rashly crossed from bank to bank; the dove coo’d in the denser foliage; the yellow vulture, apparently keeping a bright look-out, perched upon the topmost tree-crest overhanging the shoal water which lined the sides; the small grey kingfisher poised himself with twinkling wings; the snowy paddy-bird stood meditating upon the margin of the wave, while sober-coated curlews and sandpipers took short sharp runs, and stopped to dive beak into the dark vegetable mud. After seven hours, or ten miles, of alternate rowing, sailing, and pushing through pelting rain and potent sunbeams, we reached, about mid-day, the pier—a tree projecting from the right bank over the miry graves of many defunct mangroves. Our boat, stripped of sail, oars, and rudder, to secure her presence next morning, was made fast to a stump, and we proceeded to breast the hills. We began with rolling ground, sliced and split by alternate heat and moisture, thickly grown with tall coarse grass, sun-scorched to a sickly tawny brown, and thinly sprinkled with thorny trees. Amongst the latter I recognized the ‘Gabol’-mimosa of Somaliland, whose long sharp needle, soft whilst young, but dry, hard, and woody when old, springs from a hollow filbert-like cone. Another mile brought us to the first ascent of the Rabai hills. The pitch of the fell was short but sharp, and the path wound amongst boulders, and at times under palms and clumps of grateful shade. On the summit appeared the straggling lodges of the savages, pent-housed sheds of dried fronds, surrounded by sparse cultivation, lean cattle, and vegetation drooping for want of rain. The desert people were all armed, being in terror of the Wamasai, the natural enemies of their kind. None, however, carried guns, the citizens of Mombasah having strictly prohibited the importation of powder; a wise precaution which might be adopted by more civilized races upon the West African coast. Amid cries of Yambo!—a salutation which recalled dim memories of Mumbo Jumbo—especially from that part of the community termed by prescriptive right the fair—questions as to whether our bundle contained provisions, and the screams of lean-ribbed children, we pursued our road under the grateful cover of a little wood, and then over ridgy ground where a scattered village, shortly to be wasted by the Kimasai spear, was surrounded by the scantiest cultivation. At the end of a five-mile walk we entered the Mission House, introduced ourselves, and received from Mr and Mrs Rebmann the kindest welcome. They were then alone, M. Deimler, who had lived with Mr Isenberg in Abyssinia, having left them three days before in H. M.’s ship Castor, the late Commodore Trotter. We afterwards saw the latter at Zanzibar.