110 Dr. Beke o« the Sources of the Nile. 



It is unnecessary to go into further details to show the rea- 

 sonableness of the opinion that these " Mountains of the 

 Moon" form the soulh-easterti rather than the southern limits 

 of the basin of the Nile. As regards the southern limits 

 themselves, no more can be said, in the existing state of our 

 knowledge (or want of knowledge) on the subject, than that 

 they are most probably formed on the east by the basin of the 

 Lutidji or some other large river flowing into the Indian 

 Ocean, and on the west by that of the Upper Congo. It must 

 however not be omitted to be mentioned, that we possess evi- 

 dence of the existence, somewhere in this direction, of a great 

 lake, which is very incorrectly shown in the ordinary maps 

 under the title of Lake Maravi, and which is more correctly 

 designated Nyassi or "the sea;" an expression apparently 

 equivalent to the Arabic Bahr, which is used indefinitely to ex- 

 press a sea, a lake, or a large river, — the "great water," in tact, 

 of Africans generally ; but whether this "Nyassi" is connected 

 with the upper course oi' the Nile, or of the Congo, or of the 

 Lutidji, or whether it possesses a separate hydrographical 

 system of its own, like the Caspian Sea, we have not for the 

 present the means of determining. Should the latter happen 

 to be the case, then it may be the basin of this inland lake, 

 and not those of rivers flowing in opposite directions into 

 the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, which forms the southern 

 boundary of the river system of the Nile. But however the 

 case may eventually be found to be, the result will not mate- 

 rially affect the arguments already used on the subject; and, at 

 all events, some of the north-eastern arms of the Congo will 

 still have their sources at the waterparting between them and 

 the extreme south-western branches of the Nile. It is to be 

 hoped that Dr. Bialloblotzky, who is on his way to explore 

 those regions, will be enabled to clear up some of these dark 

 questions of African geography*. 



It only remains for us to consider the western limits of the 

 basin of the Nile; upon which subject an almost total want of 

 positive information precludes us from saying much. 



According to the information furnished to M. Werne by 

 Lakono, king of Bari, the direct stream of the Bahr el Abyad, 

 there called Tubiri, comes from a distance of thirty days' 



which they call coldness. But in this there is nothing singular. In the 

 Arabic and Aniharic languages, bered means cold (coldness) generally, 

 while bqrad (in Amharic more frequently barado) — which is substantially 

 the same — means Aaz7 specifically. — July )l, 1849. 



* Since this paper was read this traveller lias been compelled to abandon 

 his undertaking. It must now be left to more favoured explorers to per- 

 form what was hoped for from him. 



