For themselves, they could only repeat their pledges of mutual good-will. Eleven days after the adventure with the chacmas, the little troop, not far from the Zambesi Falls, arrived at a level plain several miles in extent, and perfectly adapted for the establishment of a base. On the edge of the plain rose a native village, composed of a few huts containing a small number of inhabitants, who kindly received the Europeans. Colonel Everest found the proximity of the natives very opportune, since the measurement of the base would occupy a month, and being without waggons, or any materials for an encampment, he would have had no resource but to pass the time in the open air, with no other shelter than that afforded by the foliage. The astronomers took up their abode in the huts, which were quickly appropriated for the use of their new occupants. Their requirements were but small; their one thought was directed towards verifying their calculations by measuring the last side of their last triangle. The astronomers at once proceeded to their work. The trestles and platinum rods were arranged with all the care that had been applied to the earliest base. Nothing was neglected; all the conditions of the atmosphere, and the variations of the thermometer, were taken into account, and the Commission, without flagging, brought every energy to bear upon their final operation. The work, which lasted for five weeks, was completed on the 15th of May. When the lengths obtained had been estimated and reduced to the mean level of the sea at the temperature of 61° Fahrenheit, Palander and Emery presented to their colleagues the following numbers:-- Toises. New base actually measured 5075.25 The same base deduced trigonometrically from the entire series 5075.11 ------- Difference between the calculation and the observation 14 Thus there was only a difference of less than 1/6 of a toise that is to say, less than ten inches; yet the first base and the last were six hundred miles apart. When the meridian of France was measured from Dunkirk to Perpignan, the difference between the base at Melun and that at Perpignan was eleven inches. The agreement obtained by the Anglo-Russian Commission was still more remarkable, and thus made the work accomplished in the deserts of Africa, amid dangers of every kind, more perfect than any previous geodetic operation. The accuracy of this unprecedented result was greeted by the astronomers with repeated cheers.