Page:Seven Years in South Africa v2.djvu/244

 number of cascades and jets into which the down-rushing stream is divided, as well as by the narrowness of the deep ravine into which the raging waters are compressed. The width of the current below the falls is but a thirteenth part of what it is above.

After flowing from west to east, the Zambesi here makes a sudden bend to the south, so that the side on which we were stationed had become the western shore. As the river below does not cover the full breadth of the valley, it is quite practicable for a spectator to take his stand almost anywhere at no great distance below the level of the shore above, and so to view the cataract with his face turned to the north. Unfortunately the constant dash of the spray renders the soil too slippery to allow any one to approach the actual branch of the abyss into which the waters are hurled, but many an effective point of view is to be found within a few hundred yards of the cataract.

Let the reader then imagine himself to have taken his position upon a spot facing a rugged dark brown rocky wall about 200 yards away, rising 400 feet above its base, which is out of sight. Over the top of this are dashing the waters of the Zambesi. About 100 yards from the western bank he sees several islands adorned with tropical vegetation in rich abundance; further on towards the eastern shore and close to the edge of the abyss his eye will light upon nearly thirty bare brown crags that divide the rushing stream into as many different channels. To the left again, between the bright green islands and the western shore, he will observe that the great wall of rock is considerably lower, allowing a ponderous volume of