The Express.
London, England, 1863-06-23 00:00:00

THE SOURCE OF THE Nil.

CAPTAINS SPIME AND GRANT BEFORE THE
ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY.
Yesterday evening a special meeting of the Royal
Geographical Society was held at Burlington-house, to
welcome Captains Spoke and Grant on their return from
their thende in the interior of Africa, issuing in the dis-
covery of the true source of the Nile. Nine o'clock was
the hoar appointed for the mastics' ; bat when the doors
were comeed about eight o'clock, the room, which is very
spasious, was in • few minutes densely filled, and the heat
arising frees overcrowding was throughout very inconvenient.
A pest neenberof ladies were present. The chair was taken
at a quartet to nine, instead of nine, as previously arranged,
by Sir Roderick Murchison. Captains &sake end Grant had
the unmet diffieuity in forcing their way to the platform.
Os kaisg meognised they were greeted with hearty and re.
iterated thews. They were accompanied by two negro boys
whom they bed brought from the interior of Africa, belong-
ing to a nation from which Captain Spoke said he bad re-
ceived eminence without which he could never have suc-
ceeded in hie object.
Amongst those present were Sir Leopold iirClintoek,
lady Franklin, Sir George Clerk, Sir A. K Waugh, Sir
Henry James, Lord A. Churchill, 11. P., Admiral Murray,
Admiral Oollineon, the Chevalier Du Prat, Coloael Lynch,
Sir W. Veerpe, Air P. Illehelien, Sir T. Pithiest* Lord
de Maguire, M. Du Chaffin, Sir E. Peel, MP:rata lit -
Manes, M.P., Mr. Layard, LP., Mr. Grapes, M.P., Ald.
13•10O101111, M.P., Colonel Sykes, M.P.
Sir Roman= Mumonson, president of the society, in kr
troduoing Captains Spoke and Grant, mid—Before I call os
Capt. Spoke to read his communication on the Nile I mast'
acquaint my associates with the deep interest which our'
patron the Queen and our vioo-patron the Prime of Walla
take in this peat dip:every. Whee I meetly waited upon
the Queen at the building of the haematite:id Exhibition,
sling with other Royal Commissioners, her Majesty was
*seed to corerratzdate me most graciously opal this great
geographical feat, and I feel certain, from the kind and
emphatic manner in which her Majesty expressed herself
the first time in which the Queen had appeared after her
sad bereavement, that she is truly proud in the reflection
that two of her own pliant Indian officers should have
succeeded in doing what the people of every European
nation have failed to accomplish. Theo, as to our nos.
patron, the Prince of Walea, I know that his royal high.
rooozho is himself a great traveller, and who loves our
would have been here this evening bad sot a very
Wind engagement prevented him ; but arrangements have,l
I am happy to say, been made by which his royal high.
nem will hear, tomorrow night, a lecture from Captain
Spoke at the Royal Institution. Whilst our own •
royal family recogemes the importance of this great 'I
discovery, the King of Deily haa taken the lead '
amongst foreign soveregne in the expression of his desire to
commemorate this great discovery, and has directed two
gold medals to be struck in honour of our heroes of the Nile.
One of them, or that which is destined for the leader, has
arrived, and has on it the inscription, " Honor a Nilo." I
must here add that the letter of the Italian minister, the
Marquis d'Aceglio, which aocompaniea this appropriate
is ward, such such an elegant and wont) composition that it is
worthy of the country which reared a Columbus. The
chairman read a letter from the Marquis d'Azeglio exprees-
iog the admiration of the King of Italy for the gallant
explorers, and 0000luded by saying, As the French Geo-
graphical Society (like our own society) gave a gold medal to
Captain Spoke, for his original diacovery of the great lake,
he, in grateful remembrance of that act, named a chan-
nel at the head of the Victoria Nyanca after the Emperor
Napoleon, who will, I doubt not, duly appreciate the honour
of having bad his name affixed to such an important feature
in the haartof Africa, and by such a distinguished British
geographer. I now call on Captain Spoke to read his com.
municatioe.
Captain Sears then came forward, and after a most
enthusiastic reception read a paper on "The Nile sod its
Tributaries." After stating that the facts he was about to
communicate were the result of two journeys into the inte-
rior, and intimating that the lake Nyanza was the real source
of the Nile, be said—Had I been all aloes on the first expe-
dition I should have settled the Nile in 1859, by travelling
from Unganyambe to Uganda, with an -Indian merchant.
Mum Mizuri, who was prepared to go there; but my proposal
having been negatived by the chief of the expedition
who was sick at the time and tired of tl»
journey, I returned to England, aad to my roof
ible delight the very fine day that I arrived
here I found in Sir Roderick lmpey Murchison a warm
advocate and proposer to the Royal Geographical Society to
complete what I had begun ; for, as might be imagined, I
could not rest satisfied until the world accepted my own
views. happily now verified by indisputable means, actual
inspection and astrooosnical obiervations, that the Victoria
Nyanza is the great reservoir of the Nile. Suffice it now to
say, chat after returning to Unyambe (the old point),
5 degrees south of the lake, is 1851 I struck upon a new
route which I imagined, from the unsophisticated defi-
nitions of the ivory merchants, would lead me to a creek
on the left bank of the Nyanza, situated oa the
south frontier of Karagwe. Geographical definitions were
here again found wanting, for instead of the creek of the
greet lake appearing, a new lake was found, called the
Lucre (Lo-of Una* which it appeared fcemerly contained •
large quantity of water, but now fast drying up. Its
bead lies in Urundi, and circles round the south and east
flanks of Kamm., in the form of a mountain valley. It is
subsequently drained by the Kitanguls river into the
Nyanza, but not in sufficient quantity to make any sensible
impression on the perennial contents of the Nyanza's basin.
It is to the west and north of Karsgwe that time lake re-
ceive' its greater terrestrial supplies of water through the
medium of the Kitangole river, which,-in addition to the
aforesaid Luero, drains off the superfluous waters of many
rivers and lakes, a. the Akensara, in Urundi ; the Lothar°,
which is the mooed of a chain with Akenzars ;
the Ingest, an accumulation lying between Kis-
hakha and Karagwe • and the little Wiixiennere.
which in Kampfe lies below the capital oa its north • west
areas?. None of these lakes are lamer than puddles in
companion with the Great Victoria Hyaena ,• but still the
Kilauea,* river, after receiving all their contributions, is •
noble river low sunk like a huge canal, about eighty yards
across, with a velocity of about four miles an hour, which
appears equal to the Nile itself, when it issues from the
lake by the Ripon falls. The question now naturally
suggests itself, what forms these lakes—whence
originate their waters? It is simply this. The Moun-
tains of the Moon in which they lie, encircling
the northern end of the Tanganiika Lake,
a exposed to the influence of the rainy zone, when I oh:
served in 1862 no leas than 235 days out of the year wee
more or less wet days. Mashoode, in the Adds, portion of
the Uganda, is the first place where in the second expeditioo
I obtained a view of the Victoria lake, called in this more
northern country Luero (White) (Lo-011, Lots (Dead) Nzige
(Locust) inconsequence of the reported fact that flights of lo-
custs, endeavouring to cross these waters. have dropped from
fatigue unable to accomplish so extended a journey on the
wing, and perishing on the lake have been found dead in dense
masses by the boatmen. But like the word Nyasa, it is
also applied to the Nile and its tributaries, confounding all
inquiry. For instance, the Waganda, who know of the
Nile and the little Luto-Nzide a semi lake-river tributary to
it, flanking the northern boundary of Unpin, on being
Questioned as to the extent of the dead locusts, say,
Uganda, conjoined with Uogoro, is au bleed so that a man
may walk for months and never me the end of it." The whole
is likewise called Nyanza there, for, as might be expected
in countries where no literature is known, and there is no
knowledge but what suite the actual requirement; of do-
mestic life, the people are satisfied with local names. Home
there is the greatest difficulty of endeavouring to put toge-
ther the information, though you can gain more ty quee•
hoeing the natives than the Arabs—for whilst the former
regard a river as flowing from head to mouth, the Arab
invariably says it goes from mouth to head. In a southerly
direction the Waganda boatmen go as far as the island
Ulcers's, where I saw on my first journey to Muanzarat the
southern extremity of the lake, and to the eastward beyond
the escape of the Nile to the north-eastern comer of the
Victoria lake, where, by a strait., I had gone across to
another lake in quest of salt—the Baring* of Dr. Krapf,
which, from the information pined through the natives, In
called a salt lake, most likely bonanza there were salt bleeds
in it, which I deduced from time fact, that op • former omission,
when the Arabs first spoke to me of the little Luta Nage, they
described it as • salt lake belonging to the great Nyanza,
yet not belonging to it, when further pressed on the sub-
ject, as the great Nyanza's waters were perfectly pure and
sweet, the Arabs, like Dr. Krapf, merely narrating what
they beard. As salt islands were visited by the natives in
consequence of that mineral, the surrounding waters were
naturally considered sweet by them, dispossessed as they
were of those connecting links which included the whole
area of ground under consideration within the
limits of the drainage system of the Nile. The
Arabs, it Is now very clear, bad beard of everything io con-
nexion with the Nile, but from not being conversant with
the science of physical geography were unable to counect
all they had gleaned in detached fragments with it. Dr.
Krapf further tells us eta river treoding from the Snow
Mountain Komi& towards the Nile. If such is the case, it
must be a feeder to the Bering, whose waters pas off by
the Anna river IMO the Nile ; for the whole onintry an
the eastern side of the Vietoeia Nyana is said by the Arabs
who have traversed it for ivory to be covered by low rolling
hills, intersected cooly by small streams and mullahs from
its southern point in Enanza to the Strait, which is
situated on the Equator, the north branch of the Victoria
Nyanza. Turning now again to Mashoodor and promeding
north aloes the bending coast of the Nyaima, which is
situated on the Equator, the lake is constantly in view. The
land above the lake is beautiful, eon posed of low sand-
stooe hills meted down by small streams, the effect of coo-
stant rain; greased over by gigantic gram except wherethe