Rumanika, king of Karagwé, is no less singular in his theory of the source of the Alexandra Nile, for he says it issues from Lake Tanganika, through Urundi. However, these and sundry other reports only roused my interest in the noble river, and created a greater inclination to pursue the subject to its ultimate end. For a very few soundings of it enabled me, after my circumnavigation of Lake Victoria, and on examination of the several streams emptying into it, to judge this to be the principal affluent and feeder of the lake.

A journey of fourteen miles southerly across the valley of the Alexandra from its southern bank brought us to the base of the lofty ranges of Karagwé. This country comprises all the mountainous ridges between Usongora on the east and the Alexandra Nile to the west. It appears as if at a distant epoch these ridges had been connected with the uplands of Koki and Ankori north, and Ruanda west, but that, as Lake Victoria had channelled a way for its outlet through the clays and shale of Usoga and Uganda, and its altitude above the sea had subsided, the furious current of the Kagera or Alexandra had channelled a deeper course through the heart of what was formerly a lofty plateau, and that its thousands of petty tributaries then rushed down into the deep depression formed by it.

On the 24th of February we were camped at Nakahanga, a village situated twelve miles west of south of Kiyanga, and the next day, after a march of thirteen miles, we entered the Arab depot of Kafurro, in Karagwé.