SOUTHERN AFRICA. 75 
summer agitating the water of the lake produce on the 
margin a fine, light, powdery salt, like flakes of snow. This 
is equally beautiful as the refined salt of England, and is 
much sought after by the women, who always commission 
their husbands to bring home a quantity of snowy salt for 
the table. 
In endeavouring to account for the great accumulation of 
pure crystallized salt at the bottom of this lake, I should 
have conceived the following explanation sufficiently satisfac- 
tory, had not some local circumstances seemed to militate 
strongly against it. The water of the sea on the coast of 
Africa contains a very high proportion of salt. During the 
strong south-east winds of summer, the spray of the sea 
is carried to a very considerable extent into the country in 
the shape of a thick mist. The powerful and combined 
effects of the dry wind and the sun carry on a rapid evapora- 
tion of the aqueous part of the mist, and of course a disen- 
gagement of the saline particles : these, in their fall, are 
received on the ground or on the foliage of the shrubbery. 
When the rains commence they are again taken up in solu- 
tion and carried into the salt pan, towards which the coun- 
try on every side inclines. The quantity of salt thus sepa- 
rated from the sea, and borne upon the land, is much more 
considerable than at the first thought it might seem to be. 
At the distance of several miles from the sea-coast, the air, 
in walking against the wind, is perceptibly saline to the lips. 
It leaves a damp feel upon the clothes, and gives t6 them 
also a saline taste. The ostrich feather I Avore in my hat 
always hung in separate threads when near the sea-coast in a 
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