untains of the Moon." From the top of the mountains
the lovely Tanganyika Lake could be seen in all its glory by Burton.
But to Speke it was a mere mist. The glare of the sun and oft-repeated
fever had begun to tell on him, and a kind of inflammation had produced
almost total blindness. But they had reached the lake and they felt
sure they had found the source of the Nile. It was a great day when
Speke crossed the lake in a long canoe hollowed out of the trunk of
a tree and manned by twenty native savages under the command of a
captain in a "goatskin uniform." On the far side they encamped on the
opposite shore, Speke being the first white man to cross the lake.

Having retired to his hut for the night, Speke proceeded to light a
candle and arrange his baggage, when to his horror he found the whole
interior swarming with black beetles. Tired of trying to brush them
away, he put out his light and, though they crawled up his sleeves
and down his back, he fell asleep. Suddenly he woke to find one crawling
into his ear, and in spite of his frantic efforts it crept in farther
and farther till it reached the drum, which caused the tired explorer
intense agony. Inflammation ensued, his face became drawn, he could
with difficulty swallow a little broth, and he was quite deaf. He
returned across the lake to find his companion, Burton, still very
ill and unfit for further exploration.

So Speke, although still suffering from his ear, started off again,
leaving Burton behind, to find the great northern lake spoken of as
the sea of Ukerewe, where the Arabs traded largely in ivory. There
was a great empire beyond the lake, they told him, called Uganda.

But it was July 1858 when the caravan was ready to start from Kaze.
Speke himself carried Burton's large elephant gun. "I commenced the
journey," he says, "at 6 p.m., as soon as the two donkeys I took with
me to ride were caught and saddled. It was a dreary beginning. The
escort who accompanied me were sullen in their manner and walked with
heavy gait and downcast countenance. The nature of the track increased
the general gloom.

"For several weeks the caravan moved forward, till on 3rd August it
began to wind up a long but gradually inclined hill, until it reached
its summit, when the vast expanse of the pale blue waters of the Nyanza
burst suddenly upon my eyes! It was early morning. The distant sea-line
of the north horizon was defined in the calm atmosphere, but I could
get n