10 
A KRAAL OF KORAS. — AUTUMNAL COLORS. 
27 Feb. 
of a stone formed of various fragments conglutinated by a calcareous 
basis * ; and such as might be classed as a species of " pudding-stone." 
The spot where we had intended to cross the river, bore the name 
of Engehche Drift (Enghsh Ford) among the Klaarwater people, on 
account of its having been passed eleven years before, by a party 
from Cape Town, sent into the Transgariepine to purchase cattle for 
the government. The river, being here divided into two streams by 
an island, was found to be at this time too rapid and rough to be 
forded without danger : we therefore again yoked the oxen to the 
waggon, and proceeded to another place about two miles and a half 
higher up the stream. It was at this spot where the unfortunate 
Cowan and his party forded the Gariep, never more to return. 
Here we found a kraal of Koras stationed with their cows, oxen, 
and goats : they appeared, like most of the natives in this part of the 
country, to possess but few sheep, a fact which is to be accounted for, 
perhaps, by the greater care, and better pasture, required for these, 
than for the rearing of goats. Their huts were irregularly placed in 
the acacia groves, and so completely concealed by intervening thickets, 
that we might have passed the river without discovering them, if 
their inhabitants had not, in their usual friendly way, come out to 
make their salutations, as soon as they knew we were arrived. 
The branches of the acacias here were frequently decorated with 
a handsome kind of Mistleto (or, more correctly, a species of Loran- 
thus,) whose fine scarlet berries appeared very conspicuous and orna- 
mental. The delightful scenery of the Gariep had lost nothing of its 
power of pleasing, by having been admired so often before ; but as I 
had not till now beheld the willows in their sober autumnal colors, 
they possessed for me, a new charm. In Africa we look in vain for 
those mellow beautiful tints with which the sun of autumn dyes the 
forests of England. Examples of this change of color meet the eye 
so rarely in these arid deserts, that whenever they do perchance 
occur, they will forcibly, and by a natural association of ideas, remind 
* To this rock may be referred generally the description and remarks given in the 
first volume, at pages 398 and 399. 
