334 
TRAVELS IN 
We encamped on the feventeenth near the banks of the 
Olifant's river, where feveral hot fprings iffued out of a bog, 
confifting of a brownlfh oxyd of iron, mixed with irregular 
fliaped pieces of ponderous iron ftone, many of which feemed 
once to have been in a ftate of fufion. The water was chaly- 
beate, as appeared from the great quantity of orange colored 
fediment depofited in the channels through which it ran, and 
the fme fteel blue fkum with which the furfaces of the wells 
were covered. Of the four principal wells, all rifmg out of 
the fame bog, the temperatures were 1 1 1°, 109°, 105°, and 
95° of Fahrenheit's fcale. They are much frequented by the 
neighbouring peafantry, and held by them to be efficacious in 
the cure of bruifes, fprains, and rheumatic complaints. 
How friendly foever the water of the wells might prove to 
the human conftitution, it could not be more fo than in appear- 
ance it was favorable to the growth of plants. Along the fides 
of the ftreamlets a zone-leafed geranium was obferved climbing 
to the height of fifteen feet, and the whole fhrubbery that grew 
in the vicinity of the water was more than ufually luxuriant. 
The long drought had completely deprived the Olifant's river 
of its waters, and the face of the country was nearly as barren 
and parched as the Karroo on the oppofite fide of the Black 
mountains, except indeed along each fide of the bed of the river, 
where the mimofas, now full of golden blofToms, ftill retained 
their verdure, and where the Canna plant, or Salfola, was grow- 
ing to the height of eight or ten feet. Should thefe two articles, 
at any future period, be confidered as worthy attention in a 
commercial 
