218 THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



from a broad expanse of water like the great Nyanza 

 reservoir. 



The periodical swelling of the Nyanza Lake, which, 

 flooding a considerable tract of land on the south, may 

 be supposed — as it lies flush with the basal surface of 

 the country — to inundate extensively all the low lands 

 that form its periphery, forbids belief in the possibility 

 of its being the head-stream of the Nile, or the reservoir 

 of its periodical inundation. In Karagwah, upon the 

 western shore, the masika or monsoon lasts from October 

 to May or J une, after which the dry season sets in. The 

 Egyptian Expedition found the river falling fast at the 

 end of January, and they learned from the people that 

 it would again rise about the end of March, at which 

 season the sun is vertical over the equator. About the 

 summer solstice (June), when the rains cease in the 

 regions south of and upon the equator, the White Nile 

 begins to flood. Erom March to the autumnal equinox 

 (September) it continues to overflow its banks till it 

 attains its magnitude, and from that time it shrinks 

 through the winter solstice (December) till March. The 

 Nile is, therefore, full during the dry season and low 

 during the rainy season south of and immediately upon 

 the equator. And as the northern counterslope of 

 Kenia will, to a certain extent, be a lee-land, like Ugogo, 

 it cannot have the superfluity of moisture necessary to 

 send forth a first-class stream. The inundation is 

 synchronous with the great falls of the northern equa- 

 torial regions, which extend from July to September, 

 and is dependent solely upon the tropical rains. It is, 

 therefore, probable that the true sources of the " Holy 

 Kiver" will be found to be a network of runnels and 

 rivulets of scanty dimensions, filled by monsoon torrents, 

 and perhaps a little swollen by melted snow on the 



