SIX MONTHS AT CAPE TOWN. 69 



You will have heard of poor Joseph's illness just after landing, 

 and how it has obliged him to retire from business, and they 

 must return in the spriug. We have experienced great kindness 

 from the officials here. But are we not fitted in emergencies 

 by an unseen power for what of ourselves we could not accom- 

 plish ? It is not my nature to be depressed beyond due 

 measure by the circumstances in which I am placed. I try to 

 enjoy whatever is left me, while I have it, and endeavour to be 

 thankful that anything is still left. I have contrived, by making 

 short excursions in this neighbourhood, to get together a good 

 many plants. Fortunately I have not to go a hundred yards 

 from the house before I meet with the " wilderness " in all its 

 luxuriance and beauty. I have made a good many descriptions, 

 some dissections, and a few drawings. Should I be fortunate 

 enough to remain as Treasurer when they sail, I mean to occupy 

 my leisure in preparing for my " Flora Capensis," which I find 

 is a book very much wanted, and one which requires to be 

 written on the spot. Table Mountain is a fine, bold, grand rock, 

 with an outline more remarkable than beautiful. The Blue 

 Berg and Tiger Berg are magnificent, and except that the inter- 

 vening space is as flat as a bowling-green, would make our view 

 equal to something Swiss. This same plain is many miles in 

 extent, and is a favourite resort of mine, though it abounds in 

 snakes! I have made some discoveries which you would 

 rejoice to see alive. What do you think of a new genus of 

 Orchidese, the Calota of Harvey, so called from ra kcCKcl &ra, 

 because the anther cases are a perfect miniature resemblance of 

 the human ear ? A figure goes to Hooker for publication. 



December 15th. 

 I have just finished, for Hooker, my description of the 

 Calota and of a new Disa with crimson flowers. I expect to 

 have many new species to communicate, and no plants can be 

 more welcome to me, not even Algse. Alas for Alga? ! I see 

 nothing of them here. We are too far from the sea to make 

 frequent excursions, and I have too much to do in the 

 tribes on all sides to betake me to the shore for novelty. Ferns 

 are scarce, but some are lovely and others magnificent. Look 

 among your dirt pies for Gleichenia. You can but faintly 

 imagine its beauty from your fragments as I see it here when I 



