Chap. XIX. LAEGE WAVES ON THE LAKE. 371 



us warmly, as after a long absence. From this time we 

 trusted, implicitly to the opinions of our seaman, John Neil, 

 who, having been a fisherman on the coast of Ireland, under- 

 stood boating on a stormy coast, and by his advice we often 

 sat cowering on the fend for days together waiting for the 

 surf to go down. He had never seen such waves before. 

 We had to beach the boat every night to save her from 

 being swamped at anchor ; and, did we not believe the gales 

 to be peculiar to one season of the year, would call Nyassa, 

 the " Lake of Storms." 



Lake Nyassa receives no great affluents from the west. 

 The five rivers we observed in passing did not at tins time 

 appear to bring in as much water as the Shire was carrying 

 out. They were from fifteen to thirty yards wide, and some 

 too deep to ford; but the evaporation must be very con- 

 siderable. These streams, with others of about the same 

 size from the mountains on the east and north, when swollen 

 by the rains may be sufficient to account for the rise in 

 the lake without any large river. The natives nearest 

 the northern end denied the existence of a large river 

 there, though at one time it seemed necessary to account 

 for the Shire's perennial flow. Distinct white marks on the 

 rocks showed that, for some time during the rainy season, 

 the water of the lake is three feet above the point to which 

 it falls towards the close of the dry period of the' year. The 

 rains begin here in November, and the permanent rise of the 

 Shire does not take place till January. The western side of 

 Lake Nyassa, with the exception of the great harbour to the 

 west of Cape Maclear, is, as has been said before, a succession 

 of small bays of nearly similar form, each having an open sandy 

 beach and pebbly shore, and being separated from its neigh- 

 bour by a rocky headland, with detached rocks extending 

 some distance out to sea. The great south-western bay referred 



2 b 2 



