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Updated: May 5, 2025
Shortly afterwards a messenger arrived from that chief, inviting him to his town, and offering to send canoes to convey him up the river; but Clapperton, anxious to proceed on his journey, unfortunately declined the offer. He was here treated in the kindest way possible, and everyone was ready to give him information on all points, with the exception of that connected with Park's death.
Mungo Park's drowning agony in the African river he had discovered, but which he was not to live to describe; Clapperton's perishing of fever on the banks of the great lake, in the heart of the same continent, which was afterwards to be rediscovered and described by other explorers; Franklin's perishing in the snow it might be after he had solved the long-sought problem of the North-west Passage are among the most melancholy events in the history of enterprise and genius.
He was just settling into a luxurious, leather-upholstered dream chair preparatory to telling Reeve-Howard his Western experiences when Park's voice bellowed into the tent: "Roll out, boys we got a train pulling in!" There was hurried dressing in the dark of the bed-tent, hasty mounting, and a hastier ride through the cool night air.
But we may hope that the publication of Park's Journal will revive the attention of enlightened men to this subject; and that the prospect of future discoveries in that quarter of the globe will not be hastily abandoned.
We sailed on the 24th of November, and after a short but tempestuous voyage arrived at Falmouth on the 22nd of December, from whence I immediately set out for London; having been absent from England two years and seven months. The following passage from James Montgomery's poem, "The West Indies," published in 1810, was inspired by "Mungo Park's Travels in the Interior of Africa."
But the chief feature is the slave market, where the unfortunate beings are ranged, according to their sex, in two long rows. The cowrie, so frequently mentioned in Park's Travels, is here the chief medium of circulation.
The white residents at the time of Mr. Park's arrival, consisted only of Dr. Laidley and two gentlemen of the name of Ainsley, but their domestics were numerous. They enjoyed perfect security, and being highly respected by the natives at large, wanted no accommodation the country could supply, and the greatest part of the trade in slaves; ivory, and gold was in their hands.
The attention of the Scottish farmers and peasantry to the early instruction of their children has been already remarked, and is strongly exemplified in the history of Mr. Park's family.
It is obvious that no reliance can be placed on a narrative resting upon such authority; and we must be content to remain in ignorance of the precise circumstances of Park's melancholy fate. But that he was attacked by the natives on his voyage from Sansanding eastwards, that he was overpowered by numbers, and that he perished on his passage down the Niger, cannot reasonably be doubted.
Park's attendants, to whom they related a frightful story: their fears had dressed him in the flowing robes of a tremendous spirit, and one of them affirmed, that a blast of wind, cold as water, poured down upon him from the sky, while he beheld the dreadful apparition. About two o'clock, Mr.
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