Chapter X. 



spucinieus from tlu- iiiiul on the hanks. Laurent Petiyax and 

 Broclierel returned later to the lake and were able to confirm 

 the oljservation that it has normally no emissaries. 



While tlie members oi' the expedition were thus occupied at 

 Ibanda, the Duke of the Al)ruzzi was completing the exploration 

 of the mountains. He had left Bujongolo on the morning of 

 the 13th of July with the guides Joseph Petigax, Oilier, a native 

 soldier, a boy, and seventeen native porters including the guide, 

 a fine old man of fifty years. At the Freshfield Pass he was 

 joined by Sella and Botta, and they proceeded together as far 

 as Camp III at the foot of the western slopes of Mt. Baker. 



The valley of the lakes, which they had so often traversed 

 in rain and fog, now, on this fine clear day, seemed to ofter 

 an entirely new prospect. The sun, however, seems almost to 

 strike a false note in tlie dense and melancholy forest of senecios. 

 The helichrysums seem like skeleton flowers, and the scene is 

 grim, sad, lifeless and brooded over by an oppi'essive silence. 



On the following day, after a clear sunrise, the air again 

 grew dark with mists. They climbed to the Scott Elliot Pass 

 by the well-known way and set forth down along the gully 

 towards the Bujnku Vallev. Those who went ahead were in 

 incessant danger of being hit bv the stones which the numerous 

 party of natives kept rolling down, in spite of all precautions. 



From the foot of the gully, in a very short space of time, 

 after crossing the grotesque forest of senecio mingled \\ith 

 clumps of everlasting flowers, and interrupted at one point 

 by a brief marshy tract covered with reeds, they reached 

 the shores of Lake Bujuku (12,855 feet), a splendid sheet 

 of calm water upon which they saw a few duck. The 

 view of the peaks of Mt. Stanley and Mt. Baker towering above 

 them with their grim precipices was, beyond all comparison, 



264 



