Page:Enterprise and Adventure.djvu/51

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Captain Dundas Cochrane, whose narrative of a pedestrian journey through Russia and Siberian Tartary, from the frontiers of Tartary to the Frozen Sea and Kamtschatka, was published about forty years since. In the introduction to this extraordinary book, Captain Cochrane tells us that, in the month of January, 1820, he addressed a letter to the Lords of the Admiralty, offering to undertake a journey on foot into the interior of Africa, or to any other place to which they pleased to send him. He was entirely without funds for the purpose, his whole fortune consisting of his half-pay as a commander in the Navy; but his intention was to proceed alone, and he asked only to be furnished with the countenance of the Government. "With this protection," he says, "and such recommendations as it might procure me, I would have accompanied the caravans in some servile capacity, nor hesitated even to sell myself as a slave if that miserable alternative were necessary to accomplish the object I had in view." His opinion upon the advantages of this mode of exploring were peculiar, but were not without some plausibility. "In going alone," he said, "I relied upon my own individual exertions and knowledge of man, unfettered by the frailties and misconduct of others. I was then, as now, convinced that many people travelling together for the purpose of exploring a barbarous country, have the less chance of succeeding; more especially when they go armed, and take with them presents of value. The appearance of numbers must naturally excite the natives to resistance, from motives of jealousy or fear; and the danger would be greatly increased by the hope of plunder. The death of the whole party, and conse-