BETWEEN THE ZAMBEZI AND THE PUNGWE 



fishes. Our negroes are clever fishermen, and used 

 large nets without checking our progress. 



On the 1st of February we reach the mouths of the 

 Urema and of the Mediguedigue. The flood 

 continues, and during three days the Pungwe rises 

 uninterruptedly. 



Its waters extend over a width of several kilometres, 

 with an average depth of about three feet. I now go 

 in the canoe where I had previously hunted on foot, 

 although the density of the submerged water-weeds 

 frequently arrests our boat. Among the curious birds 

 I kill, figures a duck of very large size, resembling 

 in the matter of plumage the Manilla duck : its beak 

 bears an enormous excrescence. Fishes also make 

 their appearance in shoals, and my negroes, armed 

 with two lines, brought in during a single morning 

 more than 240 lbs. of enormous cat-fishes which they 

 called m'sopo. As a provision against bad times, 

 I made them dry a considerable portion. 



While studying the hydrography of this district, 

 I continued to kill numbers of aquatic birds j a new 

 kind of teal with a red beak, black and green curlews, 

 geese, greenshanks, snipe, plovers, and lapwings. 



On the eighth we re-enter the Urema, and drop 

 anchor at the mouth of a large tributary which dis- 

 charges into the Pungwe a little below Macuire. Here 

 I obtain, in addition to the species already mentioned, 

 certain rails, in all respects similar to our own, as 

 well as two kinds of ibis, black and white. Puech, 



( 147 ) 



