2i6 
In the Heart of Africa 
munication by signs and grunts, and when it came to the worst 
I used the magic word ‘ matabisch.’ I equipped them with small 
rifles (for the nectarinud(B), breakfast, and a case for the 
plants, and marched out at six o’clock. I really had intended 
to start earlier, but my three savages had not turned up. At 
five o’clock I watched the moon sinking over the Semliki plain, 
and, smoking a morning cigar, I gazed on the awakening of a 
new day, which broke in wonderful clearness. The sun was still 
below the horizon and it would take another good hour before 
it would be able to peep over Ruwenzori into our camps; but 
a 
the Wawunga mountains were already looming up like blue 
silhouettes against the clear sky, and opposite to them the 
bolder outline of the ridge which bounds the Butagu valley in 
the north. 
“We started out in the clear light of the dawn. On reach¬ 
ing the ‘ lower Belgian camp ’ we could see, away over the ridges, 
the white, snow-capped heads which had appeared so gigantic in 
the fog previously, and from the upper camp I soon saw that all 
difficulties were overcome and that I had been quite close to the 
goal on the cold, misty day when I first attempted the climb. 
Ulimbi rose gently up covered with mosses and grey alchemillay 
and at intervals grew senecio trees, stalk lobelias, helichrysum 
bushes, and shrubs of Hypericum keniense^ radiant in the warm 
sunshine, although frost still lay in shady places. Up we went, 
leisurely ascending almost imperceptibly to the edge of the 
plateau ; and then a spectacle of such grandeur confronted us 
that words fail to picture it. The cliff fell down precipitously 
to the dark surface of a dammed lake, and opposite rose wild, 
black and jagged walls of rock, between which the glaciers 
glimmered blue, torrents rushed down from the dazzling snow 
lines of three kingly heads, where silence reigned supreme. 
“We proceeded along the edge of Ulimbi to the 'chupa,’ the 
bottle which serves as visitors’ book, an object which will doubt¬ 
less not long be wanting on any African alp (on Ninagongo 
there must have been a good dozen). Unfortunately I had to 
break it, as it was impossible to pull the paper out; Schubotz 
