ed a beef-sandwich appearance, puce or purple alternating with
creamy-white. Quartz and other igneous rocks were also scattered about,
lying like superficial accumulations in the dips at the foot of the
hills, and red sandstone conglomerates clearly indicated the presence
of iron. The soil itself looked rich and red, not unlike our own fine
country of Devon.

On arriving in camp we pitched under some trees, and at once were
greeted by an officer sent by Rumanika to help us out of Usui. This was
Kachuchu, an old friend of Nasib's, who no sooner saw him than, beaming
with delight, he said to us, "Now, was I not right when I told you the
birds flying about on Lohugati hill were a good omen? Look here what
this man says: Rumanika has ordered him to bring you on to his palace at
once, and wherever you stop a day, the village officers are instructed
to supply you with food at the king's expenses, for there are no taxes
gathered from strangers in the kingdom of Karague. Presents may
be exchanged, but the name of tax is ignored." Grant here shot a
rhinoceros, which came well into play to mix with the day's flour we had
carried on from Vihembe.

Deluded yesterday by the sight of the broad waters of the Lueru lo
Urigi, espied in the distance from the top of a hill, into the belief
that we were in view of the N'yanza itself, we walked triumphantly
along, thinking how well the Arabs at Kaze had described this to be
a creek of the great lake; but on arrival in camp we heard from the
village officer that we had been misinformed, and that it was a detached
lake, but connected with the Victoria N'yanza by a passage in the hills
and the Kitangule river. Formerly, he said, the Urigi valley was covered
with water, extending up to Uhha, when all the low lands we had crossed
from Usui had to be ferried, and the saddle-back hills were a mere chain
of islands in the water. But the country had dried up, and the lake of
Urigi became a small swamp. He further informed us, that even in the
late king Dagara's time it was a large sheet of water; but the instant
he ceased to exist, the lake shrank to what we now saw.

Our day's march had been novel and very amusing. The hilly country
surrounding us, together with the valley, brought back to recollection
many happy days I had once spent with the Tartars in the Thibetian
valley of the Indus--only this was more picturesque; for though both
countries are wild, and very thinly inhabited, this was green