143 



disused soil. These samples of red friable sandy loams were taken from 

 the centre of a well cultivated area, covered with good crops, and of about 

 2,500 to 3,000 acres extent. The underlying subsoil is a yellow clayey 

 loam of great depth. About five miles south-east of Taungs station this 

 good land gives place to an obviously less fertile and uncultivated greyish 

 soil, shallow, and resting upon schistose slates and sandstone, which often 

 appear at the surface. Lime abounds there. 



Just across the Harts River at this point, towards Thoming, there 

 lies a wide, level, and apparently fertile expanse, from which, however, no 

 samples were taken. This portion of the district would probably benefit 

 largely by moans of alluvial soil conveyed from the Campbell Rand to 

 the west. Thoming, in fact, lies upon the limestone rocks of the Campbell 

 Rand series. 



(Privately collected.) 



No. Field cornetcy. Farm or place. Collector. 



10. No. 5. Geluk. H. Abt. 



11. No. 12. Kuruman. C. D. H. Braine. 











>j 











A sample of somewhat sandy soil, No. 10, was collected at Geluk, 

 about thirty miles W.S.W. of Vryburg; the remaining six soils were 

 taken from the Crown Reserve about Kuruman township. Of the latter, 

 three were collected within the property of the London Mission, and the 

 other three around the Mission station. No. 11 was a red subsoil, taken 

 two feet below the surface to the north-east of the station. No. 12 was 

 taken from the surface near the central furrow in the middle of the Mis- 

 sion property; the spot was completely water-logged and overgrown with 

 reeds. Sample No. 13 was collected in front of the Mission House, and 

 represents a surface soil stated to have been under cultivation for over 

 sixty years and not recently manured. No. 14 is also a surface soil, taken 

 from the south-eastern portion of the Mission property. This ground waa 

 likewise under cultivation, but had not been manured of late. No. 15 

 was a subsoil, taken twelve inches below the surface, from the side of the 

 stream in the Dakwent valley, south-east of the Mission property. No. 

 16 was taken three feet below the surface, outside, and south of, the 

 Mission property, between the converging streams which join on the 

 Mission station. It was intended to irrigate all the lands represented by 

 these samples. 



The large quantities of lime which these soils, in most oases, contain, 

 are obviously derived from the geological formations to which Stow* gave 

 the name of " The Campbell Rand Series." The Campbell Rand, a range 

 of precipitous cliffs, which terminate the Great Kaap Plateau towards 

 the south-east, and flank at first the Vaal and subsequently the Harts 

 River for a distance of over a hundred miles from the junction of the 

 former with the Orange River below Campbell, is composed of limestone 

 and dolomite, which extend westwards and northwards as far as Vryburg. 



* " Notes on Griqualand West." Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society. 

 Dec., 1874, page 613. 



