THE ORIGIN OF THE SUEZ CANAL. 35 



with islets and which, extend for a hundred leagues, 

 over which distance the river is not navigable. 

 Father Knoblecher managed to pass through the first 

 islets, but he was obliged to go on foot to a rock 

 which is a hundred feet high, and from this elevated 

 point he traced the Nile, as far as the eye could 

 reach, flowing southward between two tall moun- 

 tains called Merek-Rego and Merek- Wigo. It would 

 appear from what is related by him and all other 

 travellers, that beyond the rapids the river again be- 

 comes navigable as far as the 4th or 5th degree of south 

 latitude, and that there it forms a bend towards the 

 east, afterwards coming back towards the north, and 

 having its source between the 1st and 2nd degree of 

 latitude south, at the foot of a large chain of moun- 

 tains called by the Somalis Kcenia, the tablelands 

 of which nearest to the sources are called by the 

 natives Kali-Mandjaro, or White Mountain. These, 

 then, would be the silver-capped mountains, or the 

 mountains capped with eternal snow, described by 

 the Monbaz Protestant missionaries, as well as by 

 the English navigator Short, who came from Zan- 

 zibar. 



" < Along the course of the White Nile, at the point 

 where the rapids are met with, the two banks of the 

 river are so close that the natives say they can shake 

 hands across them. The Catholic missionaries have 

 remarked that at several points a large tree is thrown 

 across the river by way of a bridge. 



