14 TRAVELS IN 
asunder by its own weight. The Diamond is the higher 
block, but less bulky, and, being cone-shaped, is difficult 
and dangerous of ascent. 
The mountain of the Paarl furnishes a fine field for the 
botanist. The plants are of infinite variety, and wonderfully 
luxuriant. The wild olive of the Cape, generally a stunted 
plant, seems to have here attained its greatest size, and the 
dark-green foliage is finely contrasted with the elegant tribe 
of heaths, some of which shoot up to the size and form of 
trees. The fruit of the wild olive is small, and so acrid as to 
be unfit for use ; but the wood is close-grained, shaded, and 
takes a polish not unlike that of walnut. Several species of 
that genus of plants to which botanists have given the name 
of Protea decorate the sides of the Paarl Mountain. Of 
these one of the most numerous and most conspicuous is 
the mellifera, which, from the great quantity of saccharine 
juice contained in the bottom of its vase-shaped flowers, is 
here called the sugar-tree. Many of the inhabitants are at 
the trouble of collecting this juice, which they consider as an 
excellent stomachic, and they sometimes boil it down to a 
thick syrup for the purpose of preserving fruits. Several spe- 
cies of the gaudy-plumed certhia, or creeper, may be seen 
at this season of the year in vast numbers perching them- 
selves on the edge of the corollas, and sucking, with their 
long sickle-shaped bills, " the honied sweets.'' The irides- 
cent and brilliant colors of these beautiful little birds, flut- 
tering about the variegated blossoms of the protea, cannot 
fail to attract the notice of the passenger, for a time, from 
every other object. One species in particular (the chalybea 
