32* TRAVELS IN 
of two hundred and twenty-five miles, to a point behind the 
Snowy Mountains called Flettenherg s Landmark^ and from 
thence be continued in a circular fweep inwards to the mouth of 
the River Koujfie, upwards of five hundred miles ; thefe lines 
will circumfcribe the tradt of country which conftitutes the co- 
lony of the Cape of Good Hope. 
By reducing this irregular figure to a parallelogram, it will be 
found to comprehend an area of at leaft one hundred and twenty 
thoufand fquare miles. And as it appears that the whole po- 
pulation of whites, blacks, and Hottentots, within this area, 
amounts only to about fixty thoufand fouls, though it cannot 
boaft that 
" Every rood of ground maintains its man," 
yet every two fquare miles may be faid to have at leaft ont 
human creature allotted to it. If, therefore, the Dutch at home 
occupy one of the moft populous countries in Europe, they 
poiTefs abroad the moft defert colony that is certainly to be met 
with upon the face of the globe. But as this is lefs owing to 
the natural defeds of the country, than to the regulations under 
which it has been governed, the comparative population with 
the extent of furface ought not be taken as the teft of the in- 
trinfic value of the fettlement, as the population of any country, 
under a moderate climate, will, in the natural courfe of things, 
always rife to a level with the means of fubfiftence. 
As the beft foil for vegetable growth is unqueftlonably pro- 
duced from a decompofition of vegetable matter, it amounts 
to 
