544 CONFORMATION OF COUNTRY. Chap. XXVH. 



them into Africa, either for the advancement of scientific know- 

 ledge, or for the purposes of trade or benevolence. In the case of 

 the eastern ridge, we have water-carriage, with only one short rapid 

 as an obstruction, right up to its base ; and if a quick passage 

 can be effected during the healthy part of the year, there would 

 be no danger of loss of health during a long stay on these high 

 lands afterwards. How much further do these high ridges extend ? 

 The eastern one seems to bend in considerably towards the great 

 falls ; and the strike of the rocks indicating that, further to 

 the N.N.E. than my investigations extend, it may not, at a few 

 degrees of latitude beyond, be more than 300 or 350 miles from 

 the coast. They at least merit inquiry, for they afford a prospect 

 to Europeans, of situations superior in point of salubrity to any of 

 those on the coast : and so on the western side of the continent ; 

 for it is a fact that many parts in the interior of Angola, which 

 were formerly thought to be unhealthy on account of then* distance 

 inland, have been found, as population advanced, to be the most 

 healthy spots in the country. Did the great Niger expedition 

 turn back when near such a desirable position for its stricken 

 and prostrate members ? 



The distances from top to top of the ridges may be about 

 10° of longitude, or 600 geographical miles. I cannot hear of a 

 lull on either riclge, and there are scarcely any in the space 

 enclosed by them. The Monakadze is the highest, but that is 

 not more than a thousand feet above the flat valley. On account 

 of tliis want of hills in the part of the country winch, by gentle 

 undulations, leads one insensibly up to an altitude of 5000 feet 

 above the level of the sea, I have adopted the agricultural term 

 ridges, for they partake very much of the character of the oblong 

 mounds with which we are all familiar. And we shall yet see 

 that the mountains which are met with outside these ridges, are 

 only a low fringe, many of which are not of much greater altitude 

 than even the bottom of the great central valley. If we leave out 

 of view the greater breadth of the central basin at other parts, and 

 speak only of the comparatively narrow part formed by the bend 

 to the westward of the eastern ridge, we might say that the form of 

 this region is a broad furrow in the middle, with an elevated ridge 

 about 200 miles broad on either side, the land sloping thence, 

 on both sides, to the sea. If I am right in believing the granite 



