256 



THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



swamp. The night was hot and rainy, clouds of mos- 

 quitos rose from their homes below, and the cynhysenas 

 were so numerous that it was necessary to frighten 

 them away with shots. The labour of laying in pro- 

 visions detained us for a day at Maroro. 



On the 17th December we left the little basin 

 by its southern opening, which gradually winds east- 

 ward. The march was delayed by the distribution of 

 the load of a porter who had fled to the Warori. After 

 crossing a fourth rise, the road fell into the cultivated 

 valley of the Mwega River. This is a rush-girt stream 

 of pure water, about 20 feet broad, and knee-deep at 

 the fords in dry weather ; its course is S.W. to the 

 stream of Maroro. Like the Mukondokwa, it spreads 

 put, except where dammed by the correspondence of 

 the salient and the re-entering angles of the hill spurs. 

 The road runs sometimes over this rocky and jungly 

 ground, horrid with thorn and cactus, fording the 

 stream, where there is no room for a path, and at other 

 times it traverses lagoon-like backwaters, garnished 

 with grass, rush, and stiff shrubs, based upon sun- 

 cracked or miry beds. After a march of four hours we 

 encamped in the Mwega Basin, where women brought 

 down grain in baskets : cattle were seen upon the 

 higher grounds, but the people refused to sell milk or 

 meat! 



The next stage was Kiperepeta ; it occupied about 2 

 hours 30 min. The road was rough, traversing the 

 bushy jungly spurs on the left bank of the rushy narrow 

 stream ; in many places there were steps and ladders of 

 detached blocks and boulders. At last passing through 

 a thick growth, where the smell of jasmine loads the air, 

 we ascended a steep and rugged incline, whose summit 

 commanded a fine back view of the Maroro Basin. A 

 shelving counterslope of earth deeply cracked and cut 



