38 A NATURALIST IN MID-AFRICA. 



I visited some very curious iron mines close to 

 the proposed station at Berkeley Bay. 



On reaching the foot of the low hills which 

 border the Victoria Nyanza at this spot, I could 

 see no sign of workings ; but suddenly an ex- 

 tremely dirty native emerged from what, in my 

 ignorance, I had supposed to be the burrow of an 

 animal. There were four or five of these holes in 

 a space of about 40 yards in diameter. They 

 are only about 15 yards deep, and have been 

 apparently scraped out by hand. The man (or 

 woman) lies on his back and scrapes the iron ore 



A. (Iui//al Set m ia H 1 1 1 __ Iron Mine s 



Fort' 

 Fbrkiss 



Fig. 9. — Section of Samia Hills. 



with his ringers from the roof and sides of the 

 burrow. This is then carried in baskets to the 

 neighbouring villages, where it is smelted by 

 means of goatskin bellows and charcoal. Some- 

 times it is carried as far as the frontiers of Usoga, 

 where I passed a market in which it was being 

 exchanged for bananas and fowls. 



The beds containing it appear to be about '200 

 feet thick, and are probably a late and local deposit 

 round the lake. The iron is found at two or three 

 spots close to the lake a little further south, and it 

 is also extracted from the other side of the Samia 



