The Eldorado of the Ancients

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II EARLY EXPLORATIONS WE were to begin our attack on this old land of ruins starting from the mouth of the Zambesi, which, apparently, was even in the remotest times a high-road into the interior. I will endeavour to show later on that the Rhapta of the Perip/iis Man's Erythraei, a description of...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II EARLY EXPLORATIONS WE were to begin our attack on this old land of ruins starting from the mouth of the Zambesi, which, apparently, was even in the remotest times a high-road into the interior. I will endeavour to show later on that the Rhapta of the Perip/iis Man's Erythraei, a description of the East African coast dating from the first century A.d., was most probably our Quilimane on the most northern estuary of the Zambesi. Thus far, therefore, there existed two thousand years ago a regular trading intercourse from the Mediterranean basin, that without question, derived its chief support from the products of Zambesia. To-day Quilimane has lost this importance, because the northern estuary of the Zambesi is choked with sand. Chinde, at the mouth of the navigable Chinde River, has taken its place. From here several river steamboat companies carry on the traffic to the Nyassa region on the one hand, up the Zambesi on the other. Eight or nine months of the year the river is open to steamers. In the dry season, from the middle of September till towards the end of December, the traffic above the Shire estuary has to be conducted by means of sailing and rowing boats.This is a great hindrance to traffic, but in judging it one often forgets that the rivers of the continent of Europe are every year closed by ice for almost as long. I arrived, then, in Chinde at the end of March, 1899, my intention being to lead straight up thence to the eastern entry to the Lupata Gorge. We were, all told, a party of six, of whom I will only mention Mr. Puzey, Herr Gramann, and Herr von Napolski. Thanks to the kind assistance of Mr. Eddelbiittel, of the International Flotilla and Transport Company, our preparations were finished in a few days, and we were ready to proceed up-river ...