clad Kilimanjaro, Mount Kenia, Obal, and other "Fahs," or culminating points of the great mountain chain of the Himadu, of Brur, of Rollet, Tremaux (Esquisse de l'Afrique), and Beke, into the Victoria Nyanza. The point most in favour of the latter view of the case is that these mountains represent the Tes Selenes oros of Ptolemy (Geo. lib. iv. cap. ix. S.S., edit. Berti p. 135), which should be translated "moon mountains" or "white mountains," rather than "mountains of the moon," and whence the Alexan. drine geographer made the waters of the Nile descend. These points have been previously discussed in the pages of the New Monthly Magazine, and it is clear that every successive exploration adds to the evidence before accumulated, that there are no "moon mountains," as advocated by the lamented Captain Speke, south of the Albert Nyanza.*

Next, if not of still greater interest and importance than the determination of the limits and character of this great African lake, comes the positive information that the Upper Nile divides into two branches after leaving the lake, about a hundred miles south of Duffili, one branch constituting the Nile of Gondokoro, the other, over 200 yards in width, flowing to the north-west. It had long been suspected, from the rivers discovered west of the Nile by various and successive explorers, that there were two outlets from Albert Nyanza, from the lake itself, or from the river flowing out of it—and this point has also been often previously discussed in our pages. Colonel Gordon and Lieutenant Chippendale had previously reported, from information derived from the natives, that the Nile divided into two channels after leaving the Albert Nyanza, or that "it left that lake by two channels," but where the western stream rejoined the main river was still doubtful.

It has been hastily advocated by some that this north-westerly river is the same as the Uelle or Welle of Schweinfurth, and the Kubanda of Barth-the latter a supposed tributary to the Congo, but both tributaries, it has also been conjectured, to the central lake

* There are, however, in this region, the so-called "Blue Mountains," rising to an elevation of some 7000 feet, west and south-west of the Albert Nyanza, as also Mfumbiro, supposed to attain an altitude of 10,000 feet south-east of the lake; and Stanley appears, from the reports in the Daily Telegraph, to have visited a mountain in the same regions, called Gambaragara, upon whose lofty uplands dwelt a strange tribe of pale-faced people. These, however, are not snow-clad mountains, or of "moon-like" whiteness. Mr. Stanley, looks upon the Kagera river (Speke's Kitangule), as "the true parent of the Victoria Nile." This may be so far correct-it may be the largest tributary, it spreads more, and opens into large lacustrine expanses yet it may not present the most remote sources, which we still expect will be met with to the east or south-east, and not to the west, or south-west of the lake.

heard of by Poncet and Piaggia, as the Matuassat, the MuatoYamoo of D'Auville-and which, again, is supposed to supply a tributary rather to Lake Tsad, or the Benuwe branch of the Niger than to the Congo. Colonel Gordon appears to think that this north-west branch, which he designates as the Yeh or Iaïe (the same as the laïe of Peney), or Bahr Jemit,* and which is navigable as far as Eliab, falls into lake Jak or Djak, and joins the Nile at the point where the Bahr Zaraf leaves it.

But this would appear to be only one of its mouths or outlets, for successive explorers, as more particularly the Messrs. Poncet (Carte du Cours Moyen des Deux Nils, 1860), Petherick and Peney found the whole country south of Lakes Nû and Jak, and of the Bahr al Ghazal, to be intersected by rivers, canals, and lakes. It appears, indeed, to be an inland delta. The Bahr Jûr, or Nam, appears to be the largest, and may be an outlet of the north-west branch of the Nile. Petherick long ago described the Giratfe river as being a branch of the Nile (Egypt, the Soudan, &c., p. 361.) It may be the same with other intervening rivers and canals. The Gazelle lake, it is to be observed, is estimated by Petherick as being in the season of the flood 180 miles in length by 60 in width (p. 388). It is, therefore, a greater reservoir of the Nile waters than the Albert Nyanza.

As to the Uelle or Welle of Schweinfurth, it appears to be the same as the Babura or Bahr Bura of others, also called Bahr Mumbutu, just as the upper portion of the Jur is designated as the Bahr Kakunda, and the lower is known to the Arabs as the Bahr al Ghazal.

It appears to have been Schweinfurth's opinion that the Welle had its origin in the mountains west of the Albert Nyanza. Others have argued that it came from the north-west corner of that lake, and now it is suggested that it is a prolongation of the north-west branch of the Nile. Considering the amount of drainage effected by the delta of the Bahr al Ghazal, the first opinion appears most likely to be the correct one.

But opposed to this view of the case is the remarkable fact that the ancients and the old Arab geographers, more especially al Edrisi and Abu'lfada, alike state that the Nile divides into an Egyptian and an Ethiopian river. This would seem to intimate that the north-west branch flowed to Lake Tsad, the Benuwe branch of the Niger, or to the Congo. The fact of there being two branches to the Nile below Albert Nyanza remains under any circumstances an extraordinary hydrographical phenomen.

* Long Bey makes the Yeh river a congeries of streams, where seen by bim a little south of the parallel of Gondokoro.”—Bull. de la Soc. de Gen graphie, Oct. 1875.

JOHN CHRISTOPHER.

THERE was a gleam of sunshine over the meadows in spite of the April shower; and after the showera rainbow, which, arching over the village church, lost itself among the branches of the distant treetops.

Suddenly the passing bell began to toll.

"Who's dead?” asked Mrs. Minton, pausing, as she worked herself backward and forward in her chair. "I didn't know any one in the village was ill."

"I suppose it will be old Mr. Christopher," answered her grand. daughter. "I heard this morning that he couldn't last till sundown. But one car scarcely say he's been ill; he's been just quietly fading away these months past."

"Old Mr. Christopher, once young John Christopher," said the old woman, in a voice that struck strangely on Susan's ear; and looking up at the grandmother, she saw a tear slowly coursing down her cheek, and her hands clasped tightly together.

"Forgotten by all but me," murmured Mrs. Minton; "I didn't think one's memory was so long, but young days come back in the latter days, and it seems but yesterday since I was a girl.”

"Why, did you know Mr. Christopher, granny?" asked the girl, in surprise.

But Mrs. Minton made no reply; she closed her eyes, and sat quite quiet for some minutes. Perhaps she was going over a piece of her history that had lain dormant for long enough, but had su l. denly started up before her at the sound of the bell.

"I didn't think I should have felt his death like this. I haven't spoken to him for these fifty years; I thought he was dead and buried long and long ago to me. We must go to the funeral, Susan; not to be seen like as mourners, but still to be at the grave. I should like to do it; it may make me feel better over it. You've got a black dress, child, and you can get a black riband for your bonnet."

Granny!" ejaculated Susan, wondering if her grandmother were in her right senses.

"It will be quite right and proper; we've been neighbours these five years."

"But you've never spoken to him, and scarce seen him." "That was my own doing," answered Mrs. Minton; "this is my doing, too; and it's all right anl proper, aul as it should be, and I don't care who talks."

Again the passing bell tolled out.

"At rest-at rest! so may we all go in peace when it comes to our turn," murmured Mrs. Minton.

And then she fell into a reverie; and Susan moved softly about so as not to disturb her; wondering why the death of old Mr. Christopher should so disturb her grandmother, seeing that she had taken no heed of him, and had asked no questions about him since he had been their neighbour. Neither, now she came to think of it, had Mr. Christopher, in the occasional chats she had had with him over the low garden hedge, ever asked after her grandmother, or appeared to be aware of her existence.

He had been a handsome man in his time, and there was a courteousness and gentleness in his manner that had taken the young girl's fancy, and made her feel an interest in his lonely condition; and all at once to learn that her grandmother had at one time of her life so known him as to make her desire to attend his funeral filled her with a degree of astonishment that was quite as great as her curiosity to know how it came to pass.

The afternoon dragged slowly on, the sun-gleam over the meadows died away, and the April showers turned to steady rain.

Susan heaped more coal on the fire, for her grandmother shivered slightly; then she put the kettle on to boil, cut the bread-andbutter, set the tea-things, and finally made the tea.

When it was ready Mrs. Minton took it mechanically, but did not appear to be inclined to speak until Susan had settled to her sewing on the other side of the fireplace. Then, rocking herself gently to and fro, she began:

"It's an old story, and I'd half forgotten it; but, somehow, it's all come up before me as clear as if it happened yesterday. It's wonderful how a door is suddenly opened in one's mind, and all the old pictures come out in fresh colours, or rather in the old ones with all the fading taken out of them."

Mrs. Minton paused.

"And you'll tell it to me, granny," said Susan. "I like old stories better than those of now-a-days, when everything is moving so fast that there is no time for poetry and romance. No quiet little bits of dainty trimness, but a hurry and a flash, and a railway-whistle, and then a puff, and it's all over and ended just as one thought it was but beginning. I should liked to have lived long, long ago, when it was quiet."

"I don't know," said Mrs. Minton; "human nature is human nature in every age, and no better and no worse than it ever was, It's all very well to talk about progress; but it hasn't changed human nature in the least, and certainly hasn't altered love.

making; it's all the same over and over again, and there's nothing new and never will be-that's my opinion."

Susan did not take up the argument; she was anxious to hear the story, and afraid lest her grandmother's train of thought might run in another direction.

"But the story, granny," she said.

"You must go a

"It's an old story," repeated Mrs. Minton. good many years back for the beginning of it-years before you were born, or your father either, and he was the youngest of all my sons, and the longest lived of all his brothers and sisters, and he's been dead these twelve years, and you're the only grandchild I have the last of my name, and most of the money gone. ᎪᏂ ! dear, dear! to think of it."

"Still we've enough to live upon, granny.'

"Yes; the Lord be thanked, Who deals better with us than we deserve."

And again she relapsed into silence, but after awhile went on again :

"You must go back to the time when I was a girl no older than yourself, Susy a young, pretty girl, though I say it myself, for not only did my glass tell it me, but half the village besides, and John Christopher among the rest.

"It was an afternoon in May that I was standing at the gardengate looking along the road to see if father was coming from market. I can see the road now, and the hawthorn all in flower along the hedges as if a fall of snow had come in the sunshine; and the great lilac bushes had come into bloom-I seem as if I could smell the scent now. And the laburnum tree, that was close by the gate, looked as if it were dropping a shower of golden drops upon the holly hedge; and the sky was as blue as blue could be, with never a cloud upon it, and there wasn't a breath of wind; the air was just as still as on a July day. I had set out the table for supper, and had come out to watch for father, and to enjoy the beautiful afternoon.

Presently the cart came in sight, so I ran to give mother notice: then I went out again, and by that time the cart had come near enough for me to see that there were two people in it. Father was one, of course, and the other was a young man I had never seen before, tall, fair, with clear grey eyes, and a pleasant face,

"It's John Christopher,' said my father; he's son of one of my old schoolmates that you've heard me talk of, and he's come to live at Durford. He's got a place at the mill, and Durford Mill's not a bad place for a young fellow to begin at. He'll be miller himself some day, if he's the luck of his family.'