Wherever we see an island all sand, or with only one layer of mud in it, we know it is one of recent formation, and that it may be swept away at any time by a flood; while those islands which are all of mud are the more ancient, having in fact existed ever since the time when the ebbing and flowing tides originally formed them as parts of the delta.  This mud resists the action of the river wonderfully.  It is a kind of clay on which the eroding power of water has little effect.  Were maps made, showing which banks and which islands are liable to erosion, it would go far to settle where the annual change of the channel would take place; and, were a few stakes driven in year by year to guide the water in its course, the river might be made of considerable commercial value in the hands of any energetic European nation.  No canal or railway would ever be thought of for this part of Africa.  A few improvements would make the Zambesi a ready means of transit for all the trade that, with a population thinned by Portuguese slaving, will ever be developed in our day.  Here there is no instance on record of the natives flocking in thousands to the colony, as they did at Natal, and even to the Arabs on Lake Nyassa.  This keeping aloof renders it unlikely that in Portuguese hands the Zambesi will ever be of any more value to the world than it has been.

After a hurried visit to Senna, in order to settle with Major Sicard and Senhor Ferrao for supplies we had drawn thence after the depopulation of the Shire, we proceeded down to the Zambesi’s mouth, and were fortunate in meeting, on the 13th February, with H.M.S.  “Orestes.”  She was joined next day by H.M.S.  “Ariel.”  The “Orestes” took the “Pioneer,” and the “Ariel” the “Lady Nyassa” in tow, for Mosambique.  On the 16th a circular storm proved the sea-going qualities of the “Lady of the Lake;” for on this day a hurricane struck the “Ariel,” and drove her nearly backwards at a rate of six knots.  The towing hawser wound round her screw and stopped her engines.  No sooner had she recovered from this shock than she was again taken aback on the other tack, and driven stem on towards the “Lady Nyassa’s” broadside.  We who were on board the little vessel saw no chance of escape unless the crew of the “Ariel” should think of heaving ropes when the big ship went over us; but she glided past our bow, and we breathed freely again.  We had now an opportunity of witnessing man-of-war seamanship.  Captain Chapman, though his engines were disabled, did not think of abandoning us in the heavy gale, but crossed the bows of the “Lady Nyassa” again and again, dropping a cask with a line by which to give us another hawser.  We might never have picked it up, had not a Krooman jumped overboard and fastened a second line to the cask; and then we drew the hawser on board, and were again in tow.  During the whole time of the hurricane the little vessel behaved admirably, and never shipped a single green sea.  When the “Ariel”