228 Seven Years in the Soudan.

went in search of ivory and when he was head of the slave-trading expeditions. I showed him Stanley's map, which marks the course of the Congo, and now he is persuaded that the information he obtained was correct, confirming him more than ever in his opinion that the river lying five days' journey south of Bakangoi is the Congo. As to the Welle, he believes that this river can only come from the Nile (P), and assured me that there is a branch which issues from the Nile, flows towards Munza, and then })asses Kanna and Bakangoi (r). Mason says that he did not notice this brancli, which I believe is possible. Its mouth is rather hidden (at least at the time when I went up the river to explore the Albert Nyanza) by a mass of papyrus and floating plants. I passed very close, and cannot think that I only dreamed, still less can anyone think that T could invent rivers and mountains Avhere none existed.

It may be that this river, after flowing for some distance towards the interior, re-enters the Nile, but in navisratinof the whole of the latter river I never observed any other important affluent on the left bank, except those already noted. Colonel Mason explored the Albert Nyanza in a steamer at the most favourable season, and had every opportunity of executing a work, much more exactly and extensively than 1 was able to accomplish in an open boat at the time of the equinox and the rains, Avliile suffering from hunger, and living for many days on bananas alone, without counting the fact that almost during the whole voyage we were continually wet through. However, it afforded me real satisfaction to know that Colonel Mason, when he arrived at Khartoum, spoke of me in very flattering terms to Gordon Pasha, asserting that he found ' See our previous note relating to the error into -which our explorer fell. It is the numerous islands, they say, -w-hich hide the true bank of the river, that are the cause of this error. — Eu.