Richard Burton

Abstract

WE have already announced the not unexpected death, at the age of 69, of Sir Richard Burton, one of the most versatile geniuses and extensive explorers of any time, and one who, so far as Africa is concerned, deserves to be ranked with Stanley and Livingstone. He was born on March 19, 1821, at Barham House, Herts, of old families on both sides, and with a heritage of fighting and wandering propensities. It is curious now to think that Burton was sent to Oxford with a view to taking orders. He soon destroyed all prospects of any such career by getting himself rusticated. He succeeded in obtaining an appointment in an Indian regiment, and, while yet little more than a boy, his restless wanderings began. For half a century Burton lived a life of the fiercest intensity—equal to the lives of three ordinary men. Before his famous journey to Mecca he had published more than one book on his travels in India and neighbouring countries. Before attempting the hazardous enterprise to the holy city of the Moslems, in 1852, he took every precaution to delude his fellow-pilgrims into the belief that he was one of the faithful. His extraordinary gift of picking up languages made this easy; and whether his disguise was or was not penetrated, he succeeded in getting inside, and, better still, outside Mecca, to tell an expectant world of mysteries practically unrevealed before. This journey would certainly have made his name famous; but he meant to do even greater things. At that time it was as dangerous to attempt to enter fanatical Harrar as it was for a Christian to join the Haj. But Burton did it, and lived to tell the world the story of it; though he and Speke had a narrow escape when, the following year (1855), they attempted to reach the Nile through the Somali country.