The discovery of the termination of the course of the Niger, will be of
the greatest importance to geography, to our political power, and to
civilization.
With regard to geography, perhaps the contradiction which was afforded
by the various sources whence we derived our knowledge of the character
of the interior of Africa, and of the course of, next to the Nile, the
most renowned, and, as was considered from the same accounts, the
greatest river of that country, have in late times given unlimited zest
in the pursuit of further information, and has not in the least
detracted from the pleasure with which we find that we are indebted to
our countrymen for the solution of this all-absorbing problem. It
appears, that among the ancients many facts connected with the geography
of the interior of Africa were well known, which have still been an
object of discussion among the moderns; and of these, we may enumerate
the occurrence of a large lake or marsh (for it is either, at different
seasons of the year), whose real existence, beyond the speculations of
geographers, was very unsatisfactorily established, until the journey of
Denham and Clapperton; and the fact of the occurrence of a great river
in the west, emptying itself into the ocean, though many were of opinion
that it lost itself in an inland marsh, or in the desert, while others
supported the opinion of its identity with the Nile of the Egyptians.
The researches of Ptolemy and the Arabian geographers on the Nile of the
Negroes, and in later times the travels of Leo Africanus, who was a Moor
of Grenada, demonstrated the absurdity of this opinion; and how
extraordinary that, in the boasted perfection of human intellect, it
should have been broached several centuries afterwards, and that the
barometric levellings of Bruce should have been necessary to enforce
conviction! It is not at all improbable that Hanno, the Carthaginian, as
advanced by Macqueen, reached the Bight of Benin, or of Biafra; and
certainly the geographical information obtained on these countries by
Herodotus and Edrisi was more accurate than the speculations of many
modern geographers. Observation had demonstrated to the moderns that no
large river emptied itself into the ocean on the north-west coast,
though it required a more accurate acquaintance with the Senegal and the
Gambia before it was fully ascertained that they were not the outlets of
this great stream. The progress of navigation along the south-eastern
shores of Africa also showed that no large river emptied itself into the
sea along that coast; while the settlements of the Portuguese on the
coast to the south of Cape Lopez, led them, at an early period, to adopt
the opinion afterwards supported by Mungo Park and Mr. Barrow, that one
or more of the rivers in their vicinity were the outlets of the great
river of the interior of Africa. Two celebrated geographers, D'Anville
and Major Rennell, however, espoused the theory of the waters emptying
themselves into the Wangara, or great marsh; which argument underwent
various modifications in the hands of different geographers; and though
the probability of its emptying itself into the Gulf of Guinea had been
pointed out on the continent, and vigorously supported in this country,
an expedition was fitted out to explore the Congo or Zaire, which,
though unfortunate to the individuals concerned, was yet satisfactory in
a geographical point of view, and demonstrated that the rivers south of
Cape Lopez were not the outlets of the waters of the Niger, and gave
origin to a speculation which partook of all the characters of a romance
of the desert, beneath the sands of which its author buried the gigantic
stream, loaded with the waters of the Wangara or Lake Tchad, to make it
flow into the Mediterranean at the Syrtis of the ancients.
In the history of geography there are no examples of greater
perseverance and courageous determination than in the efforts made to
triumph over the difficulties presented in the solution of this
important question. Since 1815, there has scarcely a year passed in
which a new attempt has not been made; and of these, if we recede a
little farther back, twenty-five were made by our countrymen, fourteen
by Frenchmen, two by Americans, and one by a German; of which but a
small number, since the days of Houghton, have not fallen victims to
their heroic devotion.
Mungo Park first observed the direction of the stream which had become
as much an object of discussion as its termination; and, strange to say,
after the present discovery, it will, in some parts of its course, still
remain so. The unfortunate traveller just alluded to, previous to his
descent of the river, obtained some information from Moors and from
negroes, on its course by Timbuctoo. The Jinnie of Park is synonymous
with Jenné, Giné, Dhjenné, of other writers, as Jenné has again been
confounded with Kano or Kanno. It may be a figurative term--for the
Jinnie of Park was on an island, as was the Jenné of the Moorish
reports, while the Jenné of some travellers is at a short distance from
the river. This cannot be the case with regard to Timbuctoo, which is
visited by caravans twice a year from Morocco; nor is the name met with
any where, except the two first syllables in the town of Timbo, which
cannot be mistaken for Timbuctoo.
Major Laing had discovered the source of the Niger to be in the
mountains of Loma, in 9 deg. 15 min. west latitude, and had ascertained
its course for a short distance from its source. We were also aware of
the existence of one or two streams joining the great river, or
branching from it near Timbuctoo. De Lisle had marked a river Gambarra,
on his maps drawn up for Louis XV., and not without good authority. This
is the river coming from Houssa; and the Joliba of modern travellers is
a river, we could prove, from the concurring testimony of a variety of
sources, coming from the north-west, and joining its waters with, that
is to say flowing into the Niger, in the immediate neighbourhood of
Timbuctoo; still at that point the Kowarra, or Quorra of the Moors, or
Quolla of the Negroes, who always change the _r_ for _l_ a name which,
according to Laing, it has at its sources--according to Clapperton, it
preserves beyond Timbuctoo, and is probably still the name of the same
stream at its embouchure in the Bight of Biafra. The Quarrama is another
tributary stream which passes by Saccatoo, and falls into the Quorra
above Youri, and above the point where Mungo Park was wrecked; and the
line of country between this river and the Shashum, comprising the hills
of Doochee, of Naroo, and of Dull, is the line of water-shed to the
rivers joining the Quorra on the one hand, and those emptying themselves
into the Wangara on the other. The course given by Sultan Bello, and the
information obtained by Major Denham, both pointed out a river coursing
to the east, which is probably the branch followed by the Landers: for
its termination in Lake Tchad had not even the air of probability;
though it is not, on the other-hand, at all improbable that other
branches empty themselves into the Bight of Benin, by the rivers
Formosa or Volta, according to information given to Captain Clapperton
and Major Laing.
We had intended to embody some remarks upon the pretended journey of
Caillié; but we find we have already occupied too much space in details
necessary to make the geographical nature of the question well
understood; and we shall content ourselves with remarking, that the
discovery of the termination of the Quorra, or Niger, tends to throw a
degree of improbability upon the narrative of that individual, which it
will require much ingenuity to explain away. It is certain that the
latitude given to Timbuctoo by the editor of those travels, and upon
which sufficient ridicule has already been thrown in the Edinburgh
Geographical Journal, may be considered as an error entirely of the
editor's, who, by taking it upon himself, will relieve the burden of the
mistake from the traveller, and thus lighten the weighty doubts which
might in consequence bear upon the remainder of the details; for the
situation of that city, as given by Jomard, is quite inconsistent with
the situation it must be in, from the ascertained source, direction, and
termination of the river. There can be no doubt but that a portion of
the labours presented to the public as the travels of Caillié are
founded upon valid documents, wherever obtained, and probably most of
the errors are those of the editor. But though authorities can be found
in support of the division of the Quorra into two branches; one of
which, the Joliba, flows to the north-west, and the other in an almost
opposite direction,--fact which has no analogy in geography, and, what
is better, no existence in nature; yet no authority can be found for
placing Timbuctoo on a river flowing north from the Niger.
The details which will be given to us by the results of this successful
expedition will, then, not only be of assistance in allying the existing
condition of things with the knowledge of the ancients, but it will
enable us to reduce to a few facts the many contradictory statements
which have originated in the variety of the sources of information, and
the individual and national rivalry which the interest of the question
gave birth to among the geographers of the present day. It will also be
of importance, as it was connected with a great question, as to the
possibility of a large river traversing an extensive continent, or
losing itself in a marsh or lake, or being buried in the extensive sands
of the desert. By laying open the interior of Africa to us, it will
increase our political strength and commercial advantages on those
coasts;--it will enable us to put into practice an amelioration long
contemplated by Mr. Barrow, in the choice of our settlements on those
coasts;--it will place the greatest and most important vent of the
barbarous and inhuman traffic of negroes in our possession; and it will
enable us to diffuse the benefits of superior intelligence among an
ignorant and suffering people.--Literary Gazette.
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