BY SIR SAMUEL W. BAKER, M.A., F.R.G.S., GOLD MEDALIST OF THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY; GRANDE MÉDAILLE d'or AUTHOR OF THE ALBERT N'YANZA GREAT BASIN OF THE NILE, THE NILE COMPLETE. WITH TEN ILLUSTRATIONS BY HUARD. NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE. DEDICATION. SINCE the publication of " Albert N'yanza" and the "Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia," I have received numerous letters from boys to whom I was entirely unknown, and who are at at this moment unknown to me except through their sponta. neous correspondence. Their letters were written in the youthful enthusiasm of the moment, when, having shared in the excitement of our African journeys, they had closed the book, and, full of sympathy, they wrote to me effusions which I prize as the outburst of boyish admiration for a successful struggle with difficulties. As a proof of the value that I attach to these warm expressions of interest taken by the young in our past adventures, I now dedicate to all boys (from eight years old to eighty) a story of fiction, combined with certain facts, that will, I trust, relieve the dreariness of a long Christmas evening. At the same time that I have endeavored to avoid all improbabilities, I must apologize for having taken an astronomical liberty in producing an eclipse of the sun which is not in the almanac. S. W. BAKER. |