It occupied us sixteen days to traverse this rich forest region, generally distinguished by the name of Awamba, after the tribe, and during that time we had ten separate rainfalls, several of them lasting over nine hours, while it thundered daily. Besides this, when we issued out of the forest, and clung to the grassy foot of the range, at a few hundred feet of altitude above it, we observed that, as far as we could see, the forest extended unbroken, except by the numerous banana plantations. There were many lateral depressions, marking the courses of the streams, but few elevations of any importance, but over the whole slowly sailed the snow-white mist in broad, irregular streams; these, in a few moments, became joined into a universal mass, which to us, looking down upon it, resembled an inverted sky. All this was very annoying to us as curious sightseers, anxious to know the strange world we were in; but it furnished suggestions as to the reason why this part was so especially prolific, and why Ruwenzori was so coy. No winds could cool this portion of the valley, or waft the vapours away and clear the atmosphere from an entire corner of the compass, owing to the extent and great height of Ruwenzori. The great mountain intercepted every breeze from east round to south, and prevented the everlasting exhalations of the valley from being blown in that direction, but, on their reaching the intense cold above, distilled them, and rediffused them in copious showers of rain. From north to west the northern range of mountains obstructed the free passage of the winds, and assisted to maintain that equable heat of the valley that was necessary for the fostering of that marvellous vegetation. In every camp of this region the smoke hung over us like a pall, smarting the eyes and half suffocating us. In such a Nature’s conservatory as the Semliki Valley, buried under its own perpetual warm exhalations, vegetation, as a matter of course, finding every favourable element therein necessary for its growth and nourishment, grows in riotous profusion. Where the humus is deep we find a tall and stately forest, with an impervious underwood of young trees, bound together and sometimes altogether hidden by countless climbing vines and robust plants; where the humus is thinner, as near the foot of the range, dense crops of cane-grass, from ten to fifteen feet in height, flourish luxuriant and impenetrable. Every tree-stem has its green robe of soft moss, dripping with dew, and each tree-fern or horizontal branch has its orchids, or broad elephant-eared plant. Every rock is clothed with lichens, and if but the slightest hollow is found in it, there will be seen a multitude of tropic plants crowding every inch. In short, everywhere, except upon the perpendicular face of a late-moved boulder, vegetation thrives of every variety of greenness, form, and character.