Travels in Syria and the Holy Land | Page 8

from them for money," in the same manner as
the caravan of Mekka is now supplied by the people of the same
mountains, who meet the pilgrims on the Hadj route. After traversing
the wilderness on the eastern side of Moab, the Israelites at length
entered that country, crossing the brook Zered in the thirty-eighth year,
from their first arrival at Kadesh Barnea, "when all the generation of
the men of war were wasted out from among the host."[Deuter, c.ii.]
After passing through the centre of Moab, they crossed the Arnon,
entered Ammon, and were at length permitted to begin the overthrow
of the possessors of the promised land, by the destruction of Sihon the
Amorite, who dwelt at Heshbon.[Numbers, c.xxi. Deuter, c.ii.] The
preservation of the latter name, and of those of Diban, Medaba, Aroer,
Amman, together with the other geographical facts derived from the
journey of Burckhardt through the countries beyond the Dead Sea,
furnishes a most satisfactory illustration of the sacred historians.
[p.xvii]It remains for the Editor only to add, that while correcting the
foreign idiom of his Author, and making numerous alterations in the
structure of the language, he has been as careful as posible not to injure
the originality of the composition, stamped as it is with the simplicity,

good sense, and candour, inseparable from the Author's character. In
the Editor's wish, however, to preserve this originality, he cannot flatter
himself that incorrect expressions may not sometimes have been left. In
regard to the Greek inscriptions, he thinks it necessary only to remark,
that although the propriety of furnishing the reader with fac-similes of
all such interesting relicts of ancient history cannot in general be
doubted, yet in the present instance, the trouble and expense which it
would have occasioned, would hardly have been compensated by the
importance of the monuments themselves, or by the degree of
correctness with which they were copied by the traveller. They have
therefore been printed in a type nearly resembling the Greek characters
which were in use at the date of the inscriptions, and the Editor has
taken the liberty of separating the words, and of supplying in the small
cursive Greek character, the defective parts of the traveller's copies.
The Editor takes this opportunity of stating, that in consequence of
some discoveries in African geography, which have been made known
since the publication of Burckhardt's Travels in Nubia, he has made
some alterations in the maps of the second edition of that work. The
observations of Captain Lyon have proved Morzouk to be situated a
degree and a half to the southward of the position formerly assigned to
it, and his enquiries having at the same time confirmed the bearing and
distance between Morzouk and Bornou, as reported by former
travellers, a corresponding change will follow in the latitude of Bornou,
as well as in the [p.xviii]position of the places on the route leading to
those two cities from the countries of the Nile.
A journey into Nubia, by the Earl of Belmore, and his brother, the Hon.
Capt. Corry, has furnished some latitudes and longitudes, serving to
correct the map of "the course of the Nile, from Assouan to the
confines of Dongola", which the Editor constructed from the journals
of Burckhardt, without the assistance of any celestial observatians. The
error in the map as to the most distant point observed by Lord Belmore
is however so small, that it has not been thought necessary to make any
alteration in that map for the second edition of Burckhardt's Journey in
Nubia; but the whole delineation of this part of the Nile will be
corrected from the recent observations, in a new edition of the

Supplement to the Editor's general Map of Egypt.
Since the Journey of Lord Belmore, Mr. Waddington and Mr. Hanbury,
taking advantage of an expedition sent into AEthiopia by the Viceroy
of Egypt, have prolonged the examination of the Nile four hundred
miles beyond the extreme point reached by Burckhardt; and some
French gentlemen have continued to follow the army as far as Sennaar.
The presence of a Turkish army in that country will probably furnish
greater facilities for exploring the Bahr el Abiad, or western branch of
the Nile, than have ever before been presented to travellers; there is
reason to hope, that the opportunity will not be neglected, and thus a
survey of this celebrated river from its sources to the Mediterranean,
may, perhaps, at length be made, if not for the first time, for the first
time at least since the extinction of Egyptian science.
The expedition of the Pasha of Egypt has already produced some
important additions to African geography. By permission of Mr.
Waddington, the Editor has corrected, from that gentleman's
delineation, the parts of the Nile above Mahass, for the