404 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
three guns which now remained to us. Including my 
own guns, we possessed only forty-eight altogether, as 
Manwa Sera had lost four Sniders in the Ukassa Rapid, 
and by the capsizing of the two canoes in the tempest, 
which struck us as we crossed the Livingstone below its 
confluence with the Lowwa, we had lost four muskets. 
But more terrible for our enemies than Sniders or 
muskets was the courage of despair that now nerved 
every heart and kept cool and resolute every head. 
By river the cannibals had but little chance of success, 
and this the Mwana Ntaba after a very few rounds from 
our guns discovered ; they therefore allied themselves 
with the Baswa tribe, which during the night had 
crossed over from its islands, below the first falls. 
Until 10 a.m. we held our own safely in the camp, but 
then breaking out of it, we charged on the foe, and 
until 3 p.m. were incessantly at work. Ten of our men 
received wounds, and two were killed. To prevent 
them becoming food for the cannibals, we consigned 
them to the swift brown flood of the Livingstone. 
The Mwana Ntaba and the Baswas at length retired, 
and though we momentarily expected a visit from them 
each day, for the next two or three days we were un- 
molested. 
Early on the morning of the 6th I began to exjDlore 
the First Cataract of the Stanley Falls. I found a 
small stream about two hundred yards wide, separated 
by a lateral dyke of igneous rocks from the main stream, 
which took the boat safely down for a couple of miles. 
Then presently other dykes appeared, some mere low 
narrow ridges of rock and others, much larger and pro- 
ducing tall trees, inhabited by the Baswa tribe. Among 
these islets the left stream rushed down in cascades or 
foamy sheets, over low terraces, with a fall of from one 
foot to ten feet. The Baswas, no doubt, have recently 
fled to these islets to seek refuge from some powerful 
tribe situated inland west of the river. 
The main stream, 900 yards wide, rushed towards 
the east-north-east, and, after a mile of rapids, tilted 
itself against a hilly ridge that lay north and south, the 
