VALUABLE PRODUCTS. 555 



mountains of Rua (9° 4' south lat.) it is thirty-three miles 

 broad. Xo native ever attempts to cross it even there. Its 

 fisheries are of great value to the inhabitants, and the produce 

 is carried to great distances. 



"Among the vegetable products of this region, that which 

 interested me most was a sort of potato. It does not belong to 

 the solauaceous, but to the papilionaceous or pea family, and its 

 flowers have a delightful fragrance. It is easily propagated by 

 small cuttings of the root or stalk. The tuber is oblong, like 

 our kidney potato, and when boiled tastes exactly like our com- 

 mon potato. When unripe it has a slight degree of bitterness, 

 and it is believed to be wholesome ; a piece of the root eaten 

 raw is a good remedy in nausea. It is met with on the uplands 

 alone, and seems incapable of bearing much heat, though I kept 

 some of the roots without earth in a box, which was carried in 

 the sun almost daily for six months, without destroying their 

 vegetative power. 



" It is remarkable that in all the central regions of Africa 

 visited, the cotton is that known as the Pernambuco variety. 

 It has a long strong staple, seeds clustered together, and ad- 

 herent to each other. The bushes, eight or ten feet high, 

 have woody stems, and the people make strong striped black 

 and white shawls of the cotton. 



" It was pleasant to meet the palm-oil palm (Elais Guinea- 

 ensis) at Casembe's, which is over three thousand feet above the 

 level of the sea. The oil is sold cheap, but no tradition exists 

 of its introduction into the country. 



" I send no sketch of the country, because I have not yet 

 passed over a sufficient surface to give a connected view of the 

 whole watershed of this region, and I regret that I cannot 

 recommend any of the published maps I have seen as giving 

 even a tolerable idea of the country. One bold constructor of 

 maps has tacked on two hundred miles to the northwest end of 

 Lake Nyassa, a feat which no traveller has ever ventured to 

 imitatp. Another has placed a river in the same quarter, run- 

 ning three thousand or four thousand feet up hill, and named it 

 the ' New Zambesi,' because, I suppose, the old Zambesi runs 

 down hill. I have walked over both these mental abortions, 



