GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS AND DISCOVERY. 



335 



tract running up to Egyptian Soudan between 

 the White Nile and Tsad basins, taking in a 

 good part of Darfur and Wadai, also strips ly- 

 ing back of the eastern coast, and below the 

 Congo basin, and one dividing the interior 

 basin from the Loango coast ; (d) above 1,000 

 metres above the ocean-level, including the 

 great lake region, with a tract extending north- 

 ward up to and around the higher parts of 

 Abyssinia and Shoa, and another running across 

 the continent below latitude 10 S. This lat- 

 ter is a great, curved, irregular belt running 

 from the Red Sea to the Benguela coast, incas- 

 ing the highlands of Nubia and Abyssinia, which 

 include the greater part of the lands of Davro, 

 Waratta, Shoa, and the central part of Abys- 

 sinia, and the mountain systems among the 

 lakes ; these regions range from 2,000 to 3,000 

 metres altitude. In the Abyssinian region are 

 several mountainous groups which surpass 3,- 

 000 metres in altitude, also the single peaks 

 Gambaragare by Lake Victoria Nyanza (4,000 

 to 4,500 metres) and Livingstone by Lake Tan- 



fmyika (3,600 to 3,800 metres), and in the 

 enia system, Mounts Kenia (5,500 metres) 

 and Kilima Njaro (about 5,500 metres), which 

 two, with Mount "Wosho in Abyssinia (5,060 

 metres), are the only elevations which rise 

 above 5,000 metres that are known. The ex- 

 panse of territory, between the 15th parallels 

 above and below the equator, which rises above 

 1,000 metres is less than the area of from 500 

 to 1,000 metres elevation, and greater than 

 that below the plane of 500 metres above the 

 sea. 



Rev. 8. Macfarlane, in a voyage along the 

 southern coast of New Guinea, in the steamer 

 Ellangowan, found, at the eastern side of Hood 

 Bay, a lagoon, 15 miles in circumference, into 

 which a river flows, which rises behind the 

 Astrolabe range, and is 80 yards wide and 8 

 yards deep at its mouth. Farther eastward, 

 near Dufaure Island, he discovered a fine har- 

 bor, 8 miles by 4, and 8 to 10 fathoms in depth. 

 Along the coast from Amazon Bay to China 

 Straits, the natives are more numerous and 

 more intelligent and healthy. They had a 

 very fine quality of flax. Baron Schleinitz, 

 who was a member of the Gazelle expedition, 

 found the natives of McCluer Gulf and Melan- 

 esia very different from the true Papuans of 

 the interior of New Guinea. The complexion 

 of the inhabitants of New Hanover and New 

 Ireland was a rusty brown, and sometimes 

 hardly darker than that of the people of South- 

 ern Europe. They were a remarkably well- 

 built race. Only those in the south of New 

 Ireland and New Britannia resembled the Pa- 

 puans of northwestern New Guinea. They are 

 divided into numberless tribes, and each one 

 speaks a different language. Their boats are 

 too light for the open sea. The men go naked. 

 The women have strings about the waist, or 

 aprons of bass, cut their hair short, and wear 

 ponderous leaves as sun-shades. Their orna- 

 ments are pearls, shells, teeth, and tortoise- 



shell. The chiefs wear feather plumes, and 

 sometimes collars ornamented with rows of 

 teeth. They pay much attention to their head- 

 gear, sometimes dyeing one side of the head 

 white, the other red, and the top yellow ; great 

 wigs are also worn, particularly in New Britan- 

 nia. Teeth, thorns, etc., are stuck through the 

 nostrils. The natives of McCluer Gulf are, in 

 part, mixed with Malays. They are dolicho- 

 cephalous, and 1.595 metre tall on the aver- 

 age. Dr. Miklucho Maklay describes some 

 additional customs of the Papuans. They do 

 not celebrate a birtli or a death with any cere- 

 mony, but have a rite for circumcision. They 

 prepare a beverage by masticating leaves and 

 young shoots of the cocoa-palm. He thinks 

 the Papuan language does not contain over 

 1,000 roots. The island of Yap in the Caro- 

 line group, it appears, is inhabited by Papuans, 

 who, though less civilized, seem to dominate 

 the neighboring islanders. After an extended 

 tour through the Malay peninsula, this coura- 

 geous Russian traveler returned to his old 

 quarters on the coast of New Guinea, where 

 he was warmly welcomed back by the natives. 

 The maize introduced by him in 1872 is thriv- 

 ing finely. An earthquake has destroyed a 

 number of villages on the hills. 



Don F. P. Moreno, the Argentine explorer, 

 visited, in the beginning of the year, the partly 

 unexplored lakes which form the sources of 

 the Santa Cruz, in Patagonia. He ascended the 

 Rio Santa Cruz in a boat, with one compan- 

 ion, three boatmen, and two servants with the 

 horses. The head of the river was reached 

 with difficulty on account of the rapid cur- 

 rent. The lake from which the river emerges 

 lies in latitude 50 14' 20" S., longitude 71 59' 

 W. from Greenwich. He then crossed a table- 

 land of 2,500 to 3,000 feet elevation in a north- 

 erly course. It belongs to the tertiary period. 

 Crossing the Chalia a river described by Vied- 

 ma in the last century, whose existence was 

 questioned by Captain Muster, and which Mo- 

 reno had explored from its junction with the 

 Chico, for 90 miles, a few weeks before he then 

 came to a series of lagoons, surrounded by pas- 

 ture-land, and to the west of these to a hitherto 

 undiscovered lake surrounded by snow-capped 

 mountains, 3,000 to 5,000 feet high, which he 

 supposes to be an arm of a still larger lake. 

 The latitude was 49 12' S. He named it 

 the Lago San Martin. Returning southward 

 through a fertile valley, and crossing a moun- 

 tain plain of basaltic character, he came to 

 Viedma's Lake, discovered by that traveler in 

 1782, which is falsely called Capar Lake on th* 

 maps. It was the largest lake he had seen. It- 

 extends to the foot of the cordillera, the ac- 

 tive volcano Chalten rising from its upper end. 

 From the southern end, a river 200 yards in 

 width issues, latitude 49 48' S., connecting 

 it with the lake out of which the Santa Cruz 

 flows; it enters the latter lake in latitude 50 

 11'. As this lake, which, being distinct from 

 Viedma's, wanted a name, he gave that of the 



