June 13, 1859.] EXPLORATIONS IN EASTERN AFRICA. 355 



lake. A difficulty, no doubt, presents itself in the fact that the Nile, in 

 Lower Egypt, begins to rise in June, and continues rising until September, 

 the water being supplied therefore by a summer monsoon coincident with that 

 of Western India ; whereas Captains Burton and Speke represent the monsoon 

 they experienced to have commenced in the autumn — a monsoon that could 

 not produce a rise of the Nile in June. However, it has to be determined 

 whether or not the monsoon of the north of the Equator, in Eastern Africa, is 

 or is not simultaneous with that of the Malabar coast ; and the monsoon of the 

 south of the Equator similar to the N.E. monsoon of the Coromandel coast, 

 which begins in October. These questions now become of high interest, as 

 touching the connexion between Captain Speke's lake and the Nile. We 

 know that the Nile begins to rise in June, and that that rise must either be 

 owing to a monsoon supply of water, or to the melting of snows. We know 

 that in the case of the Blue Nile, in Abyssinia, the rising there is not occa- 

 sioned by the melting of snows, but by the monsoon, which is coincident with 

 that of Western India in the months of June and July. The question is, 

 does that monsoon extend southward as far as Captain Speke's lake, and con- 

 tribute to the rise of the White Nile as it does to the rise of the Blue Nile, in 

 Abyssinia ? The solution of this question alone is worthy of the labours of 

 another expedition ; but a great many other questions also suggest themselves. 

 The work is only half accomplished, and the reputation of our country demands 

 that it should be completed. My own opinion is, that independently of 

 any commercial advantages or sordid considerations, the Society ought, for 

 the simple investigation and verification of physical truths, to use its best 

 endeavours to induce the Government to send out a second expedition. For 

 the good name of England, let us have the doubt before us removed. We 

 have an inkling of the truth ; let us have the whole truth. Pliny was aware 

 of the western source of the Nile, and said that it issued from lakes lying below 

 the Mountains of the Moon. Now it is a singular fact, that the people in the 

 neighbourhood of Captain Speke's lake call themselves Mnyamuezi — men of 

 the moon ; muezi also signifying the moon. And this association may have 

 given rise to Pliny's account, that the Nile took its origin from the Mountains 

 of the Moon. Colonel Sykes concluded with again urging the Society to 

 address Government in the strongest manner to renew the geographical re- 

 searches in Eastern Africa. 



Mr. Galton, f.e.g.s. — Before making a few observations that occur to me 

 on the subject of the papers before us, allow me to remark how closely analogous 

 the gallant exploration of Captains Burton and Speke is to that which was 

 undertaken thirty-seven years ago in the north of this same continent. It was 

 in 1822, when Lake Chad, the populous Sudan, and the course of the Niger 

 were only known to the European world through unsatisfactory and conflict- 

 ing testimony of pilgrims and traders, that Captains Denham and Clapperton 

 made their famous descent from the north, right through the Sahara, to the 

 populous regions of Negroland, and the shores of Lake Chad, and by their 

 momentous journey we reaped the first fruits of that considerable knowledge 

 that is now possessed of those extensive regions. It is no small credit to our 

 associates Captains Burton and Speke that they should henceforth take rank 

 as the Denham and Clapperton of Eastern Africa. 



However, in that part of the map before us which has been filled in from 

 native testimony, there are some serious anomalies, which make me hesitate in 

 accepting it on the evidence we now possess. In the first place, the Lake 

 Tanganyika is represented as having no outlet, but as receiving more than one 

 considerable river, and the drainage of a highly inclined basin, whose area can 

 hardly be less than eight times its own. Not only this, but I am also assured 

 by both Captains Burton and Speke, that its level is reported to be unchange- 



