474 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
the canoe instantly to one side, where it hovered over 
the steep slope and brown waves of the left branch, 
from the swirl of which we were compelled to draw it. 
Five times the attempt was made, but at last, the sixth 
time, encouraged by the safety of the cables we lowered 
the canoe until it was within ten yards of Zaidi, and 
Uledi lifted the short cable and threw it over to him 
and struck his arm. He had just time to grasp it 
before he was carried over into the chasm below. For 
thirty seconds we saw nothing of him, and thought him 
lost, when his head rose above the edge of the falling 
waters. Instantly the word was given to ‘ haul away,’ 
but at the first pull the bow and side cables parted, and 
the canoe began to glide down the left branch with my 
two boat-boys on board ! The stern cable next parted, 
and, horrified at the result, we stood muttering ‘ La il 
Allah, il Allah,’ watching the canoe severed from us 
drifting to certain destruction, when we suddenly ob- 
served it halted. Zaidi in the chasm clinging to his 
cable was acting as a kedge-anchor, which swept the 
canoe against the rocky islet. Uledi and Marzouk 
sprang out of the canoe, and leaning over assisted Zaidi 
out of the falls, and the three, working with desperate 
energy, succeeded in securing the canoe on the islet. 
“ But though we hurrahed and were exceedingly 
rejoiced, their position was still but a short reprieve 
from death. There were fifty yards of wild waves, and 
a resistless rush of water, between them and safety, and 
to the right of them was a fall 300 yards in width, and 
below was a mile of falls and rapids, and great whirl- 
pools, and waves rising like little hills in the middle 
of the terrible stream, and below these were the fell 
cannibals of Wane-Mukwa and Asama. 
“ How to reach the islet was a question which now 
perplexed me. We tied a stone to about a hundred 
yards of whipcord, and after the twentieth attempt they 
managed to catch it. To the end of the whipcord they 
tied the tent rope which had parted before, and drawing 
it to our side we tied the stout rattan creeper, which 
they drew across taut, and fastened to a rock, by which 
