292 FROM ISHOGO TO ASHANGO-LAND. Chap. XV. 



scattered here and tliei'e. Abos-e and behind the 

 village was the dark green forest. The street was 

 the broadest I ever saw in Africa ; one part of it 

 was about 100 yards broad, and not a blade of 

 grass could be seen in it. The Sycobii were build- 

 ing their nests everywhere, and made a deafening 

 noise, for there were thousands and thousands of 

 these little sociable birds. 



Mokenga, being on the skirts of the interior moun- 

 tain ranges, its neighbourhood is very varied and 

 picturesque. The spring from which the villagers 

 draw their water is situated in a most charming spot. 

 A rill of water, clear and cold, leaps from the lower 

 part of a precipitous hill, with a fall of about nine 

 feet, into a crystal basin, whence a rivulet brawls 

 down towards the lower land through luxuriant 

 woodlands. The hill itself and the neighbourhood 

 of the spring are clothed with forest, as, in fact, is 

 the whole country, and the path leads under 

 shade to the cool fountain. I used to go there in 

 the mornings whilst I was at the village to take a 

 douche-bath. In such places the vegetation of the 

 tropics always shows itself to the best advantage ; 

 favoured by the moisture, the glossy and elegant 

 foliage of many strange trees and plants assumes its 

 full development, whilst graceful creepers hang from 

 the branches, and ferns and liliaceous plants grow 

 luxuriantly about the moist margins of the spring. 



Not far from Mokenga there was a remarkable 

 and very large boulder of granite perched by itself 

 at the top of a hill. It must have been transported 

 there by some external force, but what this was I 



