39^ 
TRAVELS IN 
very large eftates may be purcbafed at the Cape with very little 
money, which is the chief reafon of the multiplicity of vendues, 
3. The corn-boors live chiefly in the Cape diftrid and thofe 
parts of Stellenbofch and Drakenftein that are not diftant more 
than two or three days' journey from the Cape. Their farms 
are fome freehold property, fome gratuity land, but moft of 
them loan farms. Many of thefe people are in good circum- 
ftances, and are confidered in rank next to the wine-boor. The 
quantity of corn they bring to market is from a hundred to a 
thoufand muids each, according to the quality of their , farm, 
but more commonly to their fkill and induftry. They fupply, 
alfo, the wine- boor and the grazier. The grain fold to thefe* 
in the country is fubjeft to no tax nor tythe ; but a duty 
amounting not quite to one-tench of the value is paid at the 
barrier for all grain pafhng towards Cape Town. Their paro- 
chial alTelTments are the fame as thofe of the win&-boor. 
The colonifts of the Cape are miferable agriculturifts, and 
may be faid to owe their crops more to the native goodnefs of 
the foil and favourable clim.ate, than to any exertions of ikill or 
induftry. Their plough is an unwieldy machine drawn by 
fourteen or fixteen oxen, juft {k'lms the furface, and, if the foil 
happens to be a little ftifF, is as frequently out of the ground as 
in it ; hence, in moft of their corn fields, may be obferved large 
patches of ten, fifteen, or twenty fquare yards without a ftem 
of grain upon them. Such grounds, when fown and harrowed, 
are infinitely more rough than the rougheft lea-ploughing in 
England. They have not the leafl; idea of rolling the fandy 
foils, 
