6S Mr Red field on American Steam-Boats. 



sustains the load, and affords sufficient reaction for the moving- 

 power, is now well understood ; and in regard to rail-roads, it is 

 doubtless true, that a level metallic surface, not 07ily sustains 

 the vehicle, in the most perfect manner, but affords the least 

 possible resistance, with the best possible reaction for the pro- 

 pelling power, and combines, therefore, the greater conceivable 

 Jacilities for the transit of persons arid property *. Other ex- 

 pectations, which are often entertained without due considera- 

 tion, will doubtless end in disappointment. It is to the esta- 

 blishment and extension of these unequalled means of convey- 

 ance, that the enterprise of our growing country should be di- 

 rected. It has been truly said, that the career of improvement 

 in our age is too impetuous to be stayed, were it wise to attempt 

 it, and " though it would a futile attempt to oppose such an 

 impulse, it may not be unworthy our ambition to guide its pro- 

 gress, and direct its course/' — Amer. Journ. of Science and 

 Arts, vol. xxiii. No. % Jan. 1833, p. 311. 



LION-HUNTING IN SOUTH AFRICA. By LEWIS LeSLIE^ Esq., 



Aibth Regiment. Communicated by the Author. 



Some years ago it was my fortune to be attached to a party 

 of the Cape Cavalry encamped on the banks of Orange River 

 in South Africa, for the protection of the boors on that extreme 

 boundary, against a tribe of savages who were then supposed 

 to threaten an invasion of the Colony. That portion of our 

 African territory extending from the Fish River, formerly the 

 north eastern limit to the banks of the Gariep or Orange River, 

 had been but a few years in our possesion, and then only a 

 scanty population of Dutchmen was scattered over a space of 

 some hundred miles. The occupation, I believe, was not 



• It may be noticed, that the power employed for propelling a single 

 steam-boat of the first class, is equal to that of fifty locomotive engines, of 

 the power of twelve horses each. These would probably be adequate to the 

 conveyance of all the passengers and property now transported upon the 

 Hudson River, if the same were transferred to a level rail-way of equal ex- 

 tent. 



