“Starting in a hollowed log of wood — some thousand miles up a river, with an infinitesimal prospect of returning! I ask myself 'Why?”

—  Richard Francis Burton

and the only echo is 'damned fool!... the Devil drives'.
Burton to Lord Houghton as quoted in The Devil Drives: A life of Sir Richard Burton (1984) by Fawn Brodie.

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Richard Francis Burton 78
British explorer, geographer, translator, writer, soldier, … 1821–1890

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“Starting in a hollowed log of wood — some thousand miles up a river, with an infinitesimal prospect of returning! I ask myself 'Why?' and the only echo is 'damned fool!… the Devil drives'.”

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