212 THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



Mwanza to the southern frontier of Karagwah is a land 

 journey of one month, or a sea voyage of five days 

 towards the N. N. W. and then to the north. They also 

 pointed out the direction of Unyoro N. 20° W. 

 The Arab merchants of Kazeh have seen the Nyanza 

 opposite Weranhanja, the capital district of Armanika, 

 King of Karagwah, and declare that it receives the 

 Kitangure River, whose mouth has been placed about the 

 equator. Beyond that point all is doubtful. The mer- 

 chants have heard that Suna, the late despot of Uganda, 

 built matumbi, or undecked vessels, capable of contain- 

 ing forty or fifty men, in order to attack his enemies, 

 the Wasoga, upon the creeks which indent the western 

 shores of the Nyanza. This, if true, would protract the 

 lake to between 1° and 1° 30' of N. lat., and give it 

 a total length of about 4° or 250 miles. This point, 

 however, is still involved in the deepest obscurity. Its 

 breadth was estimated as follows. A hill, about 200 

 feet above the water-level, shows a conspicuous landmark 

 on the eastern shore, which was set down as forty miles 

 distant. On the south-western angle of the line from 

 the same point ground appeared ; it was not, however, 

 perceptible on the north-west. The total breadth, 

 therefore, has been assumed at eighty miles, — a figure 

 which approaches the traditions unconsciously chronicled 

 by European geographers. In the vicinity of Usoga 

 the lake, according to the Arabs, broadens out : of this, 

 however, and in fact of all the formation north of the 

 equator, it is at present impossible to arrive at certainty. 



The Nyanza is an elevated basin or reservoir, the 

 recipient of the surplus monsoon-rain which falls in the 

 extensive regions of the Wamasai and their kinsmen to 

 the east, the Karagwah line of the Lunar Mountains to 

 the west, and to the south Usukuma or Northern 



