Ll 
INTERIOR OF SOUTHERN AFRICA. 369 
celved its water from here, we were dissuaded by the statement of the 
natives, who tell us that the spring of the Mooyerivier originates its 
water also from a river which disappears in a similar way under the 
ground, but a considerable distance from our station, more towards the 
south-east. The muddy nature of the soil about here where we halted, 
and the apparent shape of the bed of a river, makes it credible that 
the same river which runs at present underground has flown formerly 
between the embankment of this valley. "There were here and there 
only muddy ponds of water, inhabited by various kinds of water-birds, 
resembling the sacred Ibis, several kinds of herons, and some ducks, 
The next day, May 29, brought us over a similar flat, where the 
vegetation had been burnt down, as we had experienced already the 
day before; and we arrived towards evening in a similar valley as the 
day before, being the dry bed, or the embankment of a river, but its 
waters running underground in the same way as the two others men- 
tioned before, on account of which the emigrants adopted the name of 
“Tower Fountain," to the station where we halted again for the night. 
An uninhabited building, with the nearly obliterated traces of a gar- 
den, and some arable ground as cornfields close to the farmhouse, bore 
witness of the enterprising spirit of an emigrant family. They had 
evidently chosen this place before the country towards the north had 
been explored, and were living there as border colonists. “However, 
the inmates most likely gladly left this place, as soon as the great mass 
of people entered a more northerly and milder climate, and changed - 
ths isolated and inclement place for a better one. On account of the 4 
considerable elevation of the country, the climate must be very unfa- 
vourable during rainy or cloudy weather; the falling of rain during 
winter is not sufficient to moisten the soil, and the intense cold during - 
winter are obstacles hindering the pasturage from growing, so as to 
give subsistence to the flocks. e 
Several miles’ travelling the following day over an elevated grassy _ 
plain, continually rising as we advanced, brought us near to a vast 
number of scattered stone-hills, crowned with many a fine tree of 
Protea, No. 1458, closely related to the well-known Wagenboom, or — 
Protea grandiflora, and perhaps identical with that species. The route - 
entered, after we had passed several of these stony hills, into a depressed - 
spot, where a pair of the graceful Grus carunculata, a kind of a crane, — 
rambling on our wayside, attracted our attention, as living also in these - 
VOL. VII. 3B 
