SOUTHERN AFRICA. 41 
with few variations, answer to that of alniost all the great 
ranges in Southern Africa, I may not perhaps be thought too 
tedious in entering into a detail of its form, dimensions, and 
constituent parts. 
The name of Table Land is given by seamen to every hill 
or mountain whose summit presents to the eye of the ob- 
server a line parallel to the horizon. The north front of the 
Table Mountain, directly facing the town, is a horizontal line, 
or very nearly so, of about two miles in length. The bold 
face, that rises almost at right angles to meet this line, is sup- 
ported, as it were, by a number of projecting buttresses that 
rise out of the plain, and fall in with the front a little higher 
than midway from the base. These, with the division of the 
front, by two great chasms, into three parts, a curtain flanked 
by two bastions, the first retiring and the others projecting, 
give to it the appearance of the ruined walls of some gigantic 
fortress. These walls rise above the level of Table Bay to 
the height of 3582 feet, as determined by Captain Bridges of 
the royal engineers, from a measured base and angles taken 
with a good theodolite. The east side, which runs off at 
right angles to the front, is still bolder, and has one point 
higher by several feet. The west side, along the sea-shore, is 
rent into deep chasms, and worn away into a number of 
pointed masses. In advancing to the southward about four 
miles, the mountain descends in steps or terraces, the lowest 
of which communicates by gorges with the chain that extends 
the whole length of the peninsula. The two wings of the 
front, one the Devil's Mountain, and the other the Lion's 
Plead, make in fact, with the Table, but one mountain. The 
VOL. II. G 
