EAULY IlISTOltY UF THE CAPE PROVINCE. 435 



town. Capetown (and district) is the oldest. The third oldest 

 town (and district) is SweUcndaui. It was called after Governor 

 Hendrik bwellengrebel and his wife, whose maiden name was ten 

 Damme. The district was founded in 1745, and the village a 

 year later. While the name of a third Dutch Governor is perpetu- 

 ated, it was not until nearly half a century after his death that 

 the district was so named. I refer to TulbaglL. Eyk Tulbagh 

 was Governor from 1751 to 1771, and in 1804 Commissioner de 

 Mist cut off a portion of the district of Stellenbosch and named it 

 in his honour. When the first Europeans saw what is now the 

 Tulbagh Basin in 1658 they described it as a plain " four days' 

 journey broad." In 1699 Governor W. A. van der Stel, son of 

 Simon, named this area the Land of Waver en in honour of a well- 

 known Amsterdam family to which he was related. By that 

 name it was referred to for a century. The fourth oldest town and 

 district, Graaff Bcinct, was called after Governor Cornelis Jacob 

 van der Graaff and the maiden name of his wife, Keinet. The 

 district was named in 1785. The site of the drostdy or magistracy, 

 now the town, was that of two farms belonging to one Dirk 

 Coetsee. He received Sib'dO as compensation for the buildings on 

 them and accepted land of an equivalent extent elsewhere. The 

 town and district of Uitenhage is the fifth oldest in the Province. 

 In 1804 a portion of the Graaff Keinet district was cut off and a 

 few months after the Dutch Governor- General Jaussens gave the 

 name of Uitenhage to the new area. This was in honour of 

 Commissioner J. A. de Mist, who had been sent to the Cape to 

 receive it on behalf of the Batavian Republic from the hands of 

 the British. The name was a family one of de Mist, who was 

 permitted at a later date, in 1817, by King William of the Nether- 

 lands, to resume the full family name of Uitenhage de Mist. 

 One more name recalling a statesman: The Drahenstcin Vallcg 

 and Mountains in the Paarl district take their name from a high 

 Dutch official, High Commissioner Hendrik Adriaan van Eeede 

 tot Drakenstein, Lord of Mydrecht, who visited the Cape in 1685. 

 Simon van der Stel gave this place name in 1687 in his honour, 

 when he settled the first Europeans along the banks of the Berg 

 Eiver, which flows through the valley. 



As we look round the coast line of South Africa we still see 

 some Portuguese names, and many which are now Dutch are 

 translations of early Portuguese ones. Dassen Island was named 

 in 1601 by Joris van Spilbergen, but four years later received from 

 Sir Edward Michelburne the name of Coney Island because of 

 the great number of conies found there. This was subsequently 

 translated by the Dutch into Dassen Island, a name it has 

 retained. Table Bay was visited by the Portuguese, Antonio da 

 Saldanha, who called it after himself, but the Dutch seafarer, 

 Joris van Spilbergen, gave it the name of Tafel Baai (Table Bay) 

 in 1601. Hold Bay or Wood Bay, w-as so named in 1653 in 

 consequence of the thick forests which grew on its shores. The 

 well-known seaside resort Muizcnberg owes its name to a Dutch 

 military officer Muys, who was stationed there before the middle 



