6o 
TRAVELS IN 
manufadured into a chain to which the keys of the Caftle gates 
fhould be fufpended. The chain was made, and ftill remains 
in the fame fervice for which it was originally intended, as a 
memorial of the credulity of the governor and the council. 
The Paarlberg, on the left of the pafs into the valley, is a hill 
of moderate height, and has taken its name from a chain of 
large round ftones that pafs over the fummit, like the pearls of 
a necklace. Of thefe the two that are placed near the central 
and higheft point of the range are called, par excellence,^ the 
pearl and the diamond : and a particular defcription of them 
has been thought worthy of a place in the Philofophical Tranf- 
adlions. From that paper, and Mr. MafTon's defcription, it 
,would appear that thefe two malTes of ftone refted upon their 
own bafes, and were detached from the mountain ; whereas 
they grow out, and form a part, of it. It has alfo been faid 
that their compofition was totally different from the rocks that 
are found in the neighbouring mountains, which led a naturalift 
in Europe to obferve, that thefe immenfe blocks of granite had 
probably been thrown up by volcanic explofions, or by fome 
caufe of a fmiilar nature. It has been obferved in the preced- 
ing Chapter, that the fand-ftone ftrata of the Table Mountain 
refted upon a bed of primaeval granite, and that an infinite 
number of large ftones were fcattered at the feet of the Moun- 
tains along the fea-coaft, from the Lion's Head to the true Cape 
of Good Hope. All thefe are precifely of the fame nature, and 
the fame materials, as the pearl and the diamond ; that is to 
fay, they are aggregates of quartz and mica ; the firft in large 
irregular malfes, and the latter in black lumps refembling fhorl : 
they 
