Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 3.djvu/339

 THE NIGER. 281 The Upper and Middle Niger. A special iterest attaches to the origin of the great river whose basin has thus been already prtitioned between two European Powers. Although prevented from coming within four miles of its source, Zweifel and Moustier were at least able to collect sufficient information to describe it. The Tembi, as the farthest head- stream is called appears to rise at the Tembi-Kundu hill, that is, the "Tembi Head," a huge rounded block standing between two others of like form, but much higher, with a luish range in the background. The spring immediately develops a rivulet two feet broad, which flows rapidly to a little lake with a rocky islet shaded by a wle-branching tree, the retreat of a powerful wizard renowned throughout the surrounding lands. Beyond the lake the Tembi plunges into a deep fissure, reappearing some distance below the village of Nelia. The " father of the Joliba," which at its source has an altitude of about 2,800 feet, flows mainly north to its junction with the Faliko, 84 miles from the Tembi' Kundu hill, the united stream forming the Joliba, and maintaining a north- easterly course through French Sudan to and beyond Segu, and receiving the Tankisso and several other affluents from the neighbouring hills and plateaux. At the Tankiss junction, 260 miles from its source, it has already descended considerably more than half of the total incline, and is here little more than 1,000 feet above sea-level. At Bamaku the mean breadth is over 500 yards, with a depth of 6 or 7 feet ; but the channel is here obstructed by numerous reefs and sandbanks, such is that of Sotuba, above which steamers can ascend only during the floods. At Sansadi where its bed is little more than 800 feet above the sea, the Joliba enters ailat region with scarcely any perceptible incline, in which the sluggish current ramifies into a sort of inland delta. The eastern and largest branch, which t8 alone followed by Mungo Park and Caillie, encloses with the Diaka, or western ; arm, the low island of Burgu, which is fully 120 miles long, but intersected by innumerable connecting channels. From these branches the stream converge in the Debo, a vast morass flooded during the inundations, and succeeded farther down by other insular tracts and temporary lakes, like those of the White 31g about the Bahr-el-Ghazal confluence, but destitute of the floating masses of matted vegetation so characteristic of that river. In this laculatine region the Joliba is joined from the south by its great affluent, the Bakhoy, or "White River," called also the Ulu-Ulu, which is probably as copios as the main stream itself. The vast basin of the Bakhoy, occupying all the northern slopes of the Kong uplands from Liberia to Ashanti, is still almost entirely unknown, Rènè Caillie being the only traveller who has yet crossed this region, which is watered by several navigable streams. After its confluence with the Koraba (Pambine or Mahel Bodeval), which is over 300 yards wide and 10 feet deep at the point crossed by Caillie, the Bakhoy flows parallel with the Joliba, and after ramifying into numerous branches in the Jenne country, joins the main stream above Lake Debo. 82— AF