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THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



Uzaramo or Unyamwezi, these mountains are a sanato- 

 rium, and should Europeans ever settle in Eastern Africa 

 as merchants or missionaries, here they might reside 

 until acclimatised for the interior. The east wind, a 

 local deflection of the south-east trade, laden with the 

 moisture of the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans, and 

 collecting the evaporation of the valley, impinges upon 

 the seaward slope, where, ascending, and relieved from 

 atmospheric pressure, it is condensed by a colder tempera- 

 ture ; hence the frequent precipitations of heavy rain, 

 and the banks and sheets of morning- cloud which veil 

 the tree-clad peaks of the highest gradients. As the 

 sun waxes hot, the atmosphere acquires a greater 

 capacity for carrying water ; and the results are a milky 

 mist in the basins, and in the upper hills a wonderful 

 clearness broken only by the thin cirri of the higher 

 atmosphere. After sunset, again, the gradual cooling 

 of the air causes the deposit of a copious dew, which 

 renders the nights peculiarly pleasant to a European. 

 The diurnal sea-breeze, felt in the slope, is unknown 

 in the counterslope of the mountains, where, indeed, 

 the climate is much inferior to that of the central 

 and eastern heights. As in the Sawalik Hills, and 

 the sub-ranges of the Himalayas, the sun is burning hot 

 during the dry season, and in the rains there is either a 

 storm of thunder and lightning, wind and rain, or a 

 stillness deep and depressing, with occasional gusts whose 

 distinct moaning shows the highly electrical state of the 

 atmosphere. The Masika, here commencing in early 

 January, lasts three months, when the normal easterly 

 winds shift to the north and the north-west. The Vuli, 

 confined to the eastern slopes, occurs in August, and, as 

 on the plains, frequent showers fall between the vernal 

 and the autumnal rains. 



