Why has no African explorer, for
instance, yet ventured to announce the fact,--at once interesting and
important,--that if a traveler in the central regions of that continent
could be accompanied by his wife, the chances of his success would be
greatly improved? In the apparent celibacy of explorers, barbarous races
perceive simply an absence or perversion of the masculine instinct,
which at once excites their distrust.

Let me resume the volume which I have laid down to pursue the foregoing
reflections, and, while the eastern storm drives through the autumn
woods, hurling its mingled volume of rain and leaves against my window,
ask the reader to look over my shoulder and follow with me for a while
the pilgrimage of Abou Abdallah Mohammed, better known under the name of
Ibn Batuta,--'may God be satisfied with him, and confound those who have
an aversion towards him!'--to apply to himself his own invocation in
favor of another.

Ibn Batuta, a native of Tangier, in Morocco, unquestionably takes the
first rank among the travelers of the Middle Ages, if we consider the
distances he traversed, the remote points he reached, or the number of
years consumed by his wanderings. From Pekin to Timbuctoo, from the
Volga to the Ganges, from Bukhara to Zanzibar, he vibrated to and fro,
making himself acquainted, with the exception of Christian Europe, with
the greater part of the known world. He touched, in many directions, the
borderland of darkness, beyond which the earth fell off precipitously
into chaotic depths which no mortal might explore. Having reached home
again after uncounted perils, he sat down to tell the story of his
adventures. Many of his notes had been lost by the way, and he was
obliged to depend mainly on his memory; but as this is a faculty which
all genuine travelers must not only possess, but cultivate by constant
exercise, his narrative is remarkably clear, complete, and truthful.

Born on the 24th of February, 1304, he set out, in his twenty-second
year, on a pilgrimage to Mecca, traversing the Barbary States and Egypt
on the way. Once fairly launched in the world, twenty-four years elapsed
before he again saw his native town. He explored the various provinces
of Arabia; visited Syria, Persia, and Armenia; resided for a while in
Southern Russia (Kipchak), then belonging to princes of the line of
Genghis Khan; traveled by land to Constantinople, where he was presented
to the emperor; repeated his pilgrimage t