SOUTHERN AFRICA. 381 
On the twenty-eighth we entered a narrow pafs among the 
hills that lay behind the Lions' den, which hills are confidered 
as the commencement of the Namaaqua country. The furface 
continued to be broken into hill and dale, but both were defti- 
tute of plants, except indeed that along the ftony fides of moft 
of the hills were growing vaft multitudes of a tree as unfightly 
as it was curious. It was a fpecies of the aloe, called by 
botanifls the D'lchotomay from the divifion and fubdivifion of 
each branch into pairs. Each of thefe fubdivifions is terminated 
by a tuft of leaves, and the whole forms a large hemifpherical 
crown fupported upon a tapering trunk, which is generally of 
large diameter, but fhort in proportion to the vaft circumference 
of the crown. This has been faid fometimes to amount to 
many hundred feet. The largeft I met with was about on? 
hundred feet. It is called in the country the Kooker hoom^ or 
quiver tree, its pithy branches being employed by the Bosjef- 
mans Hottentots as cafes for their arrows. In fome of the palfes 
of the hills were thinly fcattered feveral fpecies of the geranium, 
among which was one, whofe branches were armed with ftrong 
fpines ; and alfo a tree Cotyledon^ that appeared ancient and 
ftunted like the artificial dwarf trees invented and cultivated 
by the Chinefe. 
Two mountain geefe direded us by their flight to a fpring 
of water, about twenty miles beyond the Lions' den. Though 
fufficiently copious for our wants, yet it was ftrongly impreg- 
nated with fait. Ten miles beyond this brought us to the bed 
of the Hartebeeft river, which, from the very lofty mimofas 
that fkirted its banks, and entirely buried it within their ex- 
tended 
