io8 



NATURE 



[July s?', 1910 



river system of the Kubango (Okavango)-Kuito- 

 Omurambo and Kwando. These rivers discharge the 

 bulk of their waters into the remains of an ancient 

 sea, of which the Hainoma-Selinda-Mashi swamps, 

 the networlv of the Tauche streams, Lage Ngami, the 

 Hotletle River, and the Makari-kari salt-pans are the 

 vestiges ; but by two separate overflows — the Mashi- 

 Linyanti river-swamp and the Tamalakane outlet of 



the steppe flora of so much of irregularly watered 

 tropical Africa, and the rich forest and swamp flora 

 of West Africa. Seiner traces the approximate limits 

 of each phytosjeoirraphical region : the southernmost 

 boundary of the baobab tree, of the bulging-stemmed 

 Hyphaene palm (H. vcnUicosa), of the high-timber 

 forests of West African affinities, and the thin, low- 

 growing woods of Copaifera and Burkea. 



Ngami — the surplusage of the Okavango w-aters (the 

 drainage of eastern Angola) finds its way to the 

 Zambezi above the gorge of Kasungula. But the 

 complete elucidation of this puzzle still awaits the 

 results of an extremely accurate survey in which the 

 most careful attention will be given to questions of 

 level. Did this once huge South-west African fresh- 

 water sea, when at its fullest, discharge its waters 



Another noteworthy point in this exploration was 

 the additional light it threw on the distribution of 

 the Bushman-Hottentot peoples. It had been known 

 since the journeys of Serpa Pinto that a quasi- 

 Bushman race of red-skinned hunters extended north- 

 wards from the Kalahari desert almost to the south- 

 westernmost limits of the Congo basin ; but the con- 

 clusions of Pinto were rather based on fancied physical 



i distance of 3Q32 

 Schutzgcki, 



seawards through the Limpopo ; or did it pierce the 

 hills at Kasungula (some distance above the Victoria 

 Falls) and thus united what is now the Upper Zam- 

 bezi with the Gwai and the Kafue, and so create the 

 Zambezi as we know it to-day? Herr Seiner's journey 

 was singularly interesting because of his careful 

 studies of plant-distribution. In this region meet the 

 desert flora of the Kalahari and South-west Africa, 



NO. 2126, VOL. 84] 



resemblances than on language. Dr. Passarge — the 

 German explorer who has made several journeys 

 through the Okavango basin — added to our informa- 

 tion, and now Seiner extends our knowledge of these 

 people, speaking click languages, to the Kwando 

 River and almost to the Upper Zambezi. The 

 specimens of Bushman speech collected by Seiner 

 and Passarge enable these travellers to divide the 



