164 ME. G. W. LAMPLUGH ON THE [May I907, 



information may be gleaned from his descriptions. 1 The writings 

 of the numerous later travellers who have recorded their journeyiugs 

 through this part of the country contain no material addition to 

 our knowledge of its structure. 2 



With the beginning of a technical literature within the last few 

 years, the geology of the whole region has been placed on a firmer 

 basis. In a paper contributed to this Society in 1903, 3 Mr. A. J. 

 C. Molyneux, F.G.S., described the sedimentary rocks of a broad 

 strip of country south of the Zambezi, nearly conterminous with 

 the eastern margin of the tract with which I have to deal, and 

 evidently related to it in structure. In a later paper 4 Mr. Molyneux 

 discussed the geological and physiographical features of the 

 Yictoria Falls, and showed that the singular chasm into which the 

 Zambezi plunges at this spot has been developed by normal erosion, 

 and not, as popularly supposed, by a sudden rending of the earth's 

 crust. 5 In this paper the term ' Batoka Basalt ' is introduced for 

 the basic lavas that form the country -rock around the Falls. 



1 'Travels in the Interior of South Africa' vol. ii (London, 1868) chaps. 

 iv-xi, pp. 83-278. 



2 Some scraps may be gleaned from the following : — ' Explorations in South- 

 West Africa ' by Thomas Baines (London, 1864) ; ' To the Yictoria Falls of 

 the Zambesi ' by Eduard Mohr (Engl, transl. by N. D'Anvers, London, 1876) ; 

 ' Seven Years in South Africa : Travels, Researches, & Hunting Adventures 

 etc' by Emil Holub (Engl, transl. by E. E. Frewer, London, 1881, two 

 vols.); 'How I crossed Africa' by Major Serpa Pinto (Engl, transl. by 

 A. Elwes, London, 1881, two vols.); 'A Hunter's Wanderings in Africa 'by 

 F. C. Selous (London, 1890) ; 'The New Africa' by Aurel Schulz & August 

 Hammar (London, 1897) ; and later works by Major A. St. H. Gibbons and by 

 Col. C. Harding, to which reference will be made in the context. 



3 ' The Sedimentary Deposits of Southern Ehodesia ' Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 

 vol. lix (1903) pp. 266-90. 



4 'The Physical History of the Yictoria Falls' Geogr. Journ. vol. xxv 

 (1905) pp. 40-55. 



5 Although this idea of Livingstone's was repeated by all later travellers and 

 had obtained general currency, it must be remembered that so long ago as 

 1865, Sir Archibald Geikie, now our President, had already recognized the 

 real character of the Batoka Gorge. In the first edition of his 'Scenery 

 of Scotland ' (Macmillan, 1865), after pointing out that in countries where 

 the rainfall is small and frosts trifling or unknown, the rivers will cut 

 perpendicular chasms of great depth, he remarks : — ' Thus the Zambesi in 

 plunging over the precipice at the Yictoria Falls enters a gorge 100 feet deep 

 [the depth originally assigned to it by Livingstone] and only 80 feet broad, 

 which runs in a zigzag course for many miles. The river seems to have cut its 

 way backward through this winding ravine until, owing to some subterranean 

 movement, effecting a change of level, or to some other cause which would 

 probably be detected by a geologist on the spot, the body of water in place of 

 entering at the top of the ravine has been emptied over one of its sides ' 

 (p. 33). And in a footnote on the same page, referring to his examination of 

 the model of the Yictoria Falls (now in the possession of the Boyal Geo- 

 graphical Society) which had been prepared from Livingstone's description, our 

 President adds ' In looking at it I was much struck with the re- 

 semblance of the so-called "gigantic fissure" to a ravine cut by the action of 

 a stream where springs, rains, and frosts have played only a subordinate part.' 

 The foregoing passages were written when Livingstone's great discovery of the 

 Falls was still novel ; they were not reprinted in the later editions of the 

 book, probably because, after the first flush of interest in the Falls had passed, 

 it was felt that this reference to them was not well placed in a description of 

 Scotland. 



