400 ME. T. CODRINGTON ON THE [Aug. 1909, 



under the railway by a 30-foot opening half a mile south of the 

 river, which it enters half a mile lower down, and south of 

 this the spruits flow direct to the Zambesi. For them many 

 openings, as much as 12 to 24 feet wide, are provided to pass the 

 storm-water under the railway, and deposits of coarse detritus and 

 sand along their course show the violence of the streams in the 

 rains. No less than six of them cross the path along the river- 

 side in less than 1000 yards above the Eastern Cataract — dry, 

 shallow, and overgrown with scrub, they are easily overlooked in 

 the winter months (May to October), but become torrents in the 

 rains, and in heavy storms sweep over much of the ground between 

 them. Spruits from the southern end of the ridge enter the chasm 

 and the gorge below the Falls, one falling into the chasm imme- 

 diately below the Eastern Cataract and another into the gorge by 

 the ravine south of the railway. 



That which Col. Feilden considered to be Zambesi river-gravel, 1 

 near the ferry to Livingstone Island, and correctly described as con- 

 taining rounded pebbles of chalcedony, quartzites, and various other 

 rocks, with implements more or less waterworn, seems to be detritus 

 brought down by spruits from the kopjes and valley to the eastward. 

 It can be traced along the spruits across the railway to the higher 

 ground beyond, and quartzites from the Maramba Valley occur 

 in it. 2 



The implement of chalcedony described by Mr. H. Balfour 3 as 

 having been found by him on a newly-made road on the left bank 

 of the Zambesi, immediately above the Falls, appears to have been 

 derived from a similar deposit. The stones laid on the road, or 

 rather path, among which the implement was found came, it 

 appears, not from an ancient deposit of Zambesi gravel, but from 

 the detritus in a neighbouring spruit, either that passing under the 

 railway by a 12-foot opening, and falling into the chasm just below 

 the Eastern Cataract, or that rather higher up, for which a 20-foot 

 opening is provided. It so happened that on my first visit to the 

 place in May the path, probably near where Mr. Balfour found his 

 implement, had lately been made good after damage done in the 

 rains by stones from the spruit close by, and on it lay a good 

 specimen of artificially -worked quartzite. 



Mr. H. Powell, who was engaged in the construction of the 

 railway, has been good enough to give me particulars of the finding 

 of a perfectly-shaped arrow-head about half a mile to the east of 

 the Eastern Cataract. He describes it as being like and about 

 two-thirds of the size of fig. 4 (pi. xv) of Mr. Lamplugh's paper. 4 

 It was found in sinking a pit, under 10 feet of red sand, on the 

 surface of basalt which crops out from beneath the sand not far 



1 ' Nature ' vol. lxxiii (1905) p. 77. 



2 Judging from the present general character of the river, a deposit of 

 Zambesi gravel here seems to be in itself unlikely ; alongside rapids, and just 

 below 5 miles of comparatively still water. 



3 Journ. Anthrop. Inst. vol. xxxvi (1906) p. 170. 



4 Ibid. p. 168. 



