ORANGE RIVER. 463 



This magnificent river is worthy of a description, let 

 me endeavour, therefore, to picture it. Its banks are 

 remarkably steep, in many places precipitous, and 

 covered with dwarf trees and brush as brilliant in their 

 foliage at this season of the year as an American, forest 

 after the first autumnal frost. As far as I could see to 

 the east or west high mountains marked its course, many 

 of them having a mile or two of plain between their 

 slopes and the water, while others, less considerate, pro- 

 jected into the river with dark frowning headland or rocky 

 precipice. The Orange Eiver, at the ferry, must be a 

 quarter of a mile broad, while just above is a noble pool 

 double that width, with some remarkably picturesque 

 rocks at its entrance. The water is a brilliant cobalt 

 blue, thus giving it an unnatural look in the eyes of 

 Europeans. At this portion it assuredly is navigable 

 for vessels of deep draft ; what distance it continues so 

 I cannot say, but where it debouches into the sea the 

 channels are so shallow that it is currently believed 

 that the greater part of its water passes into the 

 ocean under the sand. If it were not for this what a 

 grand thoroughfare it would have been for transporting 

 to market the immense quantities of produce that could 

 be raised on the almost unlimited plains that margin its 

 upper sources ! 



The incline from the ferry till level country is 

 reached is both long and steep, so the passengers, with 

 the exception of the Boer with the unruly leg, walked 

 to its summit. Hurrah, for the Old Colony ! for we are 

 in it now, and the horses hear the shout and tear along 

 at racing pace. One town after another is passed, all 

 pretty, but Cradock most so. After this a long stretch 

 of velt is crossed, when we commence to enter wood-clad 



