152 FORESTRY OF NORWAY. 



again absorbed, and the air loaded with it is again trans- 

 parent, as is all the air around, and as it was itself before 

 passing over Table Mountain in its course. 



From Claremont, or Wynberg, or the Flats, or any place 

 to the back of Table Mountain, it may be seen that the 

 cloud is not blown to the mountain, but that there it first 

 appears ; and if some few cloudlets, formed over the crests 

 of hills belonging to the range situated to windward, be 

 seen sailing towards it, it is evident that they are 'A 

 sailing, a sailing with the wind,' and not attracted only, 

 for none are seen floating toward the Table-Cloth in other 

 direction than that in which the wind blows. 



Of this phenomenon Sir John Herschel writes, c That 

 the mere self-expansion of the ascending air is sufficient to 

 cause precipitation of vapour, when abundant, is rendered 

 matter of ocular demonstration in that very striking 

 phenomenon so common at the Cape of Good Hope, where 

 the south or south-easterly wind which sweeps over the 

 Southern Ocean, impinging on the long range of rocks 

 which terminate in the Table Mountain, is thrown up by 

 them, makes a clean sweep over the flat table-land which 

 forms the summit of that mountain (about 3,850 feet high), 

 and thence plunges down with the violence of a cataract, 

 clinging close to the mural precipices that form a kind of 

 background to Capetown, which it fills with dust and 

 uproar. A perfectly cloudless sky meanwhile prevails over 

 the town, the sea, and the level country, but the mountain 

 is covered with a dense white cloud, reaching to no great 

 height above its summit, and quite level, which, though 

 evidently swept along by the wind, and hurried furiously 

 over the edge of the precipice, dissolves and completely 

 disappears on a definite level, suggesting the idea (whence 

 it derives its name) of a "Table-Cloth." Occasionally, 

 when the wind is very violent, a ripple is formed on the 

 serial current, which, by a sort of rebound in the hollow of 

 the amphitheatre in which Capetown stands, is again 

 thrown up, just over the edge of the sea, vertically over 

 the jetty where we have stood for hours watching a 



