310 STOPPED BY ROCKY NARROWS. Chap. XI. 



people of your quality." These men were very black, and 

 wore but little clothing. A young woman, dressed in the 

 highest style of Makonde fashion, punting as dexterously 

 as a man could, brought a canoe full of girls to see us. 

 She wore an ornamental head-dress of red beads tied to her 

 hair on one side of her head, a necklace of fine beads of 

 various colours, two bright figured brass bracelets on her 

 left arm, and scarcely a farthing's worth of cloth, though 

 it was at its cheapest. 



As w r e pushed on westwards, we found that the river 

 makes a little southing, and some reaches were deeper than 

 any near the sea ; but when we had ascended about 140 

 miles by the river's course from the sea, soft tufa rocks 

 began to appear ; ten miles beyond, the river became more 

 narrow and rocky, and when, according to our measure- 

 ment, we had ascended 156 miles, our further progress was 

 arrested. We were rather less than two degrees in a 

 straight line from the Coast. The incidents worth 

 noticing were but few : seven canoes with loads of salt 

 and rice kept company with us for some days, and the 

 further we went inland, the more civil the people became. 



When we came to a stand, just below the island of 

 Nyamatolo, Long. 38° 36' E., and Lat. 11° 53', the river 

 was narrow, and full of rocks. Near the island there is a 

 rocky rapid with narrow passages fit only for native 

 canoes ; the fall is small, and the banks quite low ; but 

 these rocks were an effectual barrier to all further progress 

 in boats. Previous reports represented the navigable part 

 of this river as extending to the distance of a month's sail 

 from its mouth ; we found that, at the ordinary heights of 

 the water, a boat might reach the obstructions which seem 

 peculiar to all African rivers in six or eight days. The 

 Eovuma is remarkable for the high lands that flank it for 

 some eighty miles from the ocean. The cataracts of other 

 rivers occur in mountains, those of the Eovuma are 



