Chapter I. 



vast mountain covered ^\'ith snow. Following Its form downward, 

 I became struck with the deep blue-black colour of its base, and 

 wondered if it portended another tornado ; then, as the sight 

 descended to the gap between the eastern and western plateaux, 

 I became for the first time conscious that what I gazed upon was 

 not the image or semblance of a vast mountain, but the solid 

 substance of a real one, with its sununit covered witli snow." 



"Ruwenzori" is the one among many native names by which, 

 in Stanley's opinion, the mountain is most widely known in the 

 surrounding region. 



Of all tlie explorers who in the preceding twenty years had 

 travelled through these regions and sailed upon the waters of 

 the lakes at the foot of the chain, not one liad suspected the 

 near presence of vast tracts of eternal ice and snow hidden from 

 all eyes in the impenetrable cloak of cknid and mist. 



In 1864, Sir Samuel Baker had given the name of "Blue 

 Mountains " to the \ast shapes faintly seen looming through the 

 mists of tlie plain to the south of the Albert Nyanza. He did 

 not, however, form anv adec[uate conception of their real 

 proportions. 



Stanlev himself, in the Deceml)er of 1875, when actually 

 encamped upon the eastern slopes of the chain, relates, but 

 without comment, the descriptions given by the natives of the 

 shining white coloiu- and intense cold of peaks which he could 

 not see but which were said to be towering above him. 



Sir Harry Johnston mentions certain private letters written 

 in 1876 bv Romolo Gessi during his first complete exploration of 

 the shores of the Albert Nyanza. In these letters mention is 

 made of a strange vision which the writer saw in the sky, as if 

 of mountains covered with snow. Possibly he ascribed this 

 vision to an hallucination. The fact remains that the discovery 



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