SOUTHERN AFRICA. 9 
continuance the toAvn appears to be deserted. Every door 
and window is closed to keep out the dust and the heat, both 
of which diminish with the continuance of the gale ; the air 
gradually cools, and evei^y small pebble and particle of dust in 
the course of four-and-twenty hours is carried into the sea. 
The necessity of protecting the fruit groves, vineyards, and 
gardens from these winds, has led those colonists who dwell 
on the nearer side of tlie first chain of mountains, for they are 
not much felt beyond them, to divide that portion of their 
grounds, so employed, by oak skreens, a plant that grows here 
much more rapidly than in Europe ; but their corn-lands are 
entirely open. A Cape boor bestows no more labor on his 
farm than is unavoidable ; and as grain is mostly reaped be- 
fore the south-east winds are fairly set in, the enclosure of the 
arable land did not appear to be necessary, and was conse- 
quently omitted. 
The climate of the Cape is remarkably affected by local 
circumstances. ]n the summer months there are at least from 
6 to 10 degrees of Fahrenheit's scale in the difference of tem- 
perature between Cape Town and Wynbcrg, whose distance 
is only about seven or eight miles, owing to the latter being 
on the windward side of the Table Mountain, and the former 
to leeward of it ; from whence, also, the rays of the meridian 
Bun are thrown back upon the town, as from the surface of a 
concave mirror. The variation of climate, to which the Table 
Valley is subject, led one of the British officers to observe 
that those who lived in it were either in an oven, or at the 
VOL. II. c ' 
