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Etext prepared by Garry Gill (garrygill@hotmail.com) and the distributedproofreading team of Charles Franks (http://charlz.dynip.com/gutenberg/)
The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile
And Explorations of the Nile Sources.
by Sir Samuel W. Baker, M.A., F.R.G.S.
Gold Medallist of the Royal Geographical Society.
To Her Most Gracious Majesty
THE QUEEN
I dedicate, with Her permission,
THIS BOOK,
Containing the Story of the Discovery of the Great Lake
From which the NILE ultimately flows,
And which,
As connected so intimately,
As a NILE SOURCE, with the VICTORIA LAKE,
I have ventured to name
"THE ALBERT N'YANZA,"
In Memory of the Late Illustrious and Lamented
PRINCE CONSORT.
PREFACE.
In the history of the Nile there was a void: its Sources were a mystery.The Ancients devoted much attention to this problem; but in vain. TheEmperor Nero sent an expedition under the command of two centurions, asdescribed by Seneca. Even Roman energy failed to break the spell thatguarded these secret fountains. The expedition sent by Mehemet AliPasha, the celebrated Viceroy of Egypt, closed a long term ofunsuccessful search.
The work has now been accomplished. Three English parties, and onlythree, have at various periods started upon this obscure mission: eachhas gained its end.
Bruce won the source of the Blue Nile; Speke and Grant won the Victoriasource of the great White Nile; and I have been permitted to succeed incompleting the Nile Sources by the discovery of the great reservoir ofthe equatorial waters, the ALBERT N'YANZA, from which the river issuesas the entire White Nile.
Having thus completed the work after nearly five years passed in Africa,there still remains a task before me. I must take the reader of thisvolume by the hand, and lead him step by step along my rough path fromthe beginning to the end; through scorching deserts and thirsty sands;through swamp, and jungle, and interminable morass; throughdifficulties, fatigues, and sickness, until I bring him, faint with thewearying journey, to that high cliff where the great prize shall burstupon his view—from which he shall look down upon the vast ALBERT LAKE,and drink with me from the Sources of the Nile!
I have written "HE!" How can I lead the more tender sex through dangersand fatigues, and passages of savage life? A veil shall be thrown overmany scenes of brutality that I was forced to witness, but which I willnot force upon the reader; neither will I intrude anything that is notactually necessary in the description of scenes that unfortunately mustbe passed through in the journey now before us. Should anything offendthe sensitive mind, and suggest the unfitness of the situation for awoman's presence, I must beseech my fair readers to reflect, that thepilgrim's wife followed him, weary and footsore, through all hisdifficulties, led, not by choice, but by devotion; and that in times ofmisery and sickness her tender care saved his life and prospered theexpedition.
"O woman, in our hours of ease
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please,
And variable as the shade
By the light qui