28o 
TRAVELS IN 
in the winter season, is frequented by vast numbers of the 
black whale, where the Southern fishers very frequently resort 
in order to complete their cargoes. 
The situation of Saldanha Bay is much more convenient 
than that of the peninsula for receiving the supplies afforded 
by the country. The deep sandy isthmus, whose heavy roads 
have been the destruction of multitudes of cattle, would be 
entirely avoided ; and its distance from the corn districts, 
which is the most material article of consumption, is much 
less than that of the Cape. Its situation, with regard to all 
the northern parts of the colony, is much more convenient 
than Cape Town ; and equally so for those who inhabit the 
distant district of Graaf Reynet, and who usually pass over 
the Roode Sand Kloof. 
From the many conveniencies that Saldanha Bay possesses, 
as a secure harbour for shipping, at all seasons of the year, 
where they may be repaired, and even built, must, on the 
other hand, be deducted two very serious disadvantages, with- 
out the removal of which it must ever present insuperable 
obstacles against its becoming a great naval station ; these 
are the want of wood and of fresh water. 
The first might indeed be supplied, to a certain degree, 
from the adjacent country. In the sand hills, that surround 
a part of the bay, grow several kinds of shrubby plants, whose 
long and thick roots are easily drawn out of the loose sand, 
and in such abundance as scarcely to be credited. They 
form a kind of subterranean^ forest. The sides of the hills 
