CAMERON RECEIVES THE FREEDOM OF THE TURNER'S COMPANY 675 



adopted by the young traveller. If his instruments did not deceive him 

 about the elevations at Nyangwe — which Livingstone took at two thousand 

 feet, and Cameron sets at one thousand four hundred — no water from the 

 Lualaba can run into the Nile south of Grondokoro, which is at the same level, 

 or even a little higher. But Schweinfurth has not so absolutely settled the 

 Nile Basin about the Bahr-el-Ghazal that we can be sure that no great 

 volume of water glides into the Nile amid that great wilderness of reedy 

 swamp, where all the lakes of Africa might lose themselves. As to the mass 

 of the element upon which so much is founded, it must be borne in mind 

 that the Nile has no tributaries at all north of the Atbara, and loses by irri- 

 gation and evaporation vast proportions of its contents, while the Congo runs 

 in a deep and walled channel, with so many feeders, that it is called ' the 

 swallower-up of waters.' 



" Again, deep as the Congo is, its current is commonly slow, and at the 

 farthest point known it was found coming from the north-east, while the 

 highly imaginative map displayed on Tuesday night at St. James's Hall 

 represents it as running almost all the way due west between the third and 

 fourth parallel of south latitude. Still more puzzling is the existence of that 

 large river, the Lowa, which the Lieutenant heard of as 'joining the Congo' 

 a little below Nyangwe. If this be, as Cameron believes, the Buri or Uelle, 

 it is the same which Schweinfurth thought ran into the Shari and Lake 

 Tchad, while Nachtigal holds that it is a head-water of the Benuwe or 

 Tshadda, which flows out at Cape Nun after mingling with the Niger. We 

 cannot help agreeing with Mr, Monteiro — who knows the Congo so well — 

 that the geography of Mid-Africa is far from being cleared up yet. The 

 Mayumba and Quillo are among many streams still without fountains, and 

 the elevation ascribed to the Lualaba at Nyangwe leaves, be it remembered, 

 not nearly a foot in the mile of fall, counting windings, for the Zaire's cur- 

 rent, which has to pass besides over the great cataracts, or Yellalas. Our 

 geographers must at least take care that, while disallowing the kingly claim 

 of the Nile by figures, they leave the precipitous Congo slope enough for an 

 outflow. The placid Nile falls more than a foot per mile between Grondo- 

 koro and the sea I These are but some of the considerations which warn us 

 to be careful until the Albert Nyanza and the Lake Sankorra country have 

 been investigated. The chances are certainly strong in favour of the Congo- 

 Lualaba hypothesis, but not so strong that they should be regarded as ren- 

 dered overwhelming by the gallant and meritorious journey performed on a 

 line five hundred miles south of this supposed rival of the Nile." 



Other honours have been conferred on our traveller. On the 22nd of 

 April, 1876, he was presented with the freedom and livery of the Turners' 

 Company. The proceedings took place at the Gruildhall, London, under the 

 presidency of Mr. Tapping, President of the Company. 



