460 REPORT—1905. 
which is commonly kiiown as the yellowwood forest. (2) Open timber forest. 'T'his 
generally occupies drier country than the yellow forest, and is forest of an inferior 
type, though it may contain trees of the first importance, such as the cedar forest 
ot Clanwilliam and the Rhodesian teak (Afzelia cunanzensis) forest of Wankie. 
(3) The scrub forests of the dry, hot, coast lands, and portions of the interior 
where the rainfall is scanty and uncertain. 
There is no timber of large size in the scrub forests, and not much large timber 
in the open timber forests: the most notable is the cedar forest north of Cape Town, 
comprising an area of 116,000 acres, Leaving the western coast and its cedar 
forests the dense yellowwood forest is met as soon as the southern coast is 
reached. The indigenous yellowwood forest of South Africa is seen at its best 
in the form of dense evergreen woods disposed roughly in two stories. The lower 
story is formed by stinkwood, assegai, hard pear, ironwood, &c., and the upper 
story by the big yellowwood trees. ‘These yellowwood trees attain the stature and 
dimensions of the largest oak trees of Kurope. This forest stretches in a more or 
less broken belt along the coast mountains from Table Mountain to the north-east 
of the Transvaal. The area of the yellowwood forest in Cape Colony, Natal, and 
the Transvaal amounts to about 524,408 acres. Across the Limpopo, in Rhodesia, the 
forest is at a lower altitude and of quite another type. Most of the Rhodesian 
trees are leaf-shedding, and practically all of the species are different from those 
in the yellowwood forest. This sudden change in the character of the forest is re- 
markable. In the north-east Transvaal,on the Woodbush Range, essentially the same 
forest as at Knysna is seen, and onlya few species are changed in the long stretch of 
1,200 miles from Cape Town to the north-east Transvaal. The climate remains much 
the same, altitude compensating altitude. Beautiful though the indigenous yellow- 
wood forest of South Africa is, its present economic value is not high, mainly 
owing to its poor stocking. The average yearly production of timber throughout 
the forest has been variably estimated at from 6 to 12 cubic feet per acre. Prob- 
ably 10 cubic feet might be taken as a safe average figure. It is the work of the 
South African forester to improve the stocking of the indigenous forests with the 
native trees by cuttings arranged to favour natural reproduction, and at the same 
time to enrich the forest by the introduction of the best of the nnmerous valuable 
timber trees which are to be found in the extra-tropical forests of other countries. 
Of such trees the author cited particularly Cedrela australis, the premier timber 
tree of the Australian forests, and Sequoia sempervirens, the finest timber tree of 
California, and probakly of the world. Other two trees which are doing well as 
planted trees are blackwood (Acacia melanoxylon) and the camphor tree 
(Cinnamomum camphora). Blackwood spreads rapidly with self-sown seedlings, 
and hasa timber like walnut. It is hoped that these trees, introduced into the glades 
and artificial openings in the forest, will gradually spread themselves into the 
poorly stocked areas around and greatly increase the present low value of the 
indigenous timber forest of South Africa. 
4, The Climatology of South Africa. By Cuartes Stewart, B.Sc. 
The author said that South Africa consists essentially of a series of four 
plateaux, increasing in elevation from south to the interior: (1) Coast Plateau, 
(2) Southern or Little Karroo, (8) Central or Great Karroo, (4) Northern. 
Karroo, or, more properly, the High Veld. These plateaux were most distinctly 
marked in a section from north to south through the centre of the country, but: 
were not so apparent in the east and west, where they were reduced to mere: 
terraces. 
Temperature.—One of the most remarkable features in connection with tempera~ 
ture was the great uniformity in mean annual temperature shown by stations 
differing widely as regards latitude and longitude; e.g., Royal Observatory, Cradock, 
Bloemfontein, and Johannesburg had practically the same mean temperature of 
about 62° F. This was due to decrease of temperature with increase of elevation 
above sea-level, almost neutralising the increase of temperature which would 
