-five men to pull
one boat with its full load. The cataract is one mile long and the
roughest part is at the foot and at the head. It was in this mile of the
route that afterwards three white men were lost. We got through this
cataract about noon and cooked dinner just above it. It must be
remembered that the route was entirely unknown to us all and that we had
to find our channels and often did not take the best one. From this out
I ordered my captains to take a different channel each, there being so
many, so as to find the best one for future purposes. The boats being so
equally matched, we could easily tell who had the wrong channel, for he
was soon left astern. The officer in charge, Col. Alleyne, who is
himself an experienced boatman, was so well pleased with our progress
that he never interfered but left it all to us. It must also not be
forgotten that the boys had been forty days travelling, doing no hard
work, before we took the boats and by this time their hands were very
sore. The rocky shores were so bold that poles could only be of use in
keeping off and it was impossible to assist by shoving ahead.

To say a word about the boats now, we all had come to the conclusion
that the boats and outfit were well devised for the service so far. We
had tried them now in various ways; we had sailed against a swift
current with a beam wind, where a flat bottom would have had to be towed
with lines, and the more this towing could be avoided the better it was
on account of the fearful track along the shore. The boats were
sufficiently strong for all necessary handling and in case of accident,
they were light enough to be brought ashore and turned over for repairs
without extra help. More difficult it was to find a good place on the
shore where to haul a boat out. The boats were provided with two sails
each, a sample of which (sails) I have brought home with me.

We camped next on Tangur island and the following day the 2nd of
November, we started to face the Tangur cataract. The wind being very
strong in our favor we tried to dodge behind the many islands, but had
to give up sailing in many places and get the lines out. We overcame
this cataract without much difficulty. Above the cataract it was
considered smooth water for about one mile when a very bad stretch was
met with about half a mile long. The river here is about quarter of a
mile wide, and full of large rocks between which the water came down
very "wicked" in cha