VISIT TO SOUTH ATRICA. 
215 
to be numerous in the thicket, but we neither heard nor saw any of 
these animals, so carefully do they avoid the presence of man. 
After breakfast, our party divided, according to the landdrost's 
direction. Brother Stein and Sister Schmitt remained with tlic wag- 
gons, and with one of the Hottentot soldiers, and the guides, went 
straight to Kourney. Mr. Melville, Brother Schmitt, a soldier, and 
old Paerl, accompanied me on horseback to the AVitte Revier. 
The Sunday's river flows here between high banks, covered with 
a forest of great extent on each side. Its bed is full of large round 
stones, which makes the ford unpleasant. The water was about 
three feet in depth, but in the rainy season, the stream is very deep 
and rapid. As soon as we had mounted the heights, and got through 
the wood, Mr. Melville found some sport. Chase was made after 
antelopes, and Avild hogs, but in vain: an unlucky falcon, however, 
perching upon a tree, was brought down by a bullet. It was a 
large, handsome bird, about the size of a turkey, white and dark- 
brown being its principal colours. After we had left the wood, the 
country appeared pleasant, with good grass and many bushes, either 
standing singly, or in clumps. We directed our course towards a 
range of woody hills, and into a valley, through which the Witte 
Revier runs into the Sunday's river. At the farm of Jacobus 
Scheper, senior, the valley contracts, so as to form a glen, its en- 
trance shaded by large trees. Here a party of foot-soldiers, oc- 
cupied a military post. The old farmer was not at home, but his 
Avife and daughter received us in a friendly way. We produced 
the order from the landdrost to her husband, to show us his land- 
marks, and the unoccupied land, but did not trouble her to give us 
a guide, the Hottentot soldier being well acquainted with the place. 
The English soldiers here behaved to us with great civility. Tiiey 
showed us several skins of animals they had shot in the neighbour- 
hood, among which were those of a buffaloe, some tygers, a lynx, 
a jerboa, called springhaas by the Dutch, a creature of the didelphi 
kind with very long hind-legs. 
We now proceeded on our journej'. and entered tlic wood jj- 
