258 BOTANICAL EXCURSIONS 
wood, and descended to the valley of the Kat River, which 
is one of the principal tributaries of the Great Fish River. 
The situation of Fort Armstrong is remarkably picturesque. 
The river comes winding with a graceful sweep round the 
high tongue of land on which the fort is built, and the hills 
on the left bank rise steeply from the water's edge, in parts 
covered with thick woods of Euphorbias and other strange 
trees, in others showing bold escarpments of sandstone rock, 
half mantled with creeping evergreens. At some distance, 
on the N. and N.W., are high and picturesque mountains, 
among which the craggy peak of the Didima is the most 
conspicuous. "The cliffs near the river are stratified with re- 
markable distinctness, in thick horizontal beds, which are 
divided by vertical fissures into regularly rectangular blocks, 
so as to give to the whole a striking resemblance to the an- 
cient Etruscan walls of Cortona and Fiesola. 
We remained here the whole of the 6th. The cutting wind 
from which we had suffered two or three days before, had 
died away, and the severe cold was succeeded by very great 
heat; such are the rapid alternations usual in this climate, 
which is nevertheless extremely healthy. Fort Armstrong; 
standing on a naked rock, and half surrounded by steep hills 
which reflect the glare of the sun, is extremely hot, nor is Yt 
considered by the officers as an agreeable quarter. 
- At this place I saw a young gnoo, which belonged to an 
officer of the 75th Regt., and was so tame and fearless that 1t 
took food from off the breakfast-table, and could hardly be 
driven away. In the structure of this animal there is a €U- 
rious mixture of the characters belonging to the buffalo and 
to the antelope tribe; the former predominating in the shape 
of the head, the horns, and the neck, the latter in the slender 
and flexible limbs, while the thick mane standing upright 
along the ridge of the neck, and the flowing tail which resem- 
bles that of a horse, complete the singularity of its appear- 
ance. In their wild state, as I have been told, when chased — 
or alarmed, the gnoos always run in a single file, one follow 
ing another, often to the number of several hundreds, bae 
