Preface to the First (1856) Edition.
xxvii
any instruments except a pocket compass, a watch, and a portable thermometer more remarkable for convenience than for correctness. But the way was thus paved for scientific observation: shortly after the author's departure from Harar, the Amir or chief wrote to the Acting Political Resident at Aden, earnestly begging to be supplied with a "Frank physician," and offering protection to any European who might be persuaded to visit his dominions.
The Appendix contains the following papers connected with the movements of the expedition in the year 1854.
- The diary and observations made by Lieut. Speke, when attempting to reach the Wady Nogal.
- A sketch of the grammar, and a vocabulary of the Harari tongue. This dialect is little known to European linguists: the only notices of it hitherto published are in Salt's Abyssinia, Appendix I. pp. 6–10; by Balbi Atlas Ethnogr. Tab. xxxix. No. 297; Kielmaier, Ausland, 1840, No. 76; and Dr. Beke (Philological Journal, April 25, 1845).
- Meteorological observations in the cold season of 1854 55 by Lieuts. Herne, Stroyan, and the Author.
- A brief description of certain peculiar customs, noticed in Nubia, by Brown and Werne under the name of fibulation.[1]
- The conclusion is a condensed account of an attempt to reach Harar from Ankobar.[2] On the 14th October 1841, Major Sir William Cornwallis Harris (then Captain in the Bombay Engineers), Chief of the Mission
- ↑ [The publishers of the present edition have made diligent search for the MS. of this Appendix, which the publishers of the first edition "found it necessary to omit," but they regret to say that no trace of it can be found.]
- ↑ The author hoped to insert Lieut. Herne's journal, kept at Berberah, and the different places of note in its vicinity; as yet, however, the paper has not been received.
