222 SAGACITY OF ANTS. Chap. XVm. 



with the people of Katerna. Having proceeded six miles in a 

 N.W. direction, we reached lake Dilolo, which is about a 

 quarter of a mile broad at its eastern extremity, but attains 

 a maximum width of three miles, and a length of seven or 

 eight. It is well supplied with fish and hippopotami. I was 

 too much exhausted with fever either to explore its shores, or 

 to determine by astronomical observations its exact position. 



Immediately beyond Dilolo there is a large flat about 

 twenty miles in breath. Heavy rains prevented us from 

 crossing this in one day, and the constant wading among the 

 grass hurt the feet of the men. There is a footpath all the 

 way across, but, as this is worn down beneath the level of the 

 rest of the plain, it is necessarily the deepest portion, and is 

 therefore avoided. For this reason our progress was slow 

 and painful. 



I was much struck with the sagacity of the ants which 

 frequent these flooded plains. They erect for themselves 

 little houses of black tenacious loam on stalks of grass, at a 

 point above high- water mark, into which they ascend during 

 (SOthe period of the inundation. These tenements must have 

 been erected before the inundation commences, for, if they 

 had waited till the water actually invaded their terrestrial 

 habitations, they would not have been able to procure ma- 

 terials for their aerial quarters, unless they dived down to the 

 bottom for every mouthful of clay. Some of these upper 

 chambers are about the size of a bean, and others as large as 

 a man's thumb. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



The Kasai. — Crossing the kuana Lore.— Troubles in the teem 

 tory of the cliieoque. 



2 ±th February. — Ox reaching unflooded lands beyond the plain, 

 we found the villages under the authority of a chief named 

 Katende, and we also discovered that the plain forms the 

 watershed between the southern and northern rivers, for wo 

 had now entered a district in which the rivers flowed in a 



