Miscellaneous. 169 
of bare rocks alternating with a score of narrow falls, any one of which 
would make an English county famous. When the river is full, these 
may probably be blended into one or two larger falls. Near the east end 
of the chasm are two falls of considerable size, though nothing like the 
two betwixt the islands. The spray from these last is thrown up to an 
immense height. We saw the mass of vapour from a Batoka village four- 
and-twenty miles beyond, at which distance it appeared to be 300 feet. 
high. The early morning sun paints this vapoury mass with all the 
colours of the rainbow. It descends in a never-ending shower upon the 
large green trees opposite, from the leaves of which heavy drops are con- 
stantly falling. No bird sits and sings upon their twigs, or builds her 
nest amidst their branches. Hornbills and flocks of a pretty little black 
bird with brownish wings flitted across from the mainland to the islands, 
and thence to the promontory and back again; but they always shunned 
the evergreen trees, ever dripping with ever-falling showers. After a 
descent of some twenty feet the white waters suddenly became, as it were, 
animated. Comets, with heads resembling stars of the first magnitude, 
spring into existence, and leap out like living things, three, eight, or a 
dozen score at once, till the whole Fall seems like a mass of salient comets, 
each having a distinct and beautiful train of pure white vapour. Every 
few seconds some vigorous little fellow, as if anxious to escape the in- 
evitable abyss, springs out far beyond the range of his companions, with 
a long train waving behind him. If Niagara has any such phenomenon, 
I failed to observe it, and never saw anything of the kind in any other 
waterfall. We tried to get to the bottom of the chasm at its east end. A 
too adventurous antelope had made the attempt before us, and got within 
fifty feet of the lowest ground. He could proceed no further, and there 
left its bones and horns; and, though we got back with ours, we would 
not advise any one else to try the experiment. 
OBITUARY. 
The Rev. John Stevens Henslow, Professor of Botany in the University 
of Cambridge, was born at Rochester on the 6th of February 1796, 
where his father.was a solicitor. He was the eldest of eleven children, 
of whom four sisters only survive him. His grandfather was Sir John Hen- 
slow, surveyor of the navy. He was educated first at the Free Commer- 
cial School at Rochester, and afterwards at Camberwell in Surrey, under 
the late Rev. W. Jephson, D.D. At the latter institution he acquired a 
taste for collecting, arranging, and illustrating objects of natural history. 
This became a ruling passion through life, and placed him in a high 
position as a benefactor of mankind. He entered St John’s College, 
Cambridge, in October 1814. He graduated B.A. (16th Wrangler) in 
1818, and in the same year he was elected a Fellow of the Linnean 
Society. During his college career he devoted himself assiduously to 
science, which in those days did not occupy a prominent position in the 
University of Cambridge. He studied Chemistry under Prof. Cumming, 
and Mineralogy under Dr Clarke. He also prosecuted geology with 
vigour, and in 1819 became a Fellow of the Geological Society. In 1821 
he passed on to M.A., and during that year he communicated to the Geo- 
logical Society “Observations on Dr Roger’s Account of the Isle of Man,”’ 
and to the Cambridge Philosophical Transactions an account of the 
Geology of the Isle of Anglesea. 
In 1822 he was elected Professor of Mineralogy, succeeding Dr Clarke, 
the celebrated Russian traveller. He held this office for three years. 
In July 1825 he succeeded Martyn as Professor of Botany in the Univer- 
sity of Cambridge, and resigned the Mineralogical Chair. He now made 
NEW SERIES.—VOL. XIv. NO. I.— JULY 1861. Y 
