ZAMBESI

ZAMBESI, one of the four great African rivers, and the fourth largest as regards both the volume of its waters and the area it drains, the other three being the Nile, the Congo, and the Niger; its head-streams being the Lungebungo, the Leeba, and Leeambye; it waters a rich pastoral region, and it falls into the Indian Ocean after a course of nearly 1600 m., in which it drains 600,000 sq. m. of territory, or an area three times larger than that of France; owing to cataracts and rapids it is only navigable in different stretches; at 900 m. from its mouth it plunges in a cataract known as the Victoria Falls, and which rivals in grandeur those even of Niagara.