Note 9 — JAMES BRUCE.

In the biography of Bruce recently published there are a few mistakes in the account of this transaction, which, simple as it may appear, was precisely that upon which Bruce’s whole success in Abyssinia depended. Major Head says, that Father Christopher was the patriarch, that he accosted Bruce upon his arrival at the convent, and that it was he who addressed the letters to Abyssinia. Bruce, on the contrary, says that he was Archimandrites; and that it was “at his solicitation that Risk had desired the patriarch to furnish” him with an apartment in the convent of St. George. Nor was he at the convent to accost Bruce on his arrival. “The next day after my arrival,” says the traveller, “I was surprised by the visit of my old friend Father Christopher.” He goes on to say, that between them they digested the plan of the letters, and that Father Christopher undertook to manage the affair,—that is, to procure the patriarch to write and forward the letters.—Bruce’s Travels, vol. 1. p. 34, 35, 4to. Edin. 1790.