themselves with the water of the Sunday river, though, during the hot months, it is strongly impregnated with salt.

When the landrost, who accompanied Mr. Barrow, came to the drosdy (or residence), a long list of grievances was presented, relative to the incursions of the tribe of people called Caffres. Previously to the arrival of the landrost, the farmers, actuated chiefly by the hope of plunder, had prepared to carry, war into the country of the Caffres; but, very humanely and politically, these preparations were stopped; and it was resolved to inquire into the affairs of the Caffres upon the spot where they had posted themselves in the greatest numbers; and, should it be found necessary, to proceed from thence to the residence of their king; at the same time to pass through and examine as many parts of the country, under the jurisdiction of Graaff Reynet, as could be done without too great an expenditure of time; and particularly to visit the bay that was said to be formed where the Zwart-kops river falls into the sea.'

This journey commenced on the 11th of August; and, on the evening of the 17th, the party encamped on the verdant bank of a salt water lake, to which the inhabitants resort in order to procure salt. It is situated on a plain of considerable extent, elevated above the level of the sea; and the greatest part of the bottom of the lake is covered with one continued body of salt, like a sheet of ice, the chrystals of which were so united as to form a solid mass, hard as rock.

On the evening of the 18th, Mr. Barrow arrived at Zwartkops, or Algoa bay, situated in latitude 33 deg. 56 min. south, longitude 26 deg. 53 min. east of Greenwich, and distant from the Cape in a direct line 500 miles. He is of opinion that, from the vicinity of this place to the salt pans, from the ease of procuring bullocks in good condition, and from the abundance of excellent fish on the coast, great benefits would accrue to the East India company, if an establishment were formed for the preparation of salted beef and fish.

Quitting Graaff Reynet, on the 11th of August, Mr. Barrow, with his companions, proceeded in a southerly direction through a parched and sterile country, that scarcely afforded

either water or vegetation; and on the 13th they encamped on the arid plain, in the district of Zwart Ruggens, or black ridges, at some distance from the Sunday river, which they had already crossed nine times, to the manifest peril of the waggons, that were frequently expected to overturn.

In this district, which extended about 40 miles, there were scarcely a hundred yards of level ground; the roads were alternately carried over firm rocks, and covered with large fragments of loose stone, which, together with their constant risings and declivities, exhausted the patience of our author, and induced him to pronounce them execrable."

On the subsequent day, they passed a narrow opening, through a long range of hills, extending towards the east and west, beyond the limitation of sight. The approach to this chasm was perhaps the most beautiful that can be formed by a vigorous imagination. For the space of three miles, on the northern side, a serpentine road pursued its charming windings through a tall and elegant shrubbery, where all the choicest plants of southern Africa unfolded their beauties to the eye of the passenger, and impregnated the passing gales with their ambrosial odours.

After passing a plain of six miles in width, and encamping on the Wolga Fonteyn, at the feet of a mountainous range opposite the Rietberg, the travellers proceeded for about three days over a country that was finely diversified with romantic hills, fertile plains, gradual swells, and excavations, the whole of which was completely covered with a luxuriant shrubbery. During the day, our passengers were greatly delighted with the magnificent appearance of this extensive forest, but on the approach of night, its inconvenience was severely felt, when there was no space for the tents, waggons, or oxen; and, what was still worse, no water to allay the thirst of either man or beast.

Uncomfortable as this situation must naturally have been, it was still rendered more terrific, when the prints of a lion's foot were clearly discovered, and a dismal concert, composed of the lion's dismal roar, the jackall's shrill cry, the howl of wolves, and the deep bellowing of buffaloes, assailed the ears of per

sons who were encamped in the midst of an extensive forest, to which they were total strangers.

The habitations of the graziers, in the midst of these extensive forests, are indeed the pictures of extreme wretchedness. A miserable hovel, composed of four mud walls, with a door of wicker work, a slovenly thatch of rushes, and a couple of holes to admit the light, is the usual residence of a peasant, who possesses several thousand sheep, and an equal number of cattle.

"Twenty years ago,' says Mr. Barrow, if we may credit the travellers of the day, the countries beyond the Camtoos river, which was then the eastern limit of the colony, abounded with kraals, or villages, of Hottentots, out of which the inhabitants came to meet them by hundreds in a group. Some of these villages might still have been expected to remain in this remote and not very populous part of the colony. Not one, however, was to be found. There is not in the whole extensive district of Graaff Reynet a single horde of independent Hottentots; and perhaps not a score of individuals who are not actually in the service of the Dutch. These weak people, the most helpless, and in their present condition perhaps the most wretched, of the human race, duped out of their possessions, their country, and finally out of their liberty, have entailed upon their miserable offspring a state of existence to which that of slavery might bear the comparison of happiness. It is a condition, however, not likely to continue to a very remote posterity. The name of Hottentot will be forgotten, or remembered only as that of a deceased person of little note. Their numbers of late years have rapidly declined. It has generally been observed that wherever Europeans have colonized, the less civilized natives have always dwindled away, and at length totally disappeared. Various causes have contributed to the depopulation of the Hottentots. The impolitic custom of hording together in families, and of not marrying out of their own kraals, has no doubt tended to enervate this race of men, and reduced them to their present degenerated condition, which is that of a languid, listless, phelgmatic people, in whom the prolific powers of nature seem to be almost exhausted. To this may

be added their extreme poverty, scantiness of food, and continual dejection of mind, arising from the cruel treatment they receive from an inhuman and unfeeling peasantry, who having discovered themselves to be removed to too great a distance from the seat of their former government to be awed by its authority, have exercised, in the most wanton and barbarous manner, an absolute power over these poor wretches, reduced to the necessity of depending upon them for a morsel of bread. There is scarcely an instance of cruelty said to have been committed against the slaves in the West India islands, that could not find a parallel from the Dutch farmers of the remote parts of the colony towards the Hottentots in their service. Beating and cutting them with thongs of the hide of the sea-cow or rhinosceros, is a gentle punishment, though these sort of whips which they call shambos are most horrid instruments, tough, pliant, and heavy almost as lead. Firing small shot into the legs and thighs of a Hottentot is a punishment not unknown to some of the monsters who inhabit the neighbourhood of Camtoos river. Instant death is not unfrequently the consequence of punishing these poor wretches in a moment of rage. This is of little consequence to the farmer; for though they are to all intents and purposes his slaves, yet they are not transferable property. It is this circumstance which, in his mind, makes their lives less valuable and their treatment more inhuman.

In offences of too small moment to stir up the phlegm of a Dutch peasant, the coolness and tranquillity displayed at the punishment of his slave or Hottentot is highly ridiculous, and at the same time indicative of a savage disposition to unfeeling cruelty lurking in his heart. He flogs them, not by any given number of lashes, but by time; and as they have no clocks nor substitutes for them capable of marking the smaller divisions of time, he has invented an excuse for the indulgence of one of his most favourite sensualities, by flogging them till he has smoked as many pipes of tobacco as he may judge the magnitude of the crime to deserve. The government of Malacca, according to the manuscript journal of an intelligent officer in the expedition against that settlement, has adopted VOL. III.--(46)

Q

the same custom of flogging by pipes; and the fiscal or chief magistrate, or some of his deputies, are the smokers on such

occasions.

By a resolution of the old government, as unjust as it was inhuman, a peasant was allowed to claim as his property, till the age of five-and-twenty, all the children of the Hottentots in his service to whom he had given in their infancy a morsel of meat. At the expiration of this period the odds are ten to one that the slave is not emancipated. A Hottentot knows nothing of his age; "he takes no note of time." And though the spirit that dictated this humane law expanded its beneficence in favour of the Hottentot by directing the farmer to register the birth of such children as he may intend to make his slaves, yet it seldom happens, removed as many of them are to the distance of 10 or 12 days' journey from the drosdy, that the Hottentot has an opportunity of inquiring when his servitude will expire; and indeed it is a chance if he thinks upon or even knows the existence of such a resource. Should he be fortunate enough to escape at the end of the period, the best part of his life has been spent in a profitless servitude, and he is turned adrift in the decline of life (for a Hottentot begins to grow old at thirty) without any earthly thing he can call his own, except the sheep's skin upon his back.

The condition of those who engage themselves from year to year is little better than that of the other. If they have already families, they erect for them little straw-huts near the farmhouse. Their children are encouraged to run about the house of the peasant, where they receive their morsel of food. This is deemed sufficient to establish their claim to the young Hottentots; and should the parents, at the end of the term for which they engaged, express a desire to quit the service, the farmer will suffer them to go, perhaps turn them away, and detain their children.

Those who are unmarried and free are somewhat better in their situation than the others, though not much. The pitiful wages they agree for are stopped upon every frivolous occasion. If an ox or a sheep be missing, the Hottentot must replace