“Though the Rusizi River can no longer be a subject of curiosity to geographers--and we are certain that there is no connection between the Tanganyika and Baker’s Lake, or the Albert N’yanza--it is not yet certain that there is no connection between the Tanganyika and the Nile River. The western coast has not all been explored; and there is reason to suppose that a river runs out of the Tanganyika through the deep caverns of Kabogo Mountain, far under ground and out on the western side of Kabogo into the Lualaba, or the Nile. Livingstone has seen the river about forty miles or so west of Kabogo (about forty yards broad at that place), but he does not know that it runs out of the mountain.
[Illustration: RECEPTION OF THE CHIEF RUHINGI.]
“This is one of the many things which he has yet to examine.”
It thus appearing that the Rusizi is an affluent, not an effluent, of Tanganyika Lake, the expedition failed to sustain the explorer’s hypothesis, but added a useful item of geographical knowledge to the then existing stock. Nor does it follow that because the Rusizi flows into the Tanganyika, there is no river flowing out of it into that system of lakes which had before been discovered by the explorer, and of which the Chambesi--almost a system of rivers itself--is the largest affluent yet discovered. Should Dr. Livingstone’s hypothesis of an effluent from the west shore of Tanganyika Lake not be sustained, and its waters found to procure outlet by Lake Nyassa and the Zambesi, his future discoveries will in all probability show a similar formation of the continent in east central Africa to that which he discovered to be the fact when he explored Lake Dilolo in the land of the Balonda.
The explorers remained in Ujiji until after “merry Christmas,” both engaged much of the time in writing accounts of their explorations, which have appeared or will yet appear in this volume. Meanwhile, they had determined to make a journey together to Unyanyembe. This journey is described in telegraphic brevity:
After spending Christmas at Ujiji Dr. Livingstone, escorted by the NEW YORK HERALD Expedition, composed of forty Wanguana soldiers, well armed, left for Unyanyembe on the 26th of December, 1871.