s wife,
Ozoro Esther, between himself and whom a very affectionate intimacy
had existed.
After residing a few weeks in the south of France, he set out for
Paris, in company with Buffon, to whom he communicated much valuable
information which that celebrated naturalist has acknowledged in his
advertisement to the third volume of the History of Birds. His health
being still unconfirmed, he left the French capital in July, and made
a second tour into Italy where he resided till the spring of 1774,
when he again returned to France, and thence proceeded to England,
which he reached in June following, after an absence of twelve years.
Previously to leaving Scotland, he had contracted an engagement with a
lady, whom, during his travels, he never forgot; and he was so
incensed, on his arrival at Rome, on hearing that she had married an
Italian marquess, that he insisted on fighting with her husband, who,
however, declined the challenge. After remaining some months in
London, he returned to his mansion at Kinnaird, to regulate his
private affairs, which he found greatly disordered in consequence of
his relations having supposed him dead, and taken possession of great
part of his effects; to prevent a recurrence of which, he married the
daughter of Thomas Dundas, Esq., of Fingask, who, after bearing him
three children, died in the spring of 1785.
In 1790, the account of his travels, which had long been looked for
with anxiety, appeared in five quarto volumes, with plates, maps and
charts. The extraordinary events and discoveries which they contained,
occasioned many to doubt the truth and accuracy of Bruce; and some
went so far as to assert, that he had never even been in Abyssinia.
Recent travelers, however, and among them Mr. Salt, one of his most
hostile sceptics, have confirmed the greater part of his assertions
relative to that country, though many of them still remain doubtful
and unauthenticated. Such was the effect of the reports circulated
against his work, that, according to Dr. Clarke, a short time after
its publication, several copies were sold in Dublin for waste paper.
Being, however, translated into French, his book was widely circulated
on the continent; and he had made arrangements for printing an octavo
edition, when, on the 26th of April 1794, he fell down the stairs of
his mansion at Kinnaird, while in the act of handing a lady to dinner,
and expired the following morning.
The person of Mr. Bruce being nearly six feet four inches in height,
and of great muscular strength, was well suited to the enterprises he
undertook and the dangers he encountered. Though his hair was a dark
red, his countenance had a handsome cast; and though he possessed
great urbanity of manners, his mien was dignified, and almost haughty.
He paid particular attention to his dress, especially during his
travels, the fatigue and danger of which never prevented him from
appearing in the most elegant costume of the different countries he
visited. He was an excellent horseman and swimmer, and an unerring
marksman; and, for his skill in the latter capacity, was mistaken by
the barbarians, who were unaquainted with the use of fire-arms, for a
magician. In addition to his numerous literary accomplishments, he
acquired a considerable knowledge of physic and surgery, which he
practiced with great success in Africa and Abyssinia. He possessed a
mind prudent and vigorous, and a spirit untameable by danger or
disappointment, so that he was enabled finally to ensure the success
of his most ambitious projects. In Abyssinia he discovered a plant
very serviceable in cases of dysentery; and brought the seeds of it to
England, where it is known by the name of Brucea, having been so
called by Sir Joseph Banks, in honor of its finder. An island in the
Red Sea, on the coast of Abyssinia, also bears his name.
The doubt which prevailed respecting the truth of his narratives, was
in a great degree owing to the habit he had of telling his own
exploits, which he embellished with a coloring of romance calculated
to weaken the credulity of his hearers. His account of his travels
became the subject of much disputation; and Dr. Vincent, who defended
it, allowed that Bruce was in some instances mistaken, by aspiring to
knowledge and science which he had not sufficiently examined; though,
he adds, ‘his work throughout bears internal marks of veracity, in all
instances where he was not deceived himself; and his observations were
the best which a man, furnished with such instruments, and struggling
for his life, could obtain.’ He was often pompous and ostentatious,
especially in his character of consul. The Bey of Cairo, having, after
a long conversation, ordered him a purse of sequins, he declined
accepting any thing more than a single orange, saying to the Bey, who
requested to know his reason, ‘I am an Englishman, and the servant of
the greatest king in Europe: it is not the custom of my country to
receive pecuniary gratuities from foreign princes without the
approbation of our sovereign.’ In alluding to his pictures of Palmyra
and Balbec, which are in the king’s library at Kew, he used to speak
of them as ‘the most magnificent presents ever made in that line by a
subject to a sovereign.’ It has been said, however, that he received
for these drawings the sum of £2000. He was descended, on his mother’s
side, from Robert Bruce, King of Scotland, a circumstance he was
excessively proud of; and he once said to a friend, that ‘he was
entitled to give his servants royal livery.’ He occupied much of the
latter part of his life in the formation of a museum, in his own
house, which contained many rare and valuable curiosities.
He expressed an utter contempt for all kinds of suspicion with regard
to his veracity, which he could never be prevailed on to take any
pains to substantiate. When requested by his friends, to alter or
explain any thing, he would sternly repeat, ‘What I have written, I
have written!’ with which words he concluded the preface to his
travels. ‘Dining out, one day,’ says Major Head, ‘at the house of a
friend, a gentleman present observed, “that it was _impossible_ the
natives of Abyssinia could eat raw meat;” on which, Bruce without
saying a word, left the table, and shortly returned from the kitchen
with a piece of raw beef-steak, peppered and salted in the Abyssinian
fashion, and said to the gentleman, “Sir, you will eat that, or fight
me;” the person addressed chose to do the former, when Bruce calmly
observed, “Now sir, you will never again say it is _impossible_.”’
Major Head also relates the following anecdote: ‘Single-speech
Hamilton, who was Bruce’s first cousin, one evening said to him, “that
to convince the world of his power of drawing, he need only draw
something then in as good a style as those paintings which it had been
said were done for him by his Italian artist.” “Gerard!” replied
Bruce, very gravely, “you made _one_ fine speech, and the world
doubted its being your own composition; but, if you will stand up now
here, and make another speech as good, we shall believe it to have
been your own.”’
[Illustration: RAIL ROAD RRIDGE.]
[Illustration: VIEW ON ELK CREEK.]
He used to teach his daughter, who was scarcely twelve years old, the
proper mode of pronouncing the Abyssinian words, ‘that he might
leave,’ as he said, ‘some one behind him who could pronounce them
correctly. He repeatedly said to her, with feelings highly excited, ‘I
shall not live, my child, but _you_ probably will, to see the truth of
all I have written thoroughly confirmed.’