Egyptians than the Copts, usually deemed their representatives. Nubia was invaded and mercilessly ravaged by the army of Mehemet Ali under his second son Ismayl, in 1820-22, whose dreadful atrocities entailed a fearful fate upon himself, being surprised when attending a nocturnal banquet at some distance from his camp, and burned to death. The conquest was afterwards completed, its avowed object being to supply the slave-markets of Egypt, and obtain the gold supposed to be abundant in Sennaar. The first part of the design was accomplished; the last proved a vain expectation. Khartum, a newly created town, near the confluence of the White Nile with the Blue River, is the head-quarters of the Egyptian government. The young hippopotamus brought to the Zoological-gardens, Regent's-park, June, 1850, was captured in an island of the White Nile, about 1,800 miles above Cairo, in August, 1849. No living specimens had been seen in Europe since the period when they were exhibited by the third Gordian in the Colosseum at Rome. 361. Kordofan, a district to the west of the White Nile, tributary to the pasha of Egypt, is a collection of oases, fertile, but unhealthy, inhabited chiefly by negroes. El Obeid, the chief town, with 12,000 inhabitants, exclusive of military, is composed of several villages, the houses of which are mud-built thatched with Kordofan was conquered in 1821, by the troops of Mehemet Ali, under circumstances of atrocious cruelty. straw. 362. Abyssinia, a part of ancient Ethiopia, is situated on the south-west coast of the Red Sea. It occupies the country inland to the borders of Upper Nubia, which forms the northern and western frontier, the territory of the wild Gallas lying on the south, tribes who have considerably reduced the limits to which it extended in that direction, when the seat of a powerful empire, and established themselves within its present bounds. The area, stated to include 300,000 square miles, and the population, generally given at 4,500,000, are approximate estimates. Almost the whole region is a massive plateau, rugged mountains rising from it to a great height, with elevated valleys and plains intervening. Abba Jared, the loftiest point of the surface, is 15,200 feet above the sea, and the central plain of Dembea 6,110 feet. But the difference of level in this country is not shown by the most elevated point above the sea, for the surface of Lake Assal, near the coast, is not less than 590 feet below that of the adjoining bay of Tanjura, which, added to the height of Abba Jared, makes the total difference of level 15,700 feet. Towards Nubia and the Red Sea, the plateau is bounded by a zone of lowland, and the descent is generally abrupt, but mountains on the south connect it with the great table-land of southern Africa, of which it may be regarded as the northern promontory. Torrents and streams are numerous, fed by the snows which always overlie the principal summits, and the rains which periodically descend in perfect deluges upon the high lands. The important rivers are the Nile of Bruce, or the Blue River, which issues from fountains visited by the traveller in the neighbourhood of Geesh, on the plain of Dembea, flowing through the lake of that name; and the Tecazze or "the Terrible," which has been so entitled from its impetuous course and foaming cascades, the latest affluent of the Nile Proper. The climate is comparatively temperate on the elevated grounds, and the soil prolific with vegetable productions owing to the abundant waters; but the low region of the coast is characterized by intense heat and aridity. No country possesses a greater variety of animals, wild and tame, and almost all the large quadrupeds of Africa are found within its limits, 363. Abyssinia has no common political sovereignty. Owing to the incapacity of the old line of its kings, the chiefs of the provinces rose to power, established an independent authority, engaged in mutual struggles for an extension of territory, and for a series of years the unhappy country has suffered from repeated revolutions and warfare. There are at present three predominant kingdoms, with considerable districts under petty chieftains, lawless and unsettled: States. Chief Towns. These states have no portion of the coast. The district along the shores of the Red Sea is called by the Arab geographers, the country of the Danakil, a term which, according to Ruppell, is derived from danak, a boat, and therefore meaning boatmen or seafaring people. They form a number of small tribes, very rude, under separate chiefs. The islet of Massowah, near Arkiko on the mainland, which became a dependency of the Ottoman empire in 1557, is now possessed by the pasha of Egypt. It is founded upon one of the coral formations so frequent in the Red Sea, is the ordinary starting-point into the interior of Abyssinia from Egypt, and the great outlet of the Abyssinian trade, consisting principally of slaves, elephants' tusks, musk, wax, and coffee. The town of Massowah has about 2,000 inhabitants. Tigre, the most powerful and settled state, is the most northern, intersected by the Tecazze; Amhara includes the central parts of the country, the Dembea table-land; and Shoa lies to the south, traversed by a chain of highlands, uplands of Central Asia; a few forests and cultivable grounds confined to the freshwater courses; but dry, undulating, open plains, without the shade or ornament of a single tree, and wastes of loose sand, altered in their configuration by the winds, are predominant characteristics. Immediately east of the Aral, the great deserts of Karakoum, "black sand," and Kizilkoum, "red sand," are each several days' journey in extent, covered with shifting sandy hillocks, without a drop of fresh water. Frequently the view, at even the shortest distance, is distorted by mirage, and the soil being strongly impregnated with salt, its superficial layers assume the appearance of white buildings, in consequence of the great unequal refraction.—The climate is remarkable for its seasonal extremes of heat and cold, a torrid summer alternating with a polar winter.—Wild horses and asses, buffaloes, deer, antelopes, and wolves roam in the plains; the tall reeds and sedges which line the margin of the lakes and streams shelter wild boars and other beasts of prey; and beavers abound in the marshes. The wild ass is common about Lake Aral in summer, but in autumn the animals migrate southerly in great droves, under the conduct of a leader, to avoid the inclement winter, returning northwards in the ensuing spring.-Various branches of the great Turkish family compose the principal part of the population, estimated roughly at 5,000,000, chiefly nomadic and semi-barbarous, though to some extent stationary and more civilized. The nomadic tribes, as the three hordes of the Kirghiz in the north and north-east, dwell in tents, rear cattle, pillage caravans, and are inveterate slave-dealers. The stationary population, in the south and south-east, raise silk, cotton, and wool, for export, produce silk and cotton goods, some hardwares, and have a considerable commerce by caravans with Russia and India. The khanats of Bokhara, Kokun, and Khiva, with the steppes of the Kirghiz, are the chief political divisions. Bokhara, or Uzbegistan, the land of the Usbegs, lies immediately north of Afghanistan, on both banks of the Amoo. The extent of the khanat is about 5,600 square miles, but only a small proportion of it is inhabited, the remainder being rendered unfit for occupation by saline soil and sandy steppes. The absence of streams, wells, and fountains, occasions great inconvenience and suffering; and to unwholesome water, a prevalent and peculiarly painful disease, the rishta, is attributed. The population is very diversified, but the Uzbegs are the most numerous race. They are Mohammedans, of the sect of Omar. Bokhara, the capital, an ancient city, whose foundation is assigned to the age of Alexander the Great, occupies an oasis, and has a population of about 150,000. Among other branches of trade, there is an extensive slave-market. Its inhabitants are among the most bigoted of Mussulmans. The murder of our countrymen, Col. Connolly and Capt. Stodart, by order of the Ameer, or ruler, led to the mission of Dr. Wolff, in 1845, from which he returned with difficulty. The other cities of the Khanat are in a state of decay. Samarcand, 120 miles east of Bokhara, once the capital of the vast dominions of Tamerlane, has fallen into ruins, but the tomb of the conqueror remains, an octagonal edifice paved with white marble, and also the observatory of the astronomer Ulugh Beg. Balkh, 260 miles s.s.E. of Bokhara, one of the oldest cities of the globe, once of immense extent, has still more completely fallen. It was the birthplace of Zoroaster, and the capital of the Greek kingdom of Bactria, founded by the successors of Alexander. The Persians still call it the "mother of cities." Kokan, on the Sir, N. E. of Bokhara, is the capital of a much smaller state.Population, 60,000. The Khanat contains Tashgend, a city of about the same size. Khiva, N. w. of Bokhara, is the capital of a district extending along the Amoo about 150 miles in length by 100 in breadth, with a limited green and irrigated space. The authority of the khan is acknowledged by 300,000 souls. The town is strongly fortified with a broad embankment of earth, higher than the houses within, surrounded with turrets, outside of which is a deep moat. It is the greatest slave-market of Turkestan. The Kirghiz of the steppes are estimated at 400,000 tents, or families, each containing five or six individuals. The Great Horde has 75,000 tents; the Middle, 165,000; and the Little Horde, 160,000; their designations being thus independent of numbers. The Little Horde occupies the country north of the Caspian and Aral seas, and adjoining the Russian government of Orenburg, it has felt most directly the sway of that power. The Middle Horde encamps on the north-east, while the Great Horde lies further south-eastward, on the borders of the Chinese Empire. The wealth of the Kirghiz consists in horses, sheep, camels, cattle, and slaves. They enjoy their nomadic life, have resisted all attempts to fix them in towns, and may be regarded as, if not the most barbarous of men, at least the most irreclaimable of semi-barbarians. Their character is far removed from that innocence and unconsciousness of evil which the imagination has associated with society subject to few wants, free from artificial restraints, and pastoral in its habits. They are crafty, cruel, false, intensely selfish, and insatiable. A Kirghiz will steal his neighbour's child to sell it as a slave, and will even part with his own. The Sea of Aral is not quite one-fourth the size of the Caspian. It owes its name,"Sea of Islands," to the natural process by which the land gains upon the water. Gigantic reeds growing to the height of fifteen, ten, and even thirty feet, line its shores. They propagate also in the shallow water, and by arresting the drifting sands, are thus converted into islands. The diminution of the Aral is not due alone to excessive evaporation, but to the consumption of the fluid element by its reedy forests. The river Amou is the ancient Oxus: the Syr is the Jaxartes. In the steppes, north of the Aral, in the latitudes respectively of London and Paris, the thermometer often sinks in winter to 35° below zero, a degree of cold not surpassed by that of Greenland or Labrador. Even at the mouth of the Sir, in latitude 46°, corresponding to that of Milan and Venice, the thermometer descends 120 or more below zero. The troops of Tamerlane were frozen to death on the banks of that river; and in 1839-40, the attempted invasion of Khiva by a Russian army was frustrated by the extreme severity of the cold, which proved fatal to the camels and many men. This rigour is aggravated by the general want of fuel, and by hurricanes of indescribable violence whirling along the snow in clouds. On the other hand, upon the return of spring, the heat speedily becomes oppressive. Vegetation languishes by the close of April, and is soon burned up. The summer is that of the Sahara, the thermometer rising to 108° in the shade, and to 144° in the sun. Metal exposed cannot be touched by the naked hand, and eggs may be baked in the sand. INDIA. 324. The great central peninsula of southern Asia, or Continental India, called also the East Indies, and in the separating the basin of the Nile on the west from that of the Hawash on the east.-The Modern Abyssinians are a very motley group of different races, consisting of descendants from the primitive Ethiopic stock; many Jews, settled for ages in the country, and forming distinct. colonies under the name of Felasha, "the exiles;" a large population, of Arabic origin; Gallas, who have been introduced from the south, extremely barbarous; and true negroes, in a state of slavery. The name Abyssinia refers to this diversity among the people, being derived from the Arabic habesch, signifying mixture, or confusion.-Christianity, established in the fourth century, Mohammedanism and Judaism, are the dominant religious professions; but the Christian religion appears completely shorn of its distinctive features, and the corrupted system bearing the name operates with demoralizing effect upon its adherents. From the excessive multiplication of fasts and festivals an apparently incurable inertness in the duties of life has sprung, and want of integrity has been grafted upon sloth. Abyssinia, in fact, is perhaps the only country in which Christianity and Mohammedanism are in contact, where the professors of Islam are the more energetic and trustworthy, holding the offices which require fidelity, filling the mercantile stations, and descending to the departments of manual labour, while those who take the name of Christians are drones and beggars. Abyssinia has few towns deserving notice. Adowa, in Tigré, though not the capital, is the most important place, with regular streets, and a population of about 8,000, chiefly Mohammedan, conducting most of the trade of the country, and manufacturing cotton fabrics. But Axum, though deserted, is the most remarkable site. It was the capital, in times which go back to an early date, of an empire which included part of Arabia, and had commercial intercourse with India. Its remains consist of obelisks, without hieroglyphics, more than forty lying prostrate, and two standing, the larger consisting of a single block of granite sixty feet high, considered the most perfect monument of its kind. Another monument is the Axum inscription, cut in Greek characters on an upright slab, referring to an occurrence A.D. 330. The "Axum Chronicle," a history of Abyssinia, of which a copy was brought to Europe by Bruce, is preserved in the Christian church of the village. Gondar, the capital of Amhara, on a plain north of the Lake of Dembea, was formerly very extensive, but consists now of groups of houses, separated by wide spaces covered with shrubs and ruins.-Population, 7,000. Ankobar, the capital of Shoa, is wholly unimportant, but occupies a very elevated site, 8,200 feet above the sea. In many parts of Abyssinia, money is less generally useful as a medium of exchange with the inhabitants than various articles of merchandise, as drinkingglasses, black pepper, Indian cottons, and bands of twisted blue silk, which are eagerly sought after to be worn round the neck. Ruppell affirms that the total amount of gold and silver in the country would scarcely produce 100,000 crowns. Foreign trade is conducted by means of caravans, which, in times of tranquillity, pass to and fro, between the interior and Arkiko, the principal port. The usual arms of the merchants are the sabre, or a long spear and shield made of the skin |