SOUTHERN AFRICA. 209 
seemed delighted on the present occasion, which they con- 
sidered in the hght only of a party of pleasure. 
On the evening of the twenty-sixth we collected our forces 
at the commencement of the Sea-Cow river, which was about 
six miles to the northward of the last habitation. This river 
is formed from the collected branches that fall to the north- 
ward from the different parts of Sneuwberg, and from the 
Koode-berg, or Red mountain, which' is in fact an arm of the 
former, stretching to the northward. The Sea-Cow river, and 
indeed all the streams that behind the Snowy mountains run 
northerly, are remarkably distinguished from those whose 
currents take an opposite direction, by having their banks co- 
vered with tall reeds, the arimdo phrag7nites, and being destitute 
of a shrub or tree ; whereas the latter are always inclosed by 
mimosas, willows, and other tall arboreous plants. The north- 
ern rivers consist generally of a chain of deep stagnant pools 
connected by the beds of narrow channels that for the greater 
part of the year are entirely dry. Some of the gats, or holes, 
of the Sea-Cow river were five or six miles in length, and deep 
enough to float a line-of-battle ship. These holes, it seems, 
■contained formerly vast numbers of the animal from whence 
the river has borrowed its name ; but the encroachments of 
the colonists, and the ease and convenience of hunting them 
in these pools, have been the means of destroying them al- 
most entirely. Now and then a hippopotamus is still taken 
in some of the holes of the river. 
The following day our journey lay across plains that 
■swarmed with game. In pursuing the gnoos and different 
