THE PIGMIES. 80 



these sources amongst the marshes of Upper Egypt. We know 

 now, but only within the last few years, that an hypothesis of that 

 kind would singularly shorten the course of the Nile. These 

 marshes exist in reality. All travellers in those regions have 

 dwelt on the difficulties they experienced in getting across the 

 inextricable labyrinth of channels obstructed by islets, sometimes 

 fixed and sometimes floating, which form the Sett, a real vegetable 

 barrier, of which papyrus ( x ) and ambatch ( 2 ) form, so to speak, 

 the framework, and which humbler plants, more especially the Pistia 

 stratiotes (Linn.) — compared, by travellers to a small cabbage grow- 

 ing something after the fashion of our duck- weed — serve to conso- 

 lidate. 



But these swamps, which begin a little to the south of Khar- 

 toum, become more defined towards the 9th degree of north lati- 

 tude, and cease entirely before reaching Gondokoro, about the 7th 

 degree. ( 3 ) It is known that the Nile takes its source much 

 further from, and south of, the Equator. It was in our hemisphere* 

 close to the 2nd degree of north latitude, at two or three degrees 

 west of the great African river, and in a totally different water- 

 shed (that of the Ouelle) that Schweinfurth discovered the Akkas, 

 ( 4 ) who are evidently the small men of Akistotle. 



The latter mentions also the small horses of the Pigmies, yet no 

 traveller has ever referred to this quadruped as forming part of the 

 fauna of the country. One might feel inclined to find in this con- 

 tradiction a motive for doubting the accuracy of the information 

 furnished to the Greek philosopher by the travellers of his time, but 

 an explanation can easily be given. Baker speaks of the very small 

 proportions of the cattle of the Baris, a negro tribe in the vicinity 



(1) Papyrus domestica. (Linn.) This deservedly celebrated plant seems to 

 have been formerly abundant all over Egypt. In his Lettres sur V Egypt e, 

 Savary certifies to having seen it still in a forest near Damietta ( Poiret — Dic- 

 tionnaire des Sciences Naturelles, Art. Papyrus). Yet Schweinfurth saw it for 

 the first time on the banks of the Nile at 9o 30' north latitude. (An cceur de 

 VAfrique, p. 97. ) 



(2) Herniinieria (AdAMSON) ; JEdemonc mirabilis (KOTSCHY). This plant, 

 which grows 15 and 20 feet high and has a diameter of 5 to 6 centimetres at the 

 base, is remarkable for the very low density of its wood. 1 1 is much lighter than 

 cork, and a man can carry on his back a raft capable of bearing eight people. 



(3) Discovery of the Albert Nyanza. New Explorations to the Source of the 

 Nile, by Sir Samuel Baker. 



(i) Aucceicrde VAfrique, vol. II, passim. 



