Until I realized the extent of the volume that was here precipitated, I could hardly believe that it was indeed a vast river that was passing before me through this narrowed channel. I have seen many waterfalls during my travels in various parts of the world, but here was a stupendous river flung in full volume over a waterfall only 500 yards across. The river at the last cataract of the Stanley Falls does not merely _fall_: it is precipitated downwards. The Ripon Falls at the Victoria Lake outlet, compared to this swift descent and furious on- rush, were languid. The Victoria Nile, as it swept down the steep declivity of its bed towards Unyoro, is very pretty, picturesque, even a sufficiently exciting scene; but the Livingstone, with over ten times the volume of the Victoria Nile, though only occupying the same breadth of bed, conveys to the sense the character of irresistible force, and unites great depth with a tumultuous rush. [Illustration: FISH, SEVENTH CATARACT, STANLEY FALLS. 28 inches long; 16 inches round body; round snout; no teeth; broad tail; large scales; colour, pale brown. ] A solar observation taken opposite the last of the Stanley Falls proved the latitude to be north 0° 15′ 0″, or seventeen miles north of the first broken water of the Sixth Cataract; and a few miles below the falls, on the 28th of January, we obtained north latitude 0° 20′ 0″. By boiling point I ascertained that the declination was nearly 120 feet in these twenty-two miles, the altitude above sea at the Seventh Cataract being 1511 feet. As there are only seven miles really occupied by the Sixth and Seventh Cataracts, the intermediate fifteen miles being calm flowing water, we may not be far wrong in giving the slope of the river at the two falls a declination of 17 feet to the mile. [Illustration: FISH, STANLEY FALLS. Fine scales; weight, 23 lbs.; thick broad snout; 26 small teeth in upper jaw, 23 teeth in lower jaw; broad tongue; head, 11 inches long. ] The rocky point of the left bank was formerly connected with the rocky island of the Wenya by a ridge, which appears to have fallen southward, judging from the diagonal strata, but since that period the river has worn down this obstruction, and the cataract is now about three hundred yards south-east of the straits, pounding away at the ledge with the whole of its force.