1 905-1 906.] A Field Naturalist's Rafttble in South Africa. 287 



long line of sandhills about a couple of hundred feet high : 

 the country is entirely desert, so much so that drinking-water 

 IS regularly imported from Capetown, 700 miles away. We 

 coasted along, keeping within sight of land without a green 

 leaf for a hundred n)iles or so. That was our first impression 

 of South Africa. From Schwakopmund a railway goes inland 

 some 300 miles to copper mines. 



It was a bright sunny morning when we arrived at Cape- 

 town. Table Mountain was draped in delicate clouds like 

 pillars around its perpendicular sides. It was a sight not to 

 be forgotten. We had many walks around Capetown. There 

 was during our visit a remarkably interesting exhibition of 

 wild plants, arranged in floral regions. It was the queerest 

 collection of wild plants I ever saw, very many being adapted 

 to live through the dry season. One of our excursions was 

 to False Bay to visit the Marine Biological Station there. 

 Then we had a shore walk,— a disappointing one, because 

 while there are plenty of rocks, the rock -pools are almost 

 barren of life, and there are very few seaweeds— that is due 

 to the heavy waves. False Bay is 6° Fahr. warmer in 

 summer than Table Bay, and we saw some of the green mud 

 or sand full of foraminifera, and green from phosphate of lime, 

 which is supposed to arise from vast numbers of fish killed 

 where the warm and the cold currents meet. 

 _ One evening during our stay at Capetown we were fortunate 

 in hearing a discussion at a Literary Society on the most 

 important of all questions in South Africa,— "Natives as 

 Citizens." The recently published " Eeport of the Commis- 

 sion on Native Affairs" was largely quoted, and it was most 

 interesting to hear how the white man regarded the black 

 socially and politically. The majority of the speakers thought 

 that the blacks should have collective representation. 



Several visits to the Museum gave us a good idea of the 

 South African fauna : its richness in antelopes strikes every 

 one. '' 



In some of our excursions we met with the Pre-Cape rocks 

 —the oldest rocks of South Africa. They are highly meta- 

 morphosed, and resemble much the rocks found in the West 

 Highlands : schists, sandy clay-slate dipping at great angles, 

 granites, and veins of quartz are common. Above these 



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