The Romaic Vade-Mecum, or Traveller's Pocket Companion; being a translation of Madame Genlis' Familiar Conversations into the modern Greek, English, and Italian. By Marianna, Caterina, and Teresa Macri, of Athens, assisted by natives of England and Tuscany; for the support of themselves and mother, the widow of Procopio Macri, English consul at Athens during twenty-six years, who fell a victim to the Malaria fever, while accompanying an English gentleman in his tour through the Morea. Compelled, by the calamitous devastation and extreme personal danger every where around them, to quit Athens, and, with it, their means of subsistence, and seek an asylum in Corfu, they at length feel constrained to make this appeal to a generous public, trusting that they, at the same time, offer, to all interested in researches in Greece, a valuable and long-desired auxiliary. An attempt will be made to substitute, for the usual unprofitable prefaces of similar works, a compendious view of the pronunciation, declensions, and conjugations, as in general use among the modern Greeks. This, it is presumed, with the dialogues, will furnish every thing necessary, not only for oral intercourse, but for reading and writing, with as much accuracy, if not with the same facility, as the natives, and in a great measure supersede the necessity of any other elementary book.It will prove an almost equally useful auxiliary to the Greek studying English or Italian, and to the Italian studying Greek or English.-Subscriptions received by the Rev. George Winnock, Chaplain to the Forces, Corfu; by Miss Winnock, Scarsdale house, Kensington; and by J. Souter, 73, St. Paul's Church-yard, London.-Price, to Subscribers, 7s. each copy, square 12mo. neatly half-bound.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

Etonensis has, we fear, assumed a false signature.

We beg leave to remind S. T., that the Classical Journal is open to the admission of literary criticism, but not of personal invective.

If Græculus will peruse the preface to Porson's Hecuba, he will find that some of his Iambics are incorrect.

Notice of Dr. Jones's Greek Lexicon Westminster Epilogue and Prologue-Itinerary from Tripoli to Timbuctou-Arithmetic of the Holy Scriptures-Biblical Criticism-Geographical Extract from Ben Haukel, &c. in our next.

LACKINGTON'S CATALOGUE, PART III. This day was published, price 2s. sewed,

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To Masters of Grammar Schools, Academies, and Private Teachers.

This Day is published,

A CATALOGUE of DICTIONARIES, GRAMMARS, GREEK and LATIN CLASSICS, and other SCHOOL BOOKS, newly arranged; together with a SELECTION of the BEST WORKS, adapted to the improvement and recreation of Young Persons, with the Prices affixed.

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SELECT WORKS OF PORPHYRY; containing his four books on Abstinence from Animal Food; his treatise on the Homeric Cave of the Nymphs; and his auxiliaries to the perception of intelligible natures. Translated from the Greek by THOMAS TAYLOR (translator of Plato and Aristotle). Printed for Thomas Rodd, 2, Great Newport Street; where may be had, most of Mr. Taylor's Works.

N. B. An extensive collection of Books, Ancient and Modern, in all Branches of Literature, constantly on sale; Catalogues of which may be had.

END OF NO. LV.

CLASSICAL JOURNAL;

N. LWI.

DECEMBER, 1823.

ITINERARY from TRIPOLI (in Barbary) to
TIMBUCTOU. By the SHEIKH L'HAGE KASSEM.
TRANSLATED, AND ILLUSTRATED WITH NOTES,
BY JAMES GREY JACKSON.

The following Itinerary was written at Rabat, in West Barbary, in 1807, and was transmitted by Mr. Delaporte, chancellor of the French consulate, to the French minister for foreign affairs in 1810. It was dictated to the chancellor, by Sheikh L'Hage Kassem, an aged man, who had acted as guide to the caravans of merchants who traded from Tripoli to Timbuctou, and who, all his life, had traded to Tripoli and Gadames (which were his countries) to Timbuctou. Done at Rabat, June 18th, 1807; signed, Delaporte, Chancelier.

1st Journey.-From Tripoli to Zawieh. Zawieh is a village that resembles Coraim in Lower Egypt. There are large gardens attached to the houses: there is also a college.

2nd Journey.-From Zawieh they pass the night at a place called Beer-el-grhanam,' a well so called.

3rd Journey. From Beer-el-grhanam they rest at Wadletel,

pill Beer-el-grhanam; i. e. the sheep-well, or the well of sheep.

2 It is impossible to determine the meaning of this word Wadletel, as this itinerary was not written, but delivered or spoken in Arabic: it is as likely I think to be the river of gum-trees, or Wad attolh. I will not however dispute that letel may signify tamarinds, although I never heard the word used in the west of Africa to signify that fruit, but invariably Timur-el-hend, i. e. dates of India; and this is the etymology of the European word tamarind. NO. LVI.

VOL. XXVIII.

Cl. JI.

N

so named from a river where are seen tamarind trees; the word wadletel signifying the River of Tamarinds.

4th Journey. From Wadletel they travel and rest at Rogeban, the name of a tribe of Arabs who reside there.

5th, 6th, and 7th Journies.- From Rogeban, proceeding on the journey during three days, they reach Dorgy, and pass the night there.

8th Journey.-From Dorgy they reach a well called Beertemad, where they pass the night.

9th-13th Journey.-From Beer-temad they travel five journies in a desert without water, after which they reach the town of Gedâmes, or Gadames; which is the ancient Cadmus. Gadames is a middling-sized town, built by the side of the ancient Cadmus, where are found the remains of interesting ruins. This town is the magazine for the commerce of the interior of Africa. They bring from thence senna, grain, golddust, gums, negroes and negresses bought at Cashna, Bornou, Timbuctou, and which are distributed from hence into the regencies of Barbary, in the Levant, and in Europe, through Marseilles and Leghorn. Gadames, which formerly belonged to the regency of Tunis, is now dependent on Tripoli, which has imposed heavy duties on the merchandise coming from the interior by the caravans, and which has also levied heavy imposts on the inhabitants. The Bashaw, or chief of this regency, has latterly obliged the Gadanesians to take to Tripoli all that commerce which they before carried on more advantageously with Tunis, for the purpose of improving the revenue of the former government. From Gadames they take dates to Fazzan, the ancient Phazania. Gadames is surrounded with gardens of palm, date, and other trees, watered by one spring, the water of which is legally divided. The government of the town is in the hands of the three most ancient sheikhs of the country, who watch over the police, administer justice, and superintend the distribution of the water. The women of the Gadamesians never walk in the streets, they visit one another over the terraces of the houses, which have all the same elevation. Gadames has sustained many sieges against the regency of Tunis, from the yoke of which she delivered herself, to submit to the still harder one of the regency of Tripoli.

13th-15th Journey.-From Gadames they proceed on

'Beer-temad, i. e. the warm well; the term temad designates that degree of warmth which milk has, coming from the camel (or cow).

their journey three days, after which they go and repose themselves at the wells called Ten-yakken.

16th-18th Journey.-From Ten-yakken, which signifies, in the language of the country, the Wells of Yakken, they march on three days, after which they come to another well, called Beer-el-tabbeyed.1

19th-22nd Journey.-From Beer-el-tabbeyed they travel on four journies, resting each night in the deserts, and the fourth day they reach a place, called El-mossegguem.

22nd-25th Journey.-From El-mossegguem they perform four more journies, stopping in the intermediate way, in barren or uncultivated spots, after which they reach a well dug in a wood, and which is therefore called Beer-el-grabah,.

26th-29th Journey.-From Beer-el-grabah, during a progress of four days, they rest in desert places, after which, they reach and repose at a place called Hassi-Farsik.

30th-33rd Journey.-From Hassi-Farsik, after having performed four journies in the heart of the deserts, they come and sleep at a place called Ain-el-salah,3 that is to say, the Fountain of Saints, on account of saints or religious muselmen who reside and have their tombs there.

34th-35th Journey.-From Ain-el-salah (or more properly, Ain-essalah, the being a solar letter, a distinction which I should not think it necessary to notice, but for the infor

The French orthography of Beer, is Bir; but Bir, according to the English orthography, signifies a country or district; wherefore it became necessary to adapt the orthography to the English alphabet. Considerable errors have originated in transposing the Oriental languages into the European character, a remarkable example of which is evident in the word Nile, which is intelligible in the French, but not in the English language.

2

As I have translated this itinerary principally for the use of British travellers in Africa, it is impossible to be too particular in the pronunciation of Arabic or African words. For example, the French translation calls this word, Bir-el-gabah; but the word gabah, pronounced by an European to an African, would be perfectly unintelligible, and the word loses its identity by being so pronounced. I have repeatedly called the attention of African travellers to this matter, and it is the importance of the matter only, that induces me thus again to impress it on their minds: viz., that the Arabic letter is not rendered by the European g or gh, as Richardson and others have rendered it, but rather by gr or grh.

3 I translate this passage, o, the fountain of peace, not of saints. The word Salah is not a noun plural.