CHAPTER XIV 
Beautiful Uganda and the Nile 
W HEN the traveler in the “dark continent” crosses the great 
East African lake, Victoria Nyanza, and lands at the port 
of Entebbe, he finds himself on the threshold of one of the 
most fertile and beautiful kingdoms in the dark continent, lovely 
Uganda. This was formerly the seat of the most remarkable of the 
African native governments, and is now of as remarkable a colonial 
realm, for the old governmental system has been left unchanged under 
the shadow of the British protectorate. What the British have 
brought are the blessings of peace, of civilized habits, of education 
and Christian teaching; while no burden of foreign rule rests upon 
the neck of the natives, whose old system persists unchanged. 
What is to be found there can best be indicated by a brief descrip¬ 
tion of this singular civilization in the heart of East Africa. Extend¬ 
ing westward and northward from the Victoria Nyanza, reaching 
to and embracing the Albert Nyanza, and traversed by the upper 
channel of the Nile, Uganda is an extensive equatorial realm, its 
administrative capital of Entebbe lying nearly on the Equator, yet its 
elevation of from 2,000 to 4,000 feet gives it a partly temperate 
climate, while its vegetation has all the regal luxuriance of the 
tropics. 
Nowhere else in Africa is there a region to be compared in charm 
and attractiveness with Uganda. Different from all others in scenery, 
in vegetation, and in the character and condition of its people, it 
stands alone. In reaching it by sail, we leave the breezy uplands 
lying east of the great lake and enter a garden spot of the tropics. 
Entebbe glows with floral beauty—violet, yellow, purple and crimson 
blooms. Plants and trees of beautiful form and color grow in pro¬ 
fusion, before the Government House is a stretch of level green lawn, 
and in the distance the great blue lake and purple hills attract the 
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