126 KLOOF AND KARROO. 



swept into those countries, leaving the Cape Colony 

 unnoticed and uncared for. The plains of the Free 

 State, and the high veldt of the Transvaal, which 

 when discovered were literally overburdened with 

 almost every description of game, provided easier 

 and more abundant shooting than the older Colony ; 

 and, in consequence, the game in those States has 

 been so harried, so depleted and exterminated, that 

 there is now in the Cape Colony itself better shooting 

 than in many parts of those sadly-abused hunting 

 grounds. 



The Cape Colony is an easy-going and a non- 

 assertive country, and has been so long accustomed 

 to hear of the brilliant shooting amongst the big 

 game of the far interior, that its own merits in the 

 matter of sport have been left unnoticed and unsung. 

 And yet it can still boast, amid some of its denser 

 bush-veldt country, and in the Knysna Forest of 

 the elephant, the buffalo, and the koodoo ; while, as 

 I have shown in a former chapter, the noble zebra 

 still adorns its mountains, in which the leopard also 

 is common. Many travellers, passing up country, 

 dismiss the old Colony with a sneer, or, perhaps, 

 admit that there are a few springbok on the flats. 

 These people, who follow the beaten tracks, and 

 stay only at the accommodation-houses, know 

 nothing of the deep kloofs, the wild mountains, 

 and untraversed karroos of many parts of the 

 Colony — places almost as primeval, as secluded, 

 and as little known even now as they were fifty 

 years since. To those who like a wild rough stalk 

 amidst magnificent mountain solitudes and sombre 

 kloofs, that even to this day know not the distant 

 bleat of the farmer's flocks, the chase of the rhebok 



