A JOURNEY TO DURBAN. 125 



discovery, Natal has only been colonized in quite recent 

 times, and its flora, save by introduced plants, has had 

 insufficient time to be radically altered. The gardens 

 were gay at the time of my visit with the flowers of 

 several varieties of Hibiscus., aloes exhibited their huge 

 flowering-spikes, and lovely creepers in full bloom were 

 quite common. The fruit-market rejoiced with pine- 

 apples, mangoes, bananas, and other vegetable products 

 of a subtropical nature, which add a charm to Durban, 

 and, apart from its summer heat, I would more willingly 

 live and die at that port than in any other part of 

 Southern Africa. 



The beach in front of the hotel at which I stayed had, 

 however, other characteristics beside its beauty. One 

 suicide and two dead bodies washed up during my stay 

 of five days was rather a ghastly, though, I believe, 

 unusual spectacle. One body was described to me by 

 a " morgue " enthusiast as particularly curious from 

 the fact that only the face and boots were perfect, 

 and he seemed somewhat chagrined that I did not 

 allow him to guide me to this gruesome sight before 

 lunch, for which he said " there was just time." 



I left Durban by the morning train for the north, 

 intending to visit the bark farms of the interior. 

 Perhaps few railways exhibit more singular freaks of 

 construction and engineering skill than this Natal line. 

 When mountains cannot be avoided, the rails run 

 round them in serpentine arrangement, and to avoid 

 these elevations, when possible, the line takes such a 

 devious course as to frequently give the impression that 

 one is returning to the spot only just previously left, while 

 the curves are so sudden that you can often see both 

 ends of the train at the same time. A story is told 

 of an engine-driver who pulled up in obedience to the 

 danger-light belonging to the rear guard's break of his 

 own train, which, in the intricacies of the curves, had 

 become placed in front of him. 



Owing to the steep gradients, a single line of 

 rails, and the number of small stations, progress is 

 very slow, and my return journey did not average 



