310 



GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS AND DISCOVERY. 



the Galana Amara. Following the Nianam up to 

 6 north, where he received information regarding 

 its upper course which raised the question whether 

 this stream is to be identified with the Omo. Pass- 

 ing south from the eastern shore of Lake Rudolph 

 to the Tana, he followed it down to the coast. The 

 topography of this part of Africa will be quite com- 

 plete when the questions regarding the Omo and the 

 watershed between the Nile and Lake Rudolph are 

 settled. Dr. Smith reports having discovered some 

 new tribes, among them a race of pygmies. " These 

 people are of negro type and coal black and abso- 

 lutely naked. Although of great physical beauty, 

 with" well-formed limbs, they are barely removed 

 from animals, and their code of morality is very 

 lax. They are all between 4 and 5 feet high and 

 live in primitive wood huts. The only industries 

 are corn raising and the rearing of sheep and goats. 

 They are born hunters. In warfare they use poi- 

 soned arrows, the wounds inflicted by which prove 

 fatal in an hour." Dr. Smith brought home maps 

 and valuable natural-history collections. 



Another route through this part of Africa was 

 taken by M. Versepuy and Baron de Romans. 

 Leaving Zanzibar in July, 1895, they went to the 

 Kilimanjaro country, where they were prevented 

 by the hostility of the Massai from going on to 

 Mount Kenia and Lake Rudolph. Turning west- 

 ward, they visited Victoria lake and Mengo, the 

 capital of Uganda, and went to Lake Albert Edward, 

 where they again fell into conflict with the natives. 

 Crossing over to the Congo between the routes of 

 Goetzen and Stanley, they reached the western 

 coast by way of that river. 



Other journeys in the Kilimanjaro region have 

 been taken by Mr. P. Weatherly, Dr. M. Scholler, 

 and W. II. Nutt. The first-named, in going from 

 Lake Tanganyika to Lake Moero, took a more 

 southern route than any of his predecessors have 

 done, and Mr. Nutt reported reaching Lake Rikwa 

 by a route between Nyassa and the southern end of 

 Tanganyika. Mount Naldtumbe rises to a height 

 of 2,100 metres, and gives a view over the whole 

 Rikwa plain. This traveler confirms the opinion 

 of others that the lake is gradually drying up. In 

 the rainy season it covers the plain to the foot of 

 the mountains, but in the dry season its bed is cov- 

 ered with a stiff, hard crust. The territory about 

 Rikwa lake is the least known portion of German 

 East Africa. 



Dr. Oscar Baumann describes Chakwati lake in 

 German East Africa, not newly discovered, but not 

 yet laid down upon the map. It lies back of Kif- 

 mangao, a village en the coast between Dar-es-Sa- 

 lam and the mouth of the Rufiyi. Dr. Baumann 

 says Kifmangao is a miserable village of scattered 

 clay huts inhabited by a mixed population ; in onfc 

 part is a dirty settlement of Mohammedan traders 

 who have had a station there for years. Much 

 cleaner are the huts of the negroes who are mostly 

 from the inland districts. The place has a popula- 

 tion of about 1,000, and, miserable as it appears, is 

 not unimportant as the center of a trade in caout- 

 chouc and copal. Between the coast and the lake 

 is first a sandy stretch with light bush vegetation, 

 and on the eastern side of the lake rise the Kibun- 

 puni hills, whence a fine view of the lake with the 

 island groups of Kwale and Koma is obtained. 

 The water is brownish yellow with a scarcely per- 

 ceptible salty flavor. It has no visible inlet or out- 

 let, though at the north end there is a swampy arm, 

 which in the rainy season may connect with the lit- 

 tle lake Kiputi, lying just to the west, and having 

 on its eastern shore the little village of Kiputi. 

 The people about both these lakes are Wadengereko, 

 speaking a different language from the dwellers on 

 the Rufiyi. They raise potatoes, leguminous plants, 



sorghum, and manioca, the last-named especially 

 since the grasshopper plague appeared. The culti- 

 vation of this plant has greatly increased in East 

 Africa from the fact that the grasshoppers do not 

 touch it. There is no stone in the neighborhood ; 

 what little they use is brought from the coast. The 

 people have a legend of the origin of Lake Chak- 

 wati, saying that a village formerly occupied the 

 site of it, which was suddenly flooded and the in- 

 habitants turned into fishes, and they say that there 

 are still fish there which are warm-blooded and 

 which they will not eat. They are shy and timid, 

 most of them running away at sight of strangers. 

 Another lake still smaller than Kiputi, called the 

 Lufute, is said to lie still farther inland. 



The rapid development of Xyassaland in recent 

 years was described by Mr. II. II. Johnson, British 

 commissioner in British Central Africa, in an ad- 

 dress before the Royal Geographical Society. Some 

 of the details he gave were these : ' Agricultural 

 land four years ago was selling at from 1 cent to 

 6 cents an acre. To-day unimproved land ranges 

 in price from 25 cents to $1.50 an acre. Those 

 who have read Livingstone's description of this 

 wilderness when he first made it known to the 

 world will be struck by the amazing contrast which 

 Blantyre and the other European settlements pre- 

 sent to-day. In these towns are clean, broad, level 

 roads, bordered by handsome avenues of trees and 

 comely red brick houses, with rose-covered veran- 

 daS peeping out behind clumps of ornamental 

 shrubs. The natives who pass along are clothed in 

 white calico. A bell rings to call the children to 

 school. A planter gallops past on horseback, or a 

 missionary trots in on a white donkey from a visit 

 to an outlying station. Long rows of native car- 

 riers pass in Indian file, carrying loads of European 

 goods, or a smart-looking policeman in black fez, 

 black jacket and trousers marches off on some er- 

 rand. Native bricklayers and carpenters are build- 

 ing houses in the European style. Through the 

 open doors of the printing office natives may be 

 seen setting type for the little newspaper that ap- 

 pears every week. The visitor will see a post office, 

 a court of justice, and, perhaps, a prison, whose oc- 

 cupants, however, during the working hours are out 

 repairing the roads under charge of a black police- 

 man. On the outskirts of the towns are brickyards, 

 where the natives turn out thousands of bricks as 

 we'll made as those used in our own building opera- 

 tions. 



"The most interesting features in the neighbor- 

 hood of these settlements, however, is the coffee 

 plantations, which are the chief cause and support 

 of the prosperity of Nyassaland. Sixteen years ago 

 a small coffee plant was sent from the Edinburgh 

 botanical gardens to Blantyre, and from this plant 

 the greater part of the 5,000,000 coffee trees now 

 growing are descended. The mother tree is still 

 alive in the mission grounds at Blantyre." 



The course of the Zambesi has been carefully ex- 

 amined by Capt. Gibbons, and several of its tribu- 

 taries explored. His route lay through one of the 

 least traveled parts of the Zambesi basin. 



In the island of Fernando Po, on the western 

 coast, a Spanish missionary, P. Juanola, discovered 

 a small lake lying at a height of 1,350 miles. He 

 named it Lago Loreto. 



By a treaty between the Congo State and France 

 concerning their possessions in the Welle region, 

 the sultanate Ban^'issn. on the right bank of the 

 Mbomu, was conceded to France, and the Belgian 

 officers who had been administering it for a short 

 time were withdrawn. 



The English and French commission for estab- 

 lishing the line between Sierra Leone and the 

 French Soudan determined the source of the Niger, 



