1812. 
THE MULOKHA. 
263 
to a traveller, it is but common prudence to provide the reasonable 
means of securing them. This was, I confess, a point of prudence 
which, among my preparations, was never once thought of, because 
the full enjoyment of health induced me to regard it as very unim- 
portant and quite unnecessary. 
Attended by one of my men, I took a ramble to examine the 
mountains on our left, which form as it were an extensive amphitheatre 
around the spring. They are composed of rock of a granitic kind, 
and in some places of a black rock of a siliceous nature. As it was 
considered dangerous to venture far among these mountains, on 
account of the Bushmen who might be watching us from behind 
the crags, and who were reported to be hostile to all Hottentots, 
I confined my stroll within this amphitheatre which was well clothed 
with a variety of shrubs and bushes, and to the course of the rill 
formed by the spring. 
Here, however, I found many new and interesting plants, par- 
ticularly a species of Croton * forming a handsome bushy shrub from 
four to seven feet high, closely resembling a species peculiar to 
Madagascar: and this affinity with the botany of that island, was 
farther marked by a species of Melhania f which grew close by it ; 
and on the same spot with the Vangueria infausta. This Croton is 
called Mulokha by the Bachapins. I was informed that the leaves, 
reduced to powder, are used by the Kor as as a Bulm ; and it is in 
* Croton gratissimum, B. Catal. Geogr. 2154. Frutex pulcherrimus 4 — 10-pedalis 
ramosus sempervirens. Folia ovato-lanceolata integerrima petiolata alterna, supra viridia 
nuda, subtus argenteo-albida. Spicte terminales. Flores suavissime odorati. Folia 
(contusa) odorem aromaticum [Lauri nobilis) spirantia. Calyx patens profunde 5-fidiis. 
Petala 5 lanceolata patentia, longitudine calycis. Stamina ciciter 15, discreta. 
Sir James E. Smith has obligingly compared this with the specimens in his valuable 
hei'barium, once the property of the immortal Linnecus, and informs me that, although a 
distinct species, it is exceedingly like the C. farinosum, with the description of which, as 
given in Willd. Sp. PL, it so well agreed, that at the time of discovering it, I had supposed 
it might possibly be the same plant. 
f Melhania prostrata, B. Catal. Geogr. 2153. Frutex. Caules elongati, 2 — 4-pedales, 
prostrati ramosi. Folia petiolata linearia, basi ovata, mucronulo terminata. Stipulae 
subulatae. Flores axillares solitarii, longiiis pedunculati, flavi. Pedunculus rectus, medio 
geniculatus. 
