Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 1.djvu/595

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THE SOURCE OF THE NILE.
471


CHAP. VI.

Queen of Saba visits Jerusalem — Abyssinian Tradition concerning Her — Supposed Founder of that Monarchy — Abyssinia embraces the Jewish Religion — Jewish Hierarchy still retained by the Falasha — Some Conjectures concerning their Copy of the Old Testament.

IT is now that I am to fulfil my promise to the reader, of giving him some account of the visit made by the Queen of Sheba *[1], as we erroneously call her, and the consequences of that visit; the foundation of an Ethiopian monarchy, and the continuation of the sceptre in the tribe of Judah, down to this day. If I am obliged to go back in point of time, it is, that I may preserve both the account of the trade of the Arabian Gulf, and of this Jewish kingdom, distinct and unbroken.

We are not to wonder, if the prodigious hurry and flow of business, and the immensely valuable transactions they had with each other, had greatly familiarised the Tyrians,

  1. * It should properly be Saba, Azab, or Azaba, all signifying South.
and

  • It should properly be Saba, Azab, or Azaba, all signifying South.