24 
SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
Accordingly, they took immediate, and formal 
possession of the place, in the name of their 
sovereign, James I., without any molestation 
however, from the Dutch. They altered the 
nomenclature of the several surrounding moun- 
tains ; calling the Lion's-Kump, James' Moun- 
tain; the lower portion near Green-point, Prince 
Charles' Mountain; the Lion's Head, they chris- 
tened the Sugar- Jjoaf; and the Devil's Head 
was dignified with the name of Captain Fitz- 
herbert himself ; the Table Mountain was per- 
mitted to retain its own appropriate designation. 
No further steps in this matter were, however, 
taken, nor do the English Government appear 
to have recognised it. 
" In the fulness of time," (to quote from 
Chase) " Van Riebeck" a surgeon and botanist, 
touched at Table Bay, in his homeward voyage, 
in 1648. The excursions he made into the 
country, in the prosecution of a delightful and 
bewitching science, probably inspired him with 
the first desire to revisit this richest, and most 
splendidly adorned, temple of Flora; some lovely 
flower, perhaps, whose predecessor had been 
". born to blush unseen, 
And waste its fragrance in the desert air." 
may have thus been the trivial cause of this 
important settlement. Whether this be the 
case or not, being a man addicted to speculation, 
