23RD MARCH. 



A SUPPER picnic to Wemmer's Hoek ! A grand event in 

 these days of failing cars and restricted petrol ; but here is a 

 friend with a luxurious car filled with carefully hoarded petrol. 

 We started off about 5 p.m. as the sun was growing less fierce 

 after a grilling day of packing bulbs. 



We went into the kopjies round the other side of grand old 

 Simonsberg, and I was dropped to go plant-hunting while 

 the rest of the party bathed in the river. It was rough walking 

 on the sun-scorched slopes, and so dry that twigs and small 

 bushes just crumbled when trodden on ; but up and up I went 

 to get young plants of Aloe plicatilis where the old plants stand 

 out against the sky line as if posing for a poster " Come to 

 sunny South Africa ". This is a very attractive aloe and one of 

 the very few without thorn or prickles. The leaves are reminis- 

 cent of the old linen-fold wood carving. I think it is only found 

 in the south-west Cape : it does not stand up well to frost. 

 Here it is at home among the kopjies with queer rocks of odd 

 shapes lying around. In the spring the whole place is a flower 

 garden ; but now it is as dry as last year's pine needles. It 

 looks as if a number of gnomes had had a competition in rock- 

 garden design, each hummock or outcrop having just a slightly 

 different plan of planting a big bush here, an aloe there, a 

 tuft of grass above or below. 



I sat down and watched big blue shadows of the mountains 

 creep across the wide sunlit valley, just as a realization of a 

 deeper or inner meaning to things seen passes slowly across 

 the mind, leaving always a softening of the brilliance of per- 

 ception but a deepening of shades. 



There were lovely soft lights on the river as we went down 

 for supper. The children had made a little fire among the 

 stones at the edge of the water and had a supply of hot coffee 

 ready. How we all enjoyed our eggs and veal loaf and apples 

 and big purple grapes ! We watched the first stars come out, 

 and then the Southern Cross was there and we must start for 

 home. The children were thrilled by the sight of a vast fire raging 

 on the distant mountains an entrancing picture, but terrifying 

 to me. Jennifer summed it up well : " Beautiful, but very cruel ". 



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