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the obstructions which seem peculiar to all African rivers in six or
eight days. The Rovuma is remarkable for the high lands that flank it
for some eighty miles from the ocean. The cataracts of other rivers
occur in mountains, those of the Rovuma are found in a level part, with
hills only in the distance. Far away in the west and north we could see
high blue heights, probably of igneous origin from their forms, rising
out of a plain.

The distance from Ngomano, a spot thirty miles further up, to the Arab
crossing-places of Lake Nyassa Tsenga or Kotakota was said to be twelve
days. The way we had discovered to Lake Nyassa by Murchison's Cataracts
had so much less land carriage, that we considered it best to take our
steamer thither, by the route in which we were well known, instead of
working where we were strangers; and accordingly we made up our minds to
return.

The natives reported a worse place above our turning-point--the passage
being still narrower than this. An Arab, they said, once built a boat
above the rapids, and sent it down full of slaves; but it was broken to
pieces in these upper narrows. Many still maintained that the Rovuma
came from Nyassa, and that it is very narrow as it issues out of the
lake. One man declared that he had seen it with his own eyes as it left
the lake, and seemed displeased at being cross-questioned, as if we
doubted his veracity.

More satisfactory information, as it appeared to us, was obtained from
others. Two days, or thirty miles, beyond where we turned back, the
Rovuma is joined by the Liende, which, coming from the south-west, rises
in the mountains on the east side of Nyassa. The great slave route to
Kilwa runs up the banks of this river, which is only ankle-deep at the
dry season of the year. The Rovuma itself comes from the W.N.W., and
after the traveller passes the confluence of the Liende at Ngomano or
"meeting-place," the chief of which part is named Ndonde, he finds the
river narrow, and the people Ajawa.

Crocodiles in the Rovuma have a sorry time of it. Never before were
reptiles so persecuted and snubbed. They are hunted with spears, and
spring traps are set for them. If one of them enters an inviting pool
after fish, he soon finds a fence thrown round it, and a spring trap set
in the only path out of the enclosure. Their flesh is eaten, and
relished. The banks, on which the female lays her eggs by night, are
carefully searched by day, and all