60 [No. 99 ECONOMIC CONDITIONS section along which, by a fine piece of engineering, the road is carried up 1,200 feet from the flats by Lake Albert to Bogoro on the summit of the escarp ment. Motor lorries are now running on this road. From Kilo another road, to run through the Ituri forest to Stanleyville, is being constructed with gradients so designed as to render it adaptable for a railway track . Until rails can be laid it will be used for motor transport. In the Welle district also are several useful roads similarly built with a view to carrying railways in the future. One of these follows the course of the Welle from Bambili to Aba ; 1 another runs from Niangara northward to the old station of Pupwandi. Neither of these, however, has as yet any service of motors, and the former still lacks bridges over most of its length .

(6 ) Rivers The Colony possesses about 8,000 miles of river waterways, navigable for large or small river steam boats. This mileage is almost entirely contained within the central equatorial basin, outside which only a few short stretches are navigable. ?

The main waterways are : (a) The Congo river from Léopoldville to Stanley ville ( 1,050 miles), with further navigable sections from Ponthierville to Kindu ( 196 miles ) , and—under favourable conditions — from Kongolo to Bukama (397 miles) . The points between which navigation is impos sible are now connected by railways .

(b ) The Kasai -Sankuru , from Kwamouth, at the junction of the Kasai with the Congo, to Lusambo or Pania Mutombo higher up (660 miles ) .

1 This road is continued to Rejab, the limit of navigation on the Nile ; see below , p. 67 .

2 See for the navigation of the Congo, International Rivers, No. 149 of this series.