278 devil's peak. 



colour 4 the next above it is of a yellowish colour ; and tho 

 upper part, or that on the summit, is of a gray or beautifully 

 white colour, and sometimes so coarsely granular as to ap- 

 pear in the state of conglomerate. In many places, the sand- 

 stone passes into quartz rock, and is very highly crystalline. 

 The sandstone is distinctly stratified, and nearly horizontal. 



DeviVs Peak. — The most easterly mountain of the group 

 we are describing, named the Devil's Peak, agrees with 

 Table Mountain in the nature and arrangement of the rocks 

 of which it is composed. The lower part of the mountain 

 exhibits strata of clay-slate ; these, as we ascend, are suc- 

 ceeded by granite ; and the upper parts and summit are of 

 the usual varieties of sandstone.* 



* The following particulars, in regard to the mountains near Cape 

 Town, were communicated to us by Captain Carmichael. The Table 

 Mountain and Lion's H^ad rest upon a base of granite ; Green Point, 

 Table Valley, and the Devil's Peak, on a base of slate, of which the whole 

 of the Lion's Back or Rump is composed. The granite extends up to the 

 rocky crown of tlie Lion's Head, — an elevation of nearly 1500 feet; and 

 the declivity of the mountain is strewed with enormous masses of it 

 On the side of the Table Mountain, the space on which the granite ia 

 visible is contracted to about 500 feet, and occupies the centre ofthedecli 

 vity. At the spot called Sea Point, the granite and slate come in cotrtact. 

 In the space of 200 yards along the shore, the reef is a mixture of these 

 two rocks, each predominating in the mass as you approach its respec- 

 tive side, where it is pure and unmixed. In some parts they form alter- 

 nating layers ; in others, fragments of the slate, of all figures and sizes, 

 lie imbedded in the granite, which appears to have pervaded their mi- 

 nutest fissures. Between this mixed mass, however, and this pure slate, 

 there is interposed a rampart of granite, apparently diflerent from the 

 common sort, which, for about 200 yards, is unmixed ; but, as it ap- 

 proaches the slate, becomes mingled with it in the same manner as the 

 granite. From this to Green Point, and extending through Robben 

 Island, a distance of about twelve miles, the slate is pure, and disposed 

 in nearly vertical strata. 



Close to the i)ath which leads from Cape Town to the summit of the 

 Table Mountain, there runs a stream, which, at the point where the gra- 

 nite and slate meet, has carried off the superincumbent earth, and ex- 

 posed the surface of the rock from ten to twenty yards in diameter, and 

 about 200 yards in length, dipping at an angle ef about 30°. Along the 

 whole of this space the slate is intersected by veins of granite, varying 

 from three feet in width to aa many lines. The veins branch off in all 

 directions, some straight, others twisted in the most fantastic convolu- 

 tions. In the face of the rampart which borders the channel on each 

 side, the veins are equally conspicuous. In walking along the shore, 

 from Campo Bay to Sea Point, we meet with vinnerous veins of angite- 

 greenstone in the granite, varying in breadth from an inch to ten feet, 

 and branching in as many directions aa those of the granite with the 

 ilate. Here also are to be seen nvunerous fragments of slate in tbfl 

 granite. 



