106 LIFE OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



" The Kaan, which the road frequently crosses, is a very turbulent moun- 

 tain torrent ; it is one of the largest branches of the Schwagoup river above 

 Otjirnbengue, and pours occasionally a large body of water into that river, 

 but, owing to the quick drainage, never offers a long-continued impediment 

 to waggon travelling. When, however, its turbid waves come rolling down 

 with thundering roar after the rains, the traveller has only to wait patiently 

 until its fury is spent 



" The Kaan valley offers many a scene of striking interest to the lover of 

 Nature and the pencil of the artist. One of the most striking features in the 

 surrounding scenery is found in the uniform parallel stratifications of schist 

 projecting some distance from the earth, and all bearing in one direction; the 

 intervals are covered with a mixture of last year's crop of dry grass, blending 

 with the incipient crop of this. An occasional white-stemmed gouty-looking 

 motiudi tree, with its large, pointed, oval, pulpy leaves, strongly serrated, 

 and tall aloes, cacti, and euphorbias are seen. The round and sometimes 

 broken and cliffy hills, dotted with verdant sweet-gums, their bases often 

 washed by the flood, offer pictures which it is pleasant to behold, surrounded, 

 as they often are, with pretty forests of blooming, sweet-scented mimosa from 

 whose black stems the silvery gum is trickling, while their bright blossoms 

 perfume the morning air. The blue jay, with heavy wing, hovers mockingly 

 overhead, vociferating in concert with gay-painted but screeching paroquets 

 and discordant guinea-fowls, whose notes are further augmented by the 

 whir — r — r of pheasants and partridges, which rise on every side, while insects 

 of green and gold buzz and boom amongst the foliage. 



"The least interesting part of this valley is clothed with dabby (Tamarisk), 

 a few pretty ebony trees, aged and wide-spreading mokalas and anna-booms. 

 Here graceful koodoos are still found browsing and the rock buck perches on the 

 highest pinnacles, and the equally agile mountain zebra (the small black one of 

 the Cape), wary as a cat, barely shows his head over the mountains, ere, 

 tossing his mane and rearing back, he suddenly flings out his heels and 

 plunges forward in mad gallop. The steinboks keep on the lower plains, and 

 baboons are found in large gangs grubbing for bulbs (lunchies) and the roots 

 of the purple-blossomed sorrel, which is also abundant, and is a nourishing 

 and wholesome vegetable to man as well. Through such a landscape it is an 

 interesting sight to watch the red wheels of the white-tilted waggons drag- 

 ging heavily after the sturdy team of parti-coloured oxen, often stumbling 

 and kneeling over the sharp flints; now rolling with the roar of distant thunder 

 down the rocky steps of the mountains, with difficulty maintaining its equili- 

 brium ; now grating down the quartzy slope with the drag on, the oxen drag- 

 ging sometimes on their haunches ; anon grinding over the pebbly bed of the 

 stream, on emerging from which the sore-footed cattle more firmly tread the 

 soft, red, sandy road, cut through a carpet of emerald, until they bury them- 



