EROSIONS IN AFRICA. 121 



miles from our station. In going to it (the station), or rather to the brow of the hill 

 or precipice on this side of it, we cross a table land like the one shown in the draw- 

 ing. These table lands, with ten thousand little hills, are distinguishing natural 

 features extending the whole length of the colony. Table lands are on each side 

 of the valley of little hills. They are, however, broken at intervals, of perhaps 

 about six miles; thus affording a passage to the 'large rivers that flow into the 

 Indian ocean. Their terminations towards the valley are sometimes perpendicular 

 precipices, several hundred feet in height, covered with bushes near the top, and 

 breaking into numerous hills below. There is seldom a descent to the valley 

 sufficiently gradual to allow a wagon to be driven down. I think there is not 

 more than one such declivity from each table land." 



"In some places these platforms are perpendicular for 20 feet or more at the top, 

 and expose a face of sandstone, broken into a thousand fragments, which to a 

 great extent retain their places. Sometimes, however, these fragments are strewn 

 over the whole of the slopes of which I have spoken. There is an example in the 

 foreground of the drawing (Plate XI. Fig. 2) on the right side. Some of the 

 fragments, as exhibited, are very irregular, while others are rectangular. The 

 width of the scene presented is perhaps four miles; but in most places the great 

 valley is more extended. The widest part we have travelled over is about ten 

 miles." 



" Sometimes in the midst of these little hills single mountains rise, which seem 

 to correspond in height with the table lands, and their sides present the same 

 variety in appearance as 'do the latter. Examples of these mountains are given 

 in the outline (Plate XI. Fig. 1). The tops are not more than 5 or 6 feet wide, 

 and with the sides are covered with grass." 



" It seems to an observer of this scenery, that the whole region, including table 

 lands, mountains, peaks, and small hills, was once an immense plain, and that 

 some mighty convulsion of nature brought them into their present state. Whether 

 this great change was produced by fire or water, we are not geologists enough to 

 decide." 



These views of Mrs. Grout are doubtless correct, except "the mighty convulsions 

 of nature," which were probably little more than the quiet and slow action of the 

 present rivers, aided', perhaps, by the waves of a former ocean. But that no vio- 

 lent convulsion of nature has been concerned, is obvious from the horizontal posi- 

 tion of the sandstone, forming the upper part of the table lands and the caps of 

 the mountains. The case seems analogous to the canons of our southwestern 

 states. 



This case might perhaps have been more properly introduced under the examples 

 in sandstone. But I place it here in connection with the example from Cape Town, 

 as it seems to belong to the same class of phenomena. 



13. Pass of Dariel Caucasus, on the River Tereh, in Asia. — Maculloch's Geogra- 

 phical Dictionary represents this pass as occurring in porphyry and schist, as being 

 120 miles long, and having walls 3000 feet high. Sir R. Ker Porter speaks of the 

 walls as only 1000 feet high. — Travels, vol. I. p. 75. 

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