by ounce ever since the Deluge. These broken para- 

 pets stood up like ruins of giant castles with every 

 layer in their formation visible across their rugged 

 time-worn fronts lines, in places a few yards only and 

 in others a mile or more in length, laid one upon 

 another as true as any spirit level could set them 

 and a wealth of colouring over all that, day by day, 

 one thought more wonderful in variety and blend. 

 Grey and black and yellow, white and red and brown, 

 were there ; yet all harmonising, all shaded by growths 

 of shrub and creeper, by festoons of moss or brilliant 

 lichen, all weather-stained and softened, all toned, as 

 time and nature do it, to make straight lines and many 

 colours blend into the picturesque. 



Paradise Camp perched on the very edge of the 

 Berg. Behind us rolled green slopes to the feet of the 

 higher peaks, and in front of us lay the Bushveld. 

 From the broken battlements of the Berg we looked 

 down three thousand feet, and eastward to the sea 

 a hundred and fifty miles away, across the vast pano- 

 rama. Black densely-timbered kloofs broke the edge 

 of the plateau into a long series of projecting turrets, 

 in some places cutting far in, deep crevices into which 

 the bigger waterfalls plunged and were lost. But the 

 top of the Berg itself was bare of trees : the breeze 

 blew cool and fresh for ever there ; the waters trickled 

 and splashed in every little break or tumbled with 

 steady roar down the greater gorges ; deep pools, 

 fringed with masses of ferns, smooth as mirrors or 

 flecked with dancing sunlight, were set like brilliants 

 in the silver chain of each little stream ; and rocks and 

 241 Q 



