9 o THE TANGANYIKA PROBLEM. 



water from the whole drainage area of Kivu has been 

 entirely cut off from the Albert Edward Nyanza and the 

 Nile. And we see visible traces of this in the existence 

 of old water-marks and beaches running round the shores 

 of the Albert Edward and Albert Nyanzas, 50 feet above 

 their present level. 



Everywhere to the north along the course of the Nile 

 there are similar physical evidences and traditions of the 

 disappearance of old lakes, and it is extremely probable 

 that the shrinkage of the upper waters of the great river 

 of Egypt, which is recorded in history, is possibly still 

 going on, and is directly due to the recent changes which 

 have taken place in the modern volcanic dam between 

 Kivu and the Albert Edward Nvanza. 



Turning now to the south of the region of the volcanic 

 dam, the effects produced by its formation have been no 

 less conspicuous and strange. The whole drainage area 

 of Kivu has been added to that of Tanganyika ; and it is 

 a most remarkable fact that the outlet of Kivu, the Rusisi 

 River, is five or six times bigger than the Luakuga, the 

 outlet of Tanganyika itself. Were we, therefore, to cut 

 off the Rusisi River from Tanganyika, that lake would 

 altogether cease to overflow. 



The water of Tanganyika is somewhat salt. It seems to be 

 fresher now than when Livingstone and Stanley examined 

 it, while, as both these explorers aver, there are traditions 

 among the Arabs that, in the recollection of living men, it 

 was a lake which had never flowed out at all. 



From these considerations it would, therefore, seem quite 

 probable that after Kivu had filled up through the formation 

 of the volcanoes, its overplus of water flowed into Tan- 

 ganyika for a great number of years, until the level of 

 this lake was also raised to such a degree, that it, in like 



