John Hanning Speke questions about the height and extent of the lake could not be answered easily. Speke's eyes were still bothering him and he only saw a small part of the southern end of the lake and his view was blocked by islands in the lake so he could not judge the size of the lake well. However, Speke did estimate the elevation of Lake Victoria at 4000 feet by observing the temperature at which water boiled at that level. (This lake's being substantially higher than Lake Tanganyika did make it a more likely candidate for the source of the Nile.) From
John Hanning Speke his femur and exiting. Showing tremendous determination he used his bound fists to give his attacker a facial punch and this gave Speke an opportunity to escape, albeit he was followed by a group of Somalis and he had to dodge spears as he was running for his life. Rejoining Burton and Herne the trio eventually managed to escape with a boat passing along the coast. The expedition was a severe financial loss and Speke's natural history specimens from his earlier leg were used to make up for some of it. Speke handed Burton his diaries that Burton used as