It is my
opinion that some of these streams are torrents from the Galla country,
while others are the continuation of those southern rivers which have
lately been crossed by the slave-hunters between the second and third
degrees of N. latitude.
The White Nile is a grand river between the Sobat junction and Khartoum,
and after passing to the south of the great affluent the difference in
the character is quickly perceived. We now enter upon the region of
immense flats and boundless marshes, through which the river winds in a
labyrinth-like course for about 750 miles to Gondokoro.
Having left the Sobat, we arrived at the junction of the Bahr Giraffe,
thirty-eight miles distant, at 11 a.m. on 17th February. We turned into
the river, and waited for the arrival of the fleet.
The Bahr Giraffe was to be our new passage instead of the original White
Nile. That river, which had become so curiously obstructed by masses of
vegetation that had formed a solid dam, already described by me in "The
Albert N'yanza," had been entirely neglected by the Egyptian
authorities. In consequence of this neglect an extraordinary change had
taken place. The immense number of floating islands which are constantly
passing down the stream of the White Nile had no exit, thus they were
sucked under the original obstruction by the force of the stream, which
passed through some mysterious channel, until the subterranean passage
became choked with a wondrous accumulation of vegetable matter.
