Attempts of Horneman, Nicholls, Roentgen, and Adams.

During the interval which elapsed between Park's first and second journey, several attempts were made to explore Central Africa. The first traveller was Frederick Horneman, a student of Gottingen, who was recommended by Professor Blumenbach to the patronage of the African Association. After spending some time in the study of Natural History, and the Arabic language, he went to Cairo, intending to join some caravan, under the assumed character of an Arab or Moslem. It was not till the following year, 1798, that he was enabled to find a caravan proceeding westward, and bound for Fezzan. On the 8th September, they left Egypt, entering upon a wide expanse of sandy desert, resembling what might be supposed to be the bed of the ocean after the waters had left it. It was covered with fragments of petrified wood, of a lightish grey colour and bearing a strong resemblance to natural wood. The Arabs travelled all day, and when they halted at night, each gathered a few sticks and prepared his own victuals. There were a few oases in this waste. In ten days they came to Ummesogeir, a village containing one hundred and twenty inhabitants, who lived on a rock, subsisting on dates, and separated by immense tracts of sand from all intercourse with the rest of the world. In twenty-four hours they came to Siwah, an extensive oasis, about fifty miles in circumference, and the only inhabited spot of any considerable extent on the route to Fezzan. Here there were found some curious remains of antiquity; among the rest a monument, called by the natives Ummebeda, a large mass of dilapidated ruins, which some suppose to have been the celebrated shrine of Jupiter Ammon. Thence they travelled through sandy regions, diversified with numerous limestone rocks. Here Horneman was in considerable danger; for the caravan was met by several hundred inhabitants of Siwah, mounted on asses, who pointed to him and insisted that he and another of the caravan were Christians from Cairo, against whom they cherished a deadly enmity. But Horneman's coolness and courage disarmed their hostility; he insisted that he was a Moslem, took out the Koran and read passages from it aloud, and even challenged them to answer him on points of the Mahommedan faith.

Soon after the travellers entered the Black Harutsch, a range of dreary mountains, the long defiles of which presented the most dismal prospect imaginable. After sixteen days toilsome journeying they came to the great Oasis, or small Kingdom of Fezzan. The inhabitants were a commercial people, and received the caravan with joy. Much communication is held between this place and Central Africa. Here Horneman endeavoured to collect information concerning Tombuctoo and the Niger. He resolved to visit Tripoli before endeavouring to penetrate to the south. He set off on his journey southward on the 6th April 1800, along with two shereefs or descendants of Mahomed, who had promised to protect him. Two years elapsed before any more was heard of him; when a Fezzan merchant informed the Danish Consul at Tripoli, that he was still alive. He was afterwards reported to have resided in Kashna, about 1803. Major Denham heard that he had penetrated as far as Nyffe on the Niger, where he fell a victim to the climate.

The next traveller sent out to Africa was Mr. Nicholls, who resolved to land at Calabar, in the Gulf of Benin, and thence to proceed into the interior. He landed on the coast in January 1805, but speedily fell a victim to the fever of the country.

Roentgen, a German, endeavoured to reach the interior by the way of Morocco. He spoke Arabic fluently, assumed the Mahomedan garb, and entertained high hopes of success. Having procured two guides, he joined the Soudan caravan; but, a little distance from the spot whence he set out, his corpse was found lying on the road.

Soon after, some information concerning Tombuctoo was derived from Adams, an American sailor, who was wrecked upon the coast, and who reported that he had been carried captive to that city by the Moors, and had remained there six months. His description of this famous place ill corresponded with the ideas which Europeans entertained of its splendour; the most spacious of the houses being merely huts, one storey in height, composed of timber frame-works filled with earth; and many of the inhabitants sheltering themselves under hovels, consisting of branches of trees, covered with mats of the palmetto. The palace was merely a collection of such apartments enclosed by a mud wall. The inhabitants were of a gay and thoughtless disposition, spending much of their time in dancing. The chief traffic of the place was in slaves.