nt. The course of the
Kasai, a river seen during Dr. Livingstone's journey to the West Coast,
and its feeders was to the north-east, or somewhat in the same direction.
Whether the water thus drained off finds its way out by the Congo, or by
the Nile, has not yet been ascertained. Some parts of the continent have
been said to resemble an inverted dinner-plate. This portion seems more
of the shape, if shape it has, of a wide-awake hat, with the crown a
little depressed. The altitude of the brim in some parts is
considerable; in others, as at Tette and the bottom of Murchison's
Cataracts, it is so small that it could be ascertained only by
eliminating the daily variations of the barometer, by simultaneous
observations on the Coast, and at points some two or three hundred miles
inland. So long as African rivers remain in what we may call the brim,
they present no obstructions; but no sooner do they emerge from the
higher lands than their utility is impaired by cataracts. The low lying
belt is very irregular. At times sloping up in the manner of the rim of
an inverted dinner-plate--while in other cases, a high ridge rises near
the sea, to be succeeded by a lower district inland before we reach the
central plateau. The breadth of the low lands is sometimes as much as
three hundred miles, and that breadth determines the limits of navigation
from the seaward.

We made three long marches beyond Muazi's in a north-westerly direction;
the people were civil enough, but refused to sell us any food. We were
travelling too fast, they said; in fact, they were startled, and before
they recovered their surprise, we were obliged to depart. We suspected
that Muazi had sent them orders to refuse us food, that we might thus be
prevented from going into the depopulated district; but this may have
been mere suspicion, the result of our own uncharitable feelings.

We spent one night at Machambwe's village, and another at Chimbuzi's. It
is seldom that we can find the headman on first entering a village. He
gets out of the way till he has heard all about the strangers, or he is
actually out in the fields looking after his farms. We once thought that
when the headman came in from a visit of inspection, with his spear, bow
and arrows, they had been all taken up for the occasion, and that he had
all the while been hidden in some hut slily watching till he heard that
the strangers might be trusted; but on listening to the details given b