SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
39* 
accounted for, by various authors, from a variety of caufes. 
Though one of thefe may exift in the impurities of the water, 
yet the elTential difference in the effedl produced on a Hottentot 
and Dutch woman, fhews different predifpofitions to exift in- 
herent in the perfons of each. 
It fhould feem, however, that fome principle does exift in 
thefe highly elevated fituations of Southern Africa, that fheds 
its influence on the animal, and even on the vegetable part of 
the creation. The withered ftem of a liliaceous plant, appa- 
rently the fame as that found on the banks of the Orange river, 
was feven feet long, and crowned with an umbel of more than 
fifty fiowrets, each having a peduncle or foot-ftalk of eighteen 
inches in length, making the diameter of the umbel to exceed 
that of three feet. The bulb, of which I could but conveniently 
carry a few, was as large as the human head. Of this enormous 
lily the people gave an account, not unlike that of the fictitious 
Upas of Java, rendered famous by a relation of it inferted in the 
notes to Dodtor Darwin's fanciful, yet claffic, poem of the 
Botanic Garden. They fay, with regard to the lily, that the 
juice of its bulb is a ftrong poifon ; that the leaves occafion 
fudden death to the cattle which may chance to eat them ; and 
that if fmall birds fhould happen to perch on its bloffoms, 
they inftantly roll off lifelefs to the ground. Another fpecies of 
amaryllis, called by botanifts the dijlicha^ common on all the 
mountainous parts of the colony, was now on the Khamies berg 
throwing out its long broad leaves in oppofite pairs, forming the 
ftiape of a fan. Both the bulb, and the leaves of this plant, 
have been afcertained to be, without any preparation, moft viru- 
lent 
