SOUTHERN AFRICA. 125 
months in the year, the mind can eafily conceive that, in the 
lapfe of ages, the quantity of fait carried upon the furrounding 
country, and wafted annually from thence into the common 
refervoir, might have accumulated to the prefent bulk. 
Were this, however, adually the cafe, it would naturally 
follow that all the refervoirs of water in the proximity of this 
fea-coaft fhould contain, more or lefs, a portion of fait. Moft 
of them in fa£t do fo. Between the one in queftion and the 
fea, a diftance of fix miles, there are three other fait lakes, two 
of which are on a plain within a mile of the ftrand. None of 
thefe, however, depofit a body of fait except in very dry fum- 
mers when the greateft part of the water is evaporated. One 
is called the Red Salt pan, the chryftals of fait produced in it 
being always tinged of a ruby color with iron. This lake is 
about twice the fize of that above defcribed. All thefe fhould 
feem to favor the fuppofition of the fait being brought from the 
fea, were it not that clofe to the fide of the lake that produces 
the greateft quantity is a ftagnant pool or valley^ the water of 
which is perfectly frefh. Another ftrong argument againft the 
hypothefis above alfumed is the circumftance of our having dif- 
covered, on a future journey, feveral fait pans of the fame kind 
behind the Snowy mountains, at the diftance of two hundred 
miles from the fea-coaft, and on an elevation that could not be 
lefs than five or fix thoufand feet. The foil too on all fides of 
the Zwart Kop's fait pan was deep vegetable earth, in fome 
places red and in others black, refting upon a bed of clay, and 
without having the fmalleft veftige of fait in its compofition. 
That fait in a foil was inimical to and deftrudtive of vegetation 
was 
