398 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1909. 
mountainous hills rolls away, range on range in glorious confusion, 
their steep sides darkened with trees, save where they are ‘scarred by 
clefts and sharp angles of bare rock. And below in the deep valleys 
the courses of innumerable streams are revealed by their coiling cov- 
erings of tropical green. From here, where I climbed to a height of 
4,000 feet, far away to the eastward on the horizon, I saw for the 
first time the gray blue of the hills of the Nile. 
Finding it impossible to reach the Nile by the river system to the 
east, owing to impassable rapids and hostile natives, I trekked with 
the boat te Yei, eight days distant. The rise along this road was so 
gradual that we were greatly surprised when near Aba suddenly to 
behold the huge panorama of the Kongo-Nile watershed. Behind 
us to the south lay the dark green vastness of the Kongo forests, whose 
monotony was here and there relieved by winding partings in its 
surface that told the courses of the rivers. On either side and to the 
north stretched endless plain, with an occasional lonely hill, and far 
‘away to the east the sharp peaks of a sierra chain. 
On October 13 I arrived at Yei and started to descend the river. 
At this point it is little more than a rocky mountain stream, 25 yards 
wide, and some 50 miles from its source in Mount Watti. For the 
first 20 miles we passed a succession of rapids in terrace formation, 
rendered more difficult by the obstruction of small green islands. It 
was laborious progress, sometimes only a mile a day was made, and 
the boat had to be got past the rapids by the men hanging onto the 
chain in the water from the stern. Sometimes trees, fallen right 
across the stream, had to be cut through. At other times, where a 
passage allowed, we took the risk and shot the rapids. The boat was 
now in such a battered condition that frequently after the passing 
of a rapid it had to be drawn out of the water, a fire lit, and the 
wax melted, and the wedges renewed. After this difficult 20 miles, 
the river decidedly improved, and a navigable reach of 15 miles 
brought us to the Azandi village of Kapi. It was at this place I saw 
the interesting ceremony of the signing of a treaty between the chief 
and an ancient foe. They met, each surrounded by his followers, 
and their headman made incisions in the chiefs’ arms, and with a 
feather mingled the blood of one with the other. 
From Kapi for 23 miles the river is good, with the exception of 
two rapids, the second of which was one of the worst, and certainly 
the most disastrous, we had to encounter. Owing to the tremendous 
current the men on the chain behind for a moment relaxed, and the 
boat was driven with terrific force against an overhanging tree. 
The shock swept off two of the polers, who disappeared into the 
torrent never to be seen again. 
In the open reaches we came across numbers of hippos, and their 
closely cropped feeding grounds by the riverside afforded us excellent 
