with the aid of sticks and hatches.  These expedients proved of no avail.  The waters swelled wildly up, higher and higher, and sheets of foaming waves came whirling in amongst us.  I called out to Yusuf to select some high ground at once, to which our goods might be conveyed.  He calmly replied, “The people still stay where they are;” implying that there was no danger, that the inundation would subside like the former one, and that we should escape with a wetting.  Not so, however.  All the low parts of the valley were already covered with a turbid stream, that broke fiercely round the trunks of the trees; and at length the mounting tide threatened our tent.  Yusuf then made a little child’s dam around, as if in sport; but in a few minutes this was swept away, and we found ourselves standing in the water.

It was now absolutely necessary to move; and our people, who seemed until then to have been paralysed by the humidity, as we in northern climates sometimes are with cold, began to bestir themselves, and to transfer our tents and baggage to a piece of ground which rose considerably above the level of the valley, and was surrounded with rushing waters.  The remainder of the caravan imitated us, and we soon saw them all occupying the summits of little islands, whither the camels, at least such as did not instinctively take refuge there themselves, were also driven.  This was a good opportunity of seeing a specimen of African character.  The Kailouees made no preparation for the deluge until the last moment, and then seemed absolutely to make the worst possible.  They rolled their bales of dry goods in the water as if they were so many logs of wood, although by lifting them up a little all might have at first been saved quite dry.  Meanwhile the black servants were dancing, singing, and rolling about in the waters, as if some sudden blessing had overtaken them.[12]

 [12] The black people of Central Africa, whose character and
      opinions we do not yet understand, seem to take peculiar
      delight in those very natural phenomena which civilised
      nations regard as disastrous.  Among other instances, I have
      seen an old negress, usually gloomy and taciturn, quite
      intoxicated by an earthquake.  Whilst others were thinking of
      their safety, she ran about the courtyard on her hands and
      feet, rolling over, laughing and whooping, as if she were a
      devil and this was news from the infernal regions.—­ED.

The water still continued to rise, and to foam over the margin of the island.  We were compelled by degrees to retreat towards the centre, and as there was no sign of abatement, and as the whole valley had become one rushing river, covered with floating trees,—­some shooting singly along, others entangled into rafts or floating islands, I began to entertain serious misgivings.  Never was there a more perfect picture of a deluge!  It was the Biblical deluge in miniature: