“During his researches in that region, so pregnant in discoveries, Livingstone came to a lake lying northeast of Cazembe, which the natives called Liemba, from the country of that name, which bordered it on the east and south. In tracing the lake north he found it to be none other than the Tanganyika, or the southeastern extremity of it, which looks on the Doctor’s map very much like an outline of Italy. The latitude of the southern end of this great body of water is about nine degrees south, which gives it thus a length, from north to south, of 360 geographical miles.
“From the southern extremity of the Tanganyika he crossed Marungu and came in sight of Lake Moero. Tracing this lake, which is about sixty miles in length, to its southern head, he found a river called the Luapula entering it from that direction. Following the Luapula south he found it issue from the large lake of Bangweolo, which is as large in superficial area as the Tanganyika. In exploring for the waters which emptied into the lake he found by far the most important of these feeders was the Chambezi. So that he had thus traced the Chambezi from its source to Lake Bangweolo, and issue from its northern head under the name of Luapula, and found it enter Lake Moero. Again he returned to Cazembe, well satisfied that the river running north through three degrees of latitude could not be the river running south under the name of the Zambezi, though there might be a remarkable resemblance in their names.
“At Cazembe he found an old white-bearded half-caste named Mohammed ben Salih, who was kept as a kind of prisoner at large by the King because of certain suspicious circumstance attending his advent and stay in his country. Through Livingstone’s influence Mohammed ben Salih obtained his release. On the road to Ujiji he had bitter cause to regret having exerted himself in the half-caste’s behalf. He turned out to be a most ungrateful wretch, who poisoned the minds of the Doctor’s few followers and ingratiated himself in their favor by selling the favors of his concubines to them, thus reducing them to a kind of bondage under him. From the day he had the vile old man in his company manifold and bitter misfortunes followed the Doctor up to his arrival in Ujiji, in March, 1869.
“From the date of his arrival until the end of June (1869) he remained in Ujiji, whence he dated those letters which, though the outside world still doubted his being alive, satisfied the minds of the Royal Geographical people and his intimate friends that he was alive, and Musa’s tale an ingenious but false fabrication of a cowardly deserter. It was during this time that the thought occurred to him of sailing around the Lake Tanganyika, but the Arabs and natives were so bent upon fleecing him that, had he undertaken it the remainder of his goods would not have enabled him to explore the central line of drainage, the initial point of which he found far south of Cazembe, in about latitude 11 degrees, in the river Chambezi. In the days when tired Captain Burton was resting in Ujiji, after his march from the coast near Zanzibar, the land to which Livingstone, on his departure from Ujiji, bent his steps, was unknown to the Arabs save by vague report. Messrs. Burton and Speke never heard of it, it seems. Speke, who was the geographer of Burton’s expedition, heard of a place called Uruwa, which he placed on his map according to the general direction indicated by the Arabs; but the most enterprising of the Arabs, in their search after ivory, only touched the frontiers of Rua, as the natives and Livingstone call it; for Rua is an immense country, with a length of six degrees of latitude and as yet an undefined breadth from east to west.
“At the end of June, 1869, Livingstone took dhow at Ujiji and crossed over to Uguhha, on the western shore, for his last and greatest series of explorations, the result of which was the discovery of a series of lakes of great magnitude connected together by a large river called by different names as it left one lake to flow to another. From the port of Uguhha he set off in company with a body of traders, in an almost direct westerly course, through the lake country of Uguhha. Fifteen days march brought them to Bambarre, the first important ivory depot in Manyema, or, as the natives pronounce it, Manuyema. For nearly six months he was detained at Bambarre from ulcers in the feet, with copious discharges of bloody ichor oozing from the sores as soon as he set his feet on the ground. When well, he set off in a northerly direction, and, after several days, came to a broad, lacustrine river, called the Lualaba, flowing northward and westward, and, in some places southward, in a most confusing way. The river was from one to three miles broad. By exceeding pertinacity he contrived to follow its erratic course until he saw the Lualaba enter the narrow but lengthy lake of Kamolondo, in about latitude 6 deg. 30 min. south. Retracing it south he came to the point where he had seen the Luapula enter Lake Moero.
“One feels quite enthusiastic when listening to Livingstone’s description of the beauties of Moero scenery. Pent in on all sides by high mountains clothed to their tips with the richest vegetation of the tropics, Moero discharges its superfluous waters through a deep rent in the bosom of the mountains. The impetuous and grand river roars through the chasm with the thunder of a cataract; but soon after leaving its confined and deep bed it expands into the calm and broad Lualaba—expanding over miles of ground, making great bends west and southwest, then, curving northward, enters Kamolondo. By the natives it is called the Lualaba, but the Doctor, in order to distinguish it from the other rivers of the same name, has given it the name of Webb’s River, after Mr. Webb, the wealthy proprietor of Newstead Abbey, whom the Doctor distinguishes as one of his oldest and most consistent friends. Away to the southwest from Kamolondo is another large lake, which discharges its waters by the important river Locki, or Lomami, into the great Lualaba. To this lake, known as Chebungo by the natives, Dr. Livingstone has given the name of Lincoln, to be hereafter distinguished on maps and in books as Lake Lincoln, in memory of Abraham Lincoln, our murdered President. This was done from the vivid impression produced on his mind by hearing a portion of his inauguration speech read from an English pulpit, which related to the causes that induced him to issue his emancipation proclamation. To the memory of the man whose labors in behalf of the negro race deserved the commendation of all good men Livingstone has contributed a monument more durable than brass or stone.
“Entering Webb’s River from the south-southwest, a little north of Kamolondo, is a large river called the Lufira, but the streams that discharge themselves from the watershed into the Lualaba are so numerous that the Doctor’s map would not contain them, so he has left all out except the most important. Continuing his way north, tracing the Luabala through its manifold and crooked curves as far as latitude four degrees south, he came to another large lake called the Unknown Lake; but here you may come to a dead halt, and read it thus:—* * * * * *. Here was the furthermost point. From here he was compelled to return on the weary road to Ujiji, a distance of 600 miles.
“In this brief sketch of Doctor Livingstone’s wonderful travels it is to be hoped that the most superficial reader as well as the student of geography, comprehends this grand system of lakes connected together by Webb’s river. To assist him, let him procure a map of Africa, embracing the latest discoveries. Two degrees south of the Tanganyika, and two degrees west let him draw the outlines of a lake, its greatest length from east to west, and let him call it Bangweolo. One degree or thereabout to the northwest let him sketch the outlines of another but smaller lake and call it Moero; a degree again north of Moero another lake of similar size, and call it Kamolondo, and still a degree north of Kamolondo another lake, large and as yet undefined limits, which, in the absence of any specific term; we will call the Nameless Lake. Then let him connect these several lakes by a river called after different names. Thus, the main feeder of Bangweolo, the Chambezi; the river which issues out of Bangweolo and runs into Moero, the Luapula; the river connecting Moero with Kamolondo, Webb’s river; that which runs from Kamolondo into the Nameless Lake northward, the Lualaba; and let him write in bold letters over the rivers Chambezi, Luapula, Webb’s River and the Lualaba the ‘Nile,’ for these are all one and the same river. Again, west of Moero Lake, about one degree or thereabouts, another large lake may be placed on his map, with a river running diagonally across to meet the Lualaba north of Lake Kamolondo. This new lake is Lake Lincoln, and the river is the Lomami River, the confluence of which with the Lualaba is between Kamolondo and the Nameless Lake. Taken altogether, the reader may be said to have a very fair idea of what Dr. Livingstone has been doing these long years, and what additions he has made to the study of African geography. That this river, distinguished under several titles, flowing from one lake into another in a northerly direction, with all its great crooked bends and sinuosities is the Nile, the true Nile, the Doctor has not the least doubt. For a long time he did doubt, because of its deep bends and curves—west, and southwest even—but having traced it from its headwaters, the Chambezi, through seven degrees of latitude—that is, from latitude eleven degrees south to a little north of latitude four degrees south—he has been compelled to come to the conclusion that it can be no other river than the Nile. He had thought it was the Congo, but he has discovered the sources of the Congo to be the Kasai and the Quango, two rivers which rise on the western side of the Nile watershed in about the latitude of Bangweolo; and he was told of another river called the Lubilash, which rose from the north and ran west. But the Lualaba the Doctor thinks cannot be the Congo, from its great size and body and from its steady and continual flow northward through a broad and extensive valley, bounded by enormous mountains, westerly and easterly. The altitude of the most northerly point to which the Doctor traced the wonderful river was a little over two thousand feet, so that though Baker makes out his lake to be two thousand seven hundred feet above the sea, yet the Bahr Ghazal, through which Petherick’s branch of the White Nile issues into the Nile is only a little over two thousand feet, in which case there is a possibility that the Lualaba may be none other than Petherick’s branch. It is well known that trading stations for ivory have been established for about five hundred miles up Petherick’s branch. We must remember this fact when told that Gondokoro, in latitude four degrees north, is two thousand feet above the sea, and latitude four degrees south, where the Doctor was halted, is only a little over two thousand feet above the sea. That two rivers, said to be two thousand feet above the sea, separated from each other by eight degrees of latitude, are the same stream may, among some men, be regarded as a startling statement. But we must restrain mere expressions of surprise and take into consideration that this mighty and broad Lualaba is a lacustrine river—broader than the Mississippi—and think of our own rivers, which, though shallow, are exceedingly broad. We must wait also until the altitude of the two rivers—the Lualaba, where the Doctor halted, and the southern point on the Bahr Ghazal, where Petherick has been—are known with perfect accuracy.
CHARACTERISTIC HEAD-DRESSES.