26 
NATURE 
| May 12, 1870 
What is, then, this nocturnal music? Is it the result ofa molecular 
change or vibration in the iron acted on by some galvanic agent 
peculiar to Grey Town ? for bear in mind that it is heard nowhere 
else, not at Colon, some 250 miles distant on the same coast, 
not at Porto Bello, Carthagena, or St. Marta. The inhabitants 
on shore know nothing of it. If any of your numerous readers 
can assign a likely cause, will they be pleased to state by what 
means, if any, its accuracy may be tested? If required, I can 
forward a specimen of the mud and sand taken from the 
anchor. 
CHARLES DENNEHY, M.R.C.S.1L, R.M.S. Shannon 
[Our correspondent should dredge.—Ep. ] 
The Newly-Discovered Sources of the Nile 
RELUCTANT as I am to meddle with geographical discoveries 
made by the ‘high #77077 road,’ I cannot refrain from protesting 
against erroneous statements, which, if left uncontradicted, may 
acquire currency. The zealous geographer of former times sought 
for truth and accuracy. ‘Treasuring truth, his knowledge in- 
creased with his information. But fashions are now changed. 
It has been found that one who starts in ignorance may every day 
alight on some novelty and wonder ; and that since anything may 
be proved by data made for the purpose, the best mode of treating 
preceding information is to corrupt, change, and distort it as the 
case may require, so that instead of fettering invention, it may 
serve as proof of endless new discoveries. Captains Burton and 
Speke examined the northern end of what they called Lake 
Tanganyika. They saw it narrowing to a point and enclosed by 
hills, called by the latter officer the Mountains of the Moon. 
Six rivers, they learned, flowed into it from those hills. They 
did not examine nor approach the southern end of the lake ; they 
differed in their accounts of it ; and Captain Burton, in writing 
that it was often circumnayvigated by the Arabs, made a state- 
ment repugnant to common sense. The pedlar Arabs cross the 
lake in ill-built boats, with savage crews, navigating only in day- 
light. They navigate it no more than is absolutely necessary for 
their trade with the interior, and not for pleasure or scientific 
purposes. Captain Speke measured the altitude of the lake, 
and on his second journey, going to a great extent over the same 
ground, he saw no reason to be dissatisfied with his previous 
hypsometrical observations, The result of his observation at 
Gondokoro was thought to prove the accuracy of his instruments. 
Yet the account given of the northern end of the lake is now 
rejected, while that of the southern end is obstinately adhered to ; 
and as to the elevation of the lake, the @ gviov7 geographers find 
it convenient to add 1,000 feet to that assigned by Captain Speke. 
Among the geographers of the new school, no one holds a 
higher rank than Dr. Beke. In devoting his labours to the 
mystery of the Nile, he very properly began at the base. He 
first adjusted the Mountains of the Moon and their everlasting 
snows. A warm admirer of Ptolemy, he nevertheless found it 
expedient to correct a mistake of the old Grecian, who thought 
that those mountains extended from W. to FE. inlat. 12°30'S., 
whereas Dr. Beke discovered that they actually lie in a meridional 
line across the equator, and not far from the eastern coast. With 
the boldness of genius he set this chain of mountains, on the 
alleged authority of the East African missionaries, in a region 
where these missionaries emphatically declare that there is 
nothing of the kind. But having removed the Mountains of the 
Moon from the famed Land of the Moon, he now unaccountably 
removes the sources of the Nile as far as possible from the 
mountains supposed to give birth to them. He places them 
1,000 miles S. W. of those mountains, on the eastern frontier of 
Benguela ; and this he does, forsooth, because Dr. Livingstone 
announces the discovery of the real Lakes of the Nile (a batch of 
20), just where Ptolemy set them, between Jat. 10° and 12° S, 
Had Dr. Livingstone an opportunity of looking at Ptolemy’s map 
he would have therein seen only two lakes, nine degrees 
asunder, and respectively in lats. 6° and 7°. But with time to 
study and understand his author, he would also have perceived 
that the positions thus indicated in false graduation are really 
close to the equator, respectively in 11’ N. and 39’ S. In Dr. 
Livingstone such a mistake is not surprising ; in Dr. Beke it is 
inexcusable. But the latter, being inspired with a new hypothe- 
tical discovery, eagerly seizes on anything that will help him to 
develope it. The river Casabi he deems the chief, as being also 
the most remote source of the Nile. Its course eastward he 
concludes on the authority of Ladislaus Magyar, whose scientific 
attainments and reliability he, of course, rates highly, But the 
career of the Hungarian proves only his leaning to savage life. 
From the Brazilian navy Ladislaus passed into the service of the 
King of Calibar; and thence again he made his way to the 
interior of Benguela, where, marrying the daughter of a chief, he 
found himself in a short time the leader of a band of expert 
hunters. In 1850 he started, with his wife and 280 armed 
followers, on an excursion to the interior. The province of 
Kiboque, in which are the sources of the great river Casabi, was 
soon reached. Its forests, he says, extend far and wide, in lat. 6°S. 
But as the province in question reaches little north of the 12th 
parallel, it is evident that the Hungarian’s science deserted him at 
first starting. He continued his march through Bunda, south of 
the river Lungobungo, in lat. 10° 6’ (13° would be nearer the 
truth), and at length after a 33 days’ march, crossing the Liambegi, 
he arrived at Ya Quilem, in Kilunda. Now, the Portuguese 
traveller, Graca, travelling from Bihé in a parallel route, arrived 
in 33 days at Catende, 100 miles west of the Liambegi, so that 
we cannot doubt that Ya Quilem was not far east of that river, 
and not to the north, but probably much to the south of the 11th 
parallel. Yet Ladislaus places it in 4° 41' S.! Such is the 
science on which Dr. Beke relies. When the latter says that in 
lat. 6° 30’ Ladislaus learned the eastward course of the Casabi, 
he totally misrepresents the facts. The Hungarian was much 
further south when he embraced the belief that the great river 
runs to Nyanza and Lake Mofo (near the Cazembe), that is, that 
it occupies the valley of the Luapula. Graca, who followed the 
river down a long way to the north, states his opinion (entirely 
mistaken by Mr. Keith Johnston), that the Casabi and Lulua 
are the head-waters of the Rios de Sena (the Zambeze). To 
these two foolish attempts at a great discovery must be added a 
third. Dr. Livingstone proclaimed that the Luapula flows into 
the Liambegi, and deforming their names, he reckoned among its 
tributaries rivers which run into the Lulua. If the concurrent 
and invariable testimony of three centuries can make anything 
certain, it is certain that the Casabi falls into the river of Congo, 
commonly called the Zaire. From the first visit of the Portu- 
guese to Congo to the present day, the natives, when interro- 
gated respecting the origin of their great river, have always 
answered that it comes from the Lake (Lobale) a-Kilunda (of 
Kilunda). This is properly the name of the country about the 
head-waters of the Liambegi, but the Portuguese, copied by Dr. 
Livingstone, apply it much more widely. The Casabi certainly 
does not rise in Kilunda, but it receives many streams from it, 
and unites with the Lulua, which is swelled by many more. The 
chief river of Kilunda is, we believe, the Lualaba, which turns 
westward to join the Lulua, while 8 or ro days’ journey further east 
the Luviri, a smaller, but still an important river, flows north-east- 
ward to the Luapula. Between them, in about the meridian of 
25° E., isa well-marked water-parting. The Lualaba is bordered 
by extensive sait marshes. One of its afiluents—the Luigila—is 
said to flow over a bed of rock-salt. Hence, the Lulua or Lolo, 
which collects these waters, is, as its name implies, a salt river, 
and remarkable for its excellent fish. Lake Dilolo (the cerebral 
d here takes the place of 7), has, for the same reason, an equal 
reputation. Fish, salt, and copper are the products which 
chiefly support the trade of the African interior, and the 
great emporium of this trade is Katanga, on the River Luviri. 
T now turn to Mr. Keith Johnston, who rejects, but not on the 
best. grounds, Dr. Beke’s hypothesis that the Casabi is the 
source of the Nile, and at the same time proposes another 
equally objectionable, namely, that the Chambezi, that is, the 
Luapula, flows round by the north and west into the river of 
Congo. Surely such extravagant conjectures would never be 
brought forward if, in the quarters that exercise an influence 
on geography, fair play were allowed to the information and 
common sense of all parties. An ignorant and overbearing 
patronage has the power of spreading darkness around. Mr. 
K. Johnston unfortunately fixed his attention on a sentence of 
Dr. Livingstone’s letter, which is fitted only to mislead-—a sen- 
tence, the dangerous indistinctness of which was pointed out by 
me in an early number of this paper (NATURE No. 3). Dr. L. 
plainly says that the Luapula flows down north past the 
town of the Cazembe, and 12 wiles delow it, enters lake Moero. 
The traveller here states not what he saw, for the Luapula is 
some miles west of the Cazembe’s town, but what he miscon- 
ceived. He may have meant that twelve miles from the town, 
towards the S.W., the river issues from the lake. It is easy 
to show that Lake Moero (a name made for convenience by 
strangers, but not used by the natives) lies to the S.W. of 
the Cazembe. Dr. L., when he first visited the Cazembe, 
