Nature and Art, December 1, 1866.] 
THE GREAT TREE-ALOE OP DAMARA LAND, 
203 
divided into five stems, eacli of which, about four 
feet higher, was subdivided into four or five more ; 
and from these arose branches nearly as thick as my 
arm, and of uniform size, even to the very top, 
where each was crowned by the well-known star of 
aloe-leaves, short, thick, tapering to a finely-hard- 
ened point, and curving gracefully upward, and 
each surmounted by three or more magnificent 
spikes of yellow flowers, showing, with more than 
golden lustre, above the fresh green of the succu- 
lent leaves. The stems were smooth, round, and 
externally of a light cream-colour. Upon the 
smaller branches, immediately below the leaves, 
thin annular flakes, easily detachable, marked, I 
suppose, the position of those that had been most 
lately shed ; and near the base of the main trunk 
the bark seemed to burst and curl off as if very thin 
veneers of fine satin-wood had warped off the 
foundation they were laid upon. 
The effect of this magnificent crown of leaves 
and flowers more than fifteen feet from the ground, 
and twenty in diameter, growing from sterile ridges 
of rough red rock, strewed with many-coloured 
pebbles and quartz crystals flashing back, like 
diamonds, the intense sunlight, was lovely in the 
extreme; so, choosing a position that commanded not 
only the best view of the tree, but also of a smaller 
one (with an upright stem, perhaps eight feet in 
height, as many inches thick, and having four 
already bifurcated branches), and ®f a small ster- 
culia in the foreground, I made the sketch which, 
without more artistic license than the interpolation 
of the solitary ostrich, is now placed in chromo- 
lithography before the reader. 
It was with regret that I broke off a couple of 
branches about four inches thick, in order to possess 
myself of a specimen ; for, indeed, I am never 
quite able to get over the idea that the wondrous 
products of nature ought to be admired rather than 
destroyed, and I am rather afraid that this feeling, 
more proper to an artist than to a sportsman, 
greatly contributed to the safety of the only two 
quaggas I saw during the day. My botanical spe- 
cimen, with gun, sketching-folio, and appurtenances, 
proved too heavy a burden ; so, after carrying it 
for some time, I sat down to sketch it, and, pre- 
serving only the flower-spikes, left it by the path. 
The stony character of the country in advance 
seemed now to force npon the Euphorbias the 
necessity of enlarging their roots above ground till 
they looked like blocks of granite, as big as tables, 
with the thin green rod-like leaves growing abruptly 
out of them. 
I found Onesimus already preparing supper, and, 
on my showing him my sketches, he remarked, — 
“ Dit ist neit voor nicht dat onzen Heer zoo agter 
blyven ” (he does some work when he stays be- 
hind). He recognized the tree, and, as I was 
anxious to secure another specimen, sent a Damara 
to seek for one in the rugged kloof near Wilson’s 
Fountain. The Damaras called it “ Otjitumbo 
but that, I believe, is rather the general name for 
any stump-like tree, and is applied to many other 
aloes, as w^ell as to the Welwitschiamirabilis, which 
is distinguished by the addition of “ Otjihooro,” 
making it “ the stump with a head ; ” eventually, 
however, they gave it the name of “ Omontinde,” 
though whether this applied exclusively to the 
gigantic aloe I could not learn. 
Our path lay down a deep ravine, from whose 
dry sandy bed rose stifling dust-clouds, which 
though the moon shone brightly, rendered even the 
nearest objects all but invisible. We passed the 
junction of the Onanies river with the Swakop ; 
and, though the bed of the “Father of Waters” 
showed only as a strip of desert sand, the roots of 
the “kameel dooms” seemed to find moisture 
enough beneath to enable them to keep iip a 
refreshing verdure in their spreading foliage and 
gracefully waving catkins, among which I found an 
opportunity of netting a few butterflies. “ The 
reeds,” as, from the coarse vegetation on which the 
oxen fed, our lialting-place was called, were varied 
by groves of thorns and tamarisks; and from the 
branches we brushed off, in passing, caterpillars 
against which Onesimus earnestly warned me, as 
the mere pricking of the skin with two or three of 
their bristly tufts was enough “to make a man 
scratch himself to death.” Nevei'theless, I have 
handled more formidable-looking creatures of the 
kind in Kafirland, and the only result has been a 
slight but long-continued irritation of the finger- 
ends, and a consequent vow against future contact 
with hairy caterpillars. Some of the trees wei’e 
thickly covered with a kind of red flowering 
mistletoe, from the berry of which birdlime is 
sometimes made to strew in the path of guinea- 
fowl ; — and the spoor of a solitary rhinoceros 
proved that the species was not yet “ shot out” from 
Damara-land, though the number of bleaching 
skulls would almost lead a traveller to think so. 
After a passing call to renew my acquaintance 
with the Welwitschia, or rather “ the plant of 
Hykamkop,” — for it had as yet no scientific name, 
we reached Walvisch Bay, where Mrs. Andersson 
was waiting the arrival of the Good Hojoe, by 
which to join her husband in Cape Town. Mr. 
Latham was also there, and he not only undertook 
to convey my sketches and specimens to Mr. 
Logier, but, with the generous liberality which we 
become so accustomed to in the colonies as to think 
almost too little of it, agreed to take to Town for 
repair my disabled watch, and lend me, for the 
journey, his own, which was in perfect order. It 
was by this, and similar acts from many other 
friends, that I was enabled to lay down our route 
to the Victoria Falls with some approximation to 
correctness. 
On our return,, in 1863, a parcel of news- 
papers, received at Lake Ngami, contained the 
letter from Sir Wm. J. ^looker, Director of the 
Loyal Botanic Garden at Kew, which is quoted in 
“ Nature and Art ” for August last; and then I 
first heard the fortune of my contribution. It 
appeared that Dr. Ecklon, a talented and well- 
known Cape botanist, to whom Logier had shown 
them, considered the aloe to be the “lvoker boom,” 
or quiver-tree ( Aloe dicliotoma) ; but Sir William, 
