Burton and Speke (novel) incompetent, unable even to learn how to use simple measuring devices, vital to serious exploration. Despite these obvious drawbacks however, it is Speke who eventually discovers Lake Victoria as the source of the Nile, due to Burton falling seriously ill with malaria and having to be left behind in an Arab trading camp. Here their mutual antipathy turns to bitter enmity when Speke, breaking his word to Burton, claims sole credit for the discovery. Unfortunately for Speke his lack of accurate readings and sloppy map making skills lead the scientific world to doubt his word. Speke dies from a self-inflicted
Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772 and 1773 is a multi-volume account by the Scottish traveller James Bruce (1730–94) of his journeys in the Horn of Africa, which includes an eye-witness account of Ethiopian history and culture, as well as a description of that country and the neighboring kingdom of Sennar and the Ottoman province of Habesh. Bruce and his sensational stories were received with incredulity upon his return to London in 1774 after more than a dozen years of travel in