In these letters it was announced, that I was gone with a Russian caravan through the Curdistan, where I was to observe the transit of Venus in a place where it was not visible, and that I was to proceed to China, and return by the way of the East Indies:—a story which some of his correspondents, as profligate as himself, industriously circulated at the time, and which others, perhaps weaker than wicked, though wicked enough, have affected to believe to this day.
I conceived a violent indignation at this, and finding myself so treated in return for so complete a journey as I had then actually terminated, thought it below me to sacrifice the best years of my life to daily pain and danger, when the impression it made in the breasts of my countrymen seemed to be so weak, so infinitely unworthy of them or me. One thing only detained me from returning home; it was my desire of fulfilling my promise to my Sovereign, and of adding the ruins of Palmyra to those of Africa, already secured and out of danger.
In my anger I renounced all thoughts of the attempt to discover the sources of the Nile, and I repeated my orders no more for either quadrant, telescope, or time-keeper. I had pencils and paper; and luckily my large camera obscura, which had escaped the catastrophe of Ptolometa, was arrived from Smyrna, and then standing before me. I therefore began to cast about, with my usual care and anxiety, for the means of obtaining feasible and safe methods of repeating the famous journey to Palmyra. I found it was necessary to advance nearer the scene of action. Mr Abbot, British consul for Tripoli in Syria, kindly invited me, andafter
