CAPE OF GOOD HOPE. 9 
beneficial, as the whole state of the colony sufficiently proves. 
The revenue has been nearly doubled by the encouragement 
given to commerce ; and great improvements have been gradu- 
ally introduced into the judicial department ; the most important 
of which is an annual circuit of one of the Judges into the more 
distant parts of the colony. Agriculture is daily extending its 
benefits; the land has become more valuable ; and considerable 
alterations for the better have taken place with respect to the 
implements of husbandry, and the general mode of cultivating the 
farms. The English plough has been introduced ; the Spanish 
breed of sheep, which proves extremely advantageous, is rapidly 
increasing ; and the manner of dressing the vines as practised on 
the Rhine has been adopted in some of the vintages with success. 
Nothing indeed appears to be wanting to the welfare of the 
colony except an increase of population, which an extraordinary 
fatality, prevailing among children, seems to render hopeless 
without some external assistance ; but every attempt of this 
nature has not been attended hitherto with the expected advan- 
tages. It is a curious fact, that the male population exceeds the 
female in every class of inhabitants in this settlement ; the 
surplus on the male side amounting altogether to about 1600« 
I found that Lord Caledon had not confined his views solely 
to the improvement of the settlement itself, but that he had also 
sent a mission to the interior ; in the well-founded expectation 
that new discoveries might be made, interesting in a general 
point of view, as well as tending ultimately to the advantage of 
the colony. Mr, Cowan, a medical gentleman, was the person 
entrusted with the charge of this mission, who had previously 
