442 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
species of clambering vines, caoutchouc creepers, llianes, 
and endless lengths of rattan-cane intermeshecl and en- 
tangled, was jealously sheltered from sunlight by high, 
over-arching, and interlacing branches of fine grey- 
stemmed Rubiacese, camwood and bombax, teak, elais 
palms, ficus, with thick fleshy leaves, and tall gum-trees. 
Such is the home of the elephants, which through this 
undergrowth have trodden the only paths available. In 
the forks of trees were seen large lumps, a spongy ex- 
crescence which fosters orchids and tender ferns, and 
from many of the branches depended the Usnese moss 
in graceful and delicate fringes. Along the brown 
clayey shores, wherever there is the slightest indentation 
in the banks and still water, were to be found the 
Cyperacese sedge, and in deeper recesses and shallow 
water the papyrus. 
In such cool, damp localities as the low banks near 
the confluence of these two important streams, ento- 
mologists might revel. The Myriapedes, with their 
lengthy sinuous bodies of bright shiny chocolate or deep 
black colour, are always one of the first species to attract 
one’s attention. Next come the crowded lines of brown, 
black, or yellow ants, and the termites, which, with an 
insatiable appetite for destruction, are ever nibbling, 
gnawing, and prowling. If the mantis does not arrest 
the eye next, it most assuredly will be an unctuous earth 
caterpillar, with its polished and flexible armour, sugges- 
tive of slime and nausea. The mantis among insects 
is like the python among serpents. Its strange figure, 
trance-like attitudes, and mysterious ways have in all 
countries appealed to the imagination of the people. 
Though sometimes five inches in length, its waist is 
only about the thickness of its leg. Gaunt, weird, and 
mysterious in its action, it is as much a wonder among 
insects as a mastodon would be in a farmyard. The 
ladybird attracts the careless eye, as it slowly wanders 
about, by its brilliant red, spotted with black — but if I 
were to enter into details of the insect life I saw within 
the area of a square foot, an entire chapter might readily 
be filled. But to write upon the natural wonders of the 
