iii
PREFACE.
In the course of this process, it has been found, that our traveller’s ¬
bearings by the compass are not always to be relied on,
Those which were obviously incorrect, and useless for geographical
purposes, have been omitted in the Journal ; some instances of the
same kind, which did not occur to the Editor until the sheets were
printed, are noticed in the Errata, and if a few still remain, the
reader is intreated not to consider them as proofs of negligence in
the formation of the maps, which have been carefully constructed
from Burckhardt’s materials, occasionally assisted and corrected
by other extant authorities. One cannot easily decide, whether the
errors in our traveller’s bearings are chiefly to be attributed to the
variable nature of the instrument, or to the circumstances of haste
and concealment under which he was often obliged to take his
observations, though it is sufficiently evident that he fell into the
error, not uncommon with unexperienced travellers, of multiplying
bearings to an excessive degree, instead of verifying a smaller number, ¬
and measuring intermediate angles with a pocket sextant.
However his mistakes may have arisen, the consequence has been,
that some parts of the general map illustrative of his journeys in
Syria and the Holy Land have been constructed less from his
bearings than from his distances in time, combined with those of
other travellers, and checked by some known points on the coast.
Hence also a smaller scale has been chosen for that map than
may be formed from the same materials when a few points in the
interior are determined by celestial observations. In the mean time
it is hoped, that the present sketch will be sufficient to enable the
reader to pursue the narrative without much difficulty, espeçially
as the part of Syria which the traveller examined with more
minuteness than any other, the Haouran, is illustrated by a map
upon a larger scale, which has been composed from two delineations ¬
made by him in his two journeys in that province.
