324 
TEAVELS m CENTEAL AFEICA. 
realized it in my imagination. At that time_, although abounding 
in islands of rank reeds_, the navigable passages between them were 
from forty to sixty yards wide_, and from two to three fathoms deep. 
In the centre^ and continuing towards its southern extremity^ was 
a vast area of clear water_, in which I had cruised for days before I 
could find a passage through the shore-disguising reeds to effect a 
landing. Now^ as described^ these channels represented nothing 
more^ with the exception of two or three large pools^ than execrable 
stagnant ditches^, containing just water enough wherewith^ with the 
aid of axe and poles^ to propel our boats along them. Now in the 
possession of astronomical instruments and the knowledge of using 
them^ I was enabled to fix my points^, and therefore I am enabled 
to correct my dead reckoning of former years. The position of the 
island of Kyt is thereby reduced in a direct line of thirty miles^ 
as the crow flies^ due west from the White River, in lieu of sixty 
miles as subsequently laid down in the ^"Journal of the Royal Geo- 
graphical Society/^ by Mr. Arrowsmith, in 1865. 
In accordance therewith, I cannot but, on the other hand, avail 
myself of this opportunity to acknowledge the justice of that gen- 
tleman^s foresight in curtailing the length of my former overland 
route to the Neam Neam, at Mundo, to 3° 40' north, in lieu of, as 
I had erroneously imagined it, by unchecked dead reckoning, to 
reach to the equator. 
^‘^Notwithstanding the dried-up state of this lake, representing as 
it did a pestiferous swamp, it still was the vehicle for conveying 
three thousand and forty -two cubic feet of water per second to add 
to the volume of the White Nile ; what it would have contributed 
during the flooded state of former years I must, of course, leave 
to conjecture. 
'' Colonel Rigby, when Consul at Zanzibar, and other authorities 
