south; and Corrientes,1 San Sebastian, Delgado, and Guardafui, on the east.

Cape Bon makes near approach to the island of Sicily, but Cape Blanco, on the Mediterranean coast, is the most northerly point of the African continent. There is another Cape Blanco, a famous headland, on the western side of Africa, but Cape Verde, 450 miles south of Cape Blanco, is the most westerly point, Cape Guardafui is the most easterly headland, and Cape Agulhas, the most southerly, but the adjacent Cape of Good Hope is historically more noteworthy.

INLETS: The principal inlets along the African coast are the Gulfs of Sidra and Kabes on the north; the Gulf of Guinea-a broad arm of the Atlantic-with the Bights of Benin and Biafra, Walfish Bay, and Table Bay, on the west; False Bay, Mossel Bay, and Algoa Bay, on the south; the Red Sea with the Gulf of Suez, the Gulf of Aden, Sofala Bay, Delagoa Bay, and Port Natal, on the east.

The Mediterranean is common to the three continents of the Old World, but it is more European than either Asiatic or African. By far the larger portion of its coastline is European, and while its northern coast exhibits every variety of contour, embracing numerous peninsulas and intervening channels, its southern (or African) line of coast is comparatively unbroken. The Gulfs of Sidra and Kabes are the two chief inlets on the Mediterranean portion of the African coasts. The Gulf of Sidra was called by the ancients Syrtis major, and was dreaded by them on account of its shallows and shifting sands. The Gulf of Kabes, further west, was the Syrtis minor of antiquity.

CHANNELS and STRAITS: The principal of these are the Strait of Gibraltar, between Morocco and Spain; the Mozambique Channel, between Madagascar and the mainland; and the Strait of Bab el Mandeb, leading from the Gulf of Aden into the Red Sea.

Besides these, the artificial channel leading from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea the Suez Canal-should be noticed. This channel is not only of vast commercial importance, but practically converts the continent of Africa into an island.

ISLANDS Compared with the adjoining continents, Africa is singularly destitute of islands, while Europe and Asia are rich in islands and archipelagoes.

The principal islands are Madeira, the Canary Islands, the Cape Verde Islands, Ascension, St. Helena, and Tristan d'Acunha, in the Atlantic; with Fernando Po, Prince's Island, St. Thomas, and Annobon in the Gulf of Guinea. Madagascar, Bourbon or Réunion, Mauritius, the Comoro Islands, Zanzibar and Pemba, the Seychelles, the Amirante Islands, and Socotra, are in the Indian Ocean.

In the Red Sea there are numerous islands which adjoin the African coast, and there are also a few in the Mediterranean, but these are small and un important. Madagascar is next in size to the island of Borneo, and is there. fore (regarding Australia as a continent) the fourth largest island in the world

1. Corrientes, "current"

2. Latin, syrus, a quicksand.

3. Bab el Mandeb, "the gte of tears."
4. Described und Islands of Africa."

RELIEF: The entire continent of Africa may be regarded as a vast plateau of moderate elevation, girdled by a comparatively narrow, low-lying, and generally unhealthy coastal belt, and edged by ranges of mountains or hills. The average elevation of this great inland plateau declines from about 4,000 feet in the south, to less than 1,500 feet in the north.

The mean altitude of the continent of Africa-2,000 feet-is very nearly the same as the average height of the entire land-surface of the globe, and Africa is thus, on the whole, loftier than any of the continents except Asia.

feet.

The main axis of the great African plateau extends in a S. W.-N. E. direction from the south-west coast to the shores of the Red Sea, near which it attains, in the lofty tableland of Abyssinia, an average elevation of from 7,000 to 8,000 Several of the Abyssinian mountains rise to an absolute elevation of over 15,000 feet, but the culminating points of the continent are on the Equatorial Tableland, where Kenia and Kilimanjaro, to the east of the Victoria Nyanza, and Ruwenzori, to the west of that great upland expanse, rise above the limit of perpetual snow.

But although the interior plateau is broken here and there by ranges of moun tains and isolated elevations, there are nowhere extended mountain-chains, such as stretch through the Asiatic continent. The highlands of Abyssinia ae but a confused mass of mountains, and the average height of the irregular and broken east-wall of the plateau is not more than 7,000 or 8,000 feet, while the heights along its western edge are, on the whole, much lower. In the extreme north, however, the great chain of the Atlas intervenes between the Great Desert and the Mediterranean, and some of its peaks rival those of Abyssinia in height.

The highest mountain in all Africa, as far as known, is Mount Kilimanjaro, which is estimated to be 19,680 feet above the sea level, a height exceeding that of Mont Blanc, the culminating point of Europe, by 4,000 feet, but 9,400 feet lower than Mount Everest, the highest mountain in Asia.

MOUNTAINS: The loftiest mountains in Africa are Kilimanjaro (19,680 feet), a little to the south of the Equator; Kenia (18,000 feet), on the Equator; and Ruwenzori (16,815 feet), a little to the north of the Equator. There are lofty mountains also in Abyssinia, North Africa, South Africa, and elsewhere, but the various ranges and mountain-groups, unlike those of the Eurasian and American

continents, have little or no connection with one another.

Strictly speaking, the mountains of Africa can scarcely be arranged in systems, they must, consequently, be grouped simply according to their position on the

continent.

The Northern Ranges include the numerous ridges of the Atlas Mountains, which extend from the Atlantic seaboard of Morocco to the coast of Tunis. The low mountains, or rather hills, of Tripoli connect the Atlas uplands with the Plateau of Barca, beyond which the hills gradually sink to the dead level of the Libyan Desert and

the Delta of the Nile.

The Atlas Mountains consist of a series of ranges, generally parallel to each other, and connected by lofty uplands, but here and there divided by deep