On the 6th of August, 1861, the two doctors and Charles Livingstone started in a four-oared gig, with one white sailor and twenty Makololo, for Nyassa. Carriers were easily engaged to convey the boat past the forty miles of the Murchison Cataracts. Numberless volunteers came forward, and the men of one village transported it to the next. They passed the little Lake of Pamalombe, about ten miles long and five broad, surrounded thickly by papyrus. Myriads of mosquitos showed the presence of malaria, and they hastened by it. Again launching their boat, they proceeded up the river, and entered the lake on the 2nd of September, greatly refreshed by the cool air which came off its wide expanse of water. The centre appeared to be of a deep blue, while the shallow water along the edge was indicated by its light green colour. A little from the shore the water was from nine to fifteen fathoms in depth, but round a grand mountain promontory no bottom could be obtained with their lead-line of thirty-five fathoms. The lake was estimated to be about two hundred miles long and from twenty to sixty broad. The lake appeared to be surrounded by mountains, but on the west they were merely the edges of high table-land. It is visited by sudden and tremendous storms. One morning the sea suddenly rose around them, preventing them from advancing or receding, as the tremendous surf on the beach would have knocked their light boat to pieces, while the waves came rolling on in threes, their crests broken into spray. Had one of them struck the boat, nothing could have saved her from being swamped. For six hours they remained at anchor a little from the shore, thus exposed to the fury of the gale. The crew became sea-sick and unable to keep the boat's head to the sea, while some of their party who had remained on shore watched them, the natives every moment exclaiming: "They are lost! they are all dead!" After this, every night they hauled the boat up on the beach; and, had it not been supposed that these storms were peculiar to one season, they would have given the Nyassa the name of the "Lake of Storms."