544 
CONFOEMATION OF COUNTRY. 
Chap. XXVII. 
them into Africa, either for the advancement of scientific know¬ 
ledge, or for the purposes of trade or benevolence. In the case of 
the eastern ridge, we have water-carriage, with only one short rapid 
as an obstruction, right up to its base; and if a quick passage 
can be effected during the healthy part of the year, there would 
be no danger of loss of health during a long stay on these high 
lands afteiwards. How much further do these high ridges extend ? 
The eastern one seems to bend in considerably towards the great 
falls; and the stril?:e of the rocks indicatiug that, forther to 
the N.H.E. than my investigations extend, it may not, at a few 
degrees of latitude beyond, be more than 300 or 350 mdes from 
the coast. They at least merit inquiry, for they afford a prospect 
to Europeans, of situations superior in point of salubrity to any of 
those on the coast: and so on the western side of the continent; 
for it is a fact that many parts in the interior of Angola, v/hich 
were formerly thought to be unliealthy on account of their distance 
inland, have been found, as population advanced, to be the most 
healthy spots in the country. Hid the gieat Niger expedition 
turn back when near such a desirable position for its stricken 
and prostrate members? 
The distances from top to top of the ridges may be about 
10° of longitude, or 600 geographical miles. I cannot hear of a 
hill on either ridge, and there are scarcely any in the space 
enclosed by them. The Monakadze is the highest, but that is 
not more than a thousand feet above the flat valley. On account 
of this want of hills in the part of the country which, by gentle 
undulations, leads one insensibly up to an altitude of 5000/eet 
above the level of the sea, I have adopted the agricultural term 
ridges, for they partake very much of the character of the oblong 
mounds with which we are all familiar. And we shall yet see 
that the mountains which are met with outside these ridges, are 
only a low fringe, many of which are not of much greater altitude 
than even the bottom of the great central valley. If we leave out 
of view the greater breadth of the central basin at other parts, and 
speak only of the comparatively narrow part formed by the bend 
to the westward of the eastern ridge, we might say that the form of 
tliis region is a broad furrow in the middle, with an elevated ridge 
about 200 miles broad on either side, the land sloping thence, 
on both sides, to the sea. If I am right in believing the granite 
