. Nature . all, the isolated basinof Lake Etosa in north-east Damaraland; then comethe questions of the Ngami-Botletle-Makari-kari sys-tem, the real destination of the waters of the immense io8 NATURE [July s?, 1910 river system of the Kubango (Okavango)-Kuito-Omurambo and Kwando. These rivers discharge thebulk of their waters into the remains of an ancientsea, of which the Hainoma-Selinda-Mashi swamps,the networlv of the Tauche streams, Lage Ngami, theHotletle River, and the Makari-kari salt-pans are thevestiges; but by two separate overflows—the Mashi-Linyanti river-swamp and the Tamalakane
. Nature . all, the isolated basinof Lake Etosa in north-east Damaraland; then comethe questions of the Ngami-Botletle-Makari-kari sys-tem, the real destination of the waters of the immense io8 NATURE [July s?, 1910 river system of the Kubango (Okavango)-Kuito-Omurambo and Kwando. These rivers discharge thebulk of their waters into the remains of an ancientsea, of which the Hainoma-Selinda-Mashi swamps,the networlv of the Tauche streams, Lage Ngami, theHotletle River, and the Makari-kari salt-pans are thevestiges; but by two separate overflows—the Mashi-Linyanti river-swamp and the Tamalakane outlet of the steppe flora of so much of irregularly wateredtropical Africa, and the rich forest and swamp floraof West Africa. Seiner traces the approximate limitsof each phytosjeoirraphical region : the southernmostboundary of the baobab tree, of the bulging-stemmedHyphaene palm (H. vcnUicosa), of the high-timberforests of West African affinities, and the thin, low-growing woods of Copaifera and Ngami—the surplusage of the Okavango w-aters (thedrainage of eastern Angola) finds its way to theZambezi above the gorge of Kasungula. But thecomplete elucidation of this puzzle still awaits theresults of an extremely accurate survey in which themost careful attention will be given to questions oflevel. Did this once huge South-west African fresh-water sea, when at its fullest, discharge its waters Another noteworthy point in this exploration wasthe additional light it threw on the distribution ofthe Bushman-Hottentot peoples. It had been knownsince the journeys of Serpa Pinto that a quasi-Bushman race of red-skinned hunters extended north-wards from the Kalahari desert almost to the south-westernmost limits of the Congo basin ; but the con-clusions of Pinto were rather based on fancied physical
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