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Race for Timbuktu, The
By: Frank T. KryzaeBook Publisher: HarperCollins
Imprint: HarperCollins e-books
Format: ePub Encrypted (DRM)
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In the first decades of the nineteenth century, no place burned more brightly in the imagination of European geographers––and fortune hunters––than the lost city of Timbuktu. Africa's legendary City of Gold, not visited by Europeans since the Middle Ages, held the promise of wealth and fame for the first explorer to make it there. In 1824, the French Geographical Society offered a cash prize to the first expedition from any nation to visit Timbuktu and return to tell the tale.
One of the contenders was Major Alexander Gordon Laing, a thirty–year–old army officer. Handsome and confident, Laing was convinced that Timbuktu was his destiny, and his ticket to glory. In July 1825, after a whirlwind romance with Emma Warrington, daughter of the British consul at Tripoli, Laing left the Mediterranean coast to cross the Sahara. His 2,000–mile journey took on an added urgency when Hugh Clapperton, a more experienced explorer, set out to beat him. Apprised of each other's mission by overseers in London who hoped the two would cooperate, Clapperton instead became Laing's rival, spurring him on across a hostile wilderness.
An emotionally charged, action–packed, utterly gripping read, The Race for Timbuktu offers a close, personal look at the extraordinary people and pivotal events of nineteenth–century African exploration that changed the course of history and the shape of the modern world.
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| Title of eBook: Race for Timbuktu, The | |
| Release Date: 03-29-2011 | |
| Publisher: HarperCollins e-books |
This eBook download is available in the following formats:
| Parent title | Race for Timbuktu, The |
|---|---|
| Encrypted (DRM) | Yes |
| SKU | 2370003275254 |
| File size | 4616 |
| Internet Security | n/a |
| Printing | Not allowed |
| Copying | Not allowed |
| Read aloud | No Sys requirements Download reader |
| Devices | Samsung Tablet, Apple Ipad & Iphone, Barnes & Noble Nook, Kobo eReader, Aluratek Libre, Iliad, Nokia, Blackberry, Hanlin |
| Note | ePub, short for electronic publication is one of our favorites and should be yours for a couple of reasons. ePub offers reflowable text giving you flexibility to manipulate how the content is presented. Moreover, lots of cool features are now being developed for the reader like advanced video and audio. ePub is now an industry standard, so all of the "non-propreitary" hardware manufacturers are now supporting it. |
Race for Timbuktu, The
Chapter One
A Scotsman at TripoliOn May 9, 1825, in the silver half-light of dawn, HM Brig Gannet sailed at six knots into the southern Mediterranean port of Tripoli, all but her foresail furled to reduce her speed in the propelling breeze. Having navigated the rocks at the bay's seaward end, she passed the dour battlements of the "Old Castle," the crenellated fortress that served as palace and principal residence of Tripoli's bashaw or ruler, before steering for the central harbor and the deep anchorage reserved for her. Whirlpooling zephyrs kept her circling for a half hour before she could position herself to drop anchor. The British naval vessel had made the journey from Malta in a leisurely six days.
On the bridge with Captain Bruce stood the only debarking passenger, a tall, trimly built man in his thirties who carried himself with the self-assurance of a military officer, though he was dressed in civilian clothes. A Scotsman, Major Alexander Gordon Laing was en route from England.
He surveyed the harbor and coastline with alert interest as the square-rigged vessel's anchor chain rumbled from its hawsehole. The Gannet's prow swung slowly into the wind, now a soft south breeze laden with the smells of land.
On shore, a half mile from the ship, the gray stenciled silhouette of the Moorish fortress broke the center of the city's skyline. Slender minarets, flat housetops, and sturdy battlements flanked it in a crescent westward. The delicate palm fringe of an oasis dimmed to the east. Green-topped minarets caught the sun's orange-gold light in a cloudless sky. The white-walled city shimmered through the curtain of changing light.
Captain Br
...
