4 
F. E. Weiss. 
region is, owing to its altitude, fairly rigorous, with sharp frosts at 
night during the winter months, and always a considerablcdifference 
between the day and night temperatures. The absence of trees, 
and even of shrubs except in the moister and warmer shallow 
valleys, gives a very monotonous appearance to the landscape, 
especially at the end of the dry season when most of the bulbous 
and tuberous plants have died down. Here and there a few low 
growing composites, including several Helichrysn, are to be seen 
in flower, and in some places a handsome Lobostemoti, nearly two 
feet in height, with large inflorescences of pale bell-shaped flowers. 
One of the most striking plants of this grass veld was a species of 
Vellozia (PI. 2,fig. 4) with a short brown stem often charred by grass- 
fires. The unbranched stem, about eighteen inches in height, and 
nearly two inches in diameter, is densely covered with the dead 
leaf-bases, which render the plant very drought-resisting, and even 
protected against fire. Near the top it bears a tuft of greyish- 
green leaves of very tough and resistant nature. In the dry season 
the leaves are folded sharply along the mid-rib so as to be V-shaped 
in transverse section, and both the upper and lower surfaces are 
deeply grooved, the stomata opening into these depressions. It 
does not seem to possess any definite motor-cells which cause an 
unfolding of the leaf; but when placed in water its tissues swell, 
owing no doubt to the mucilaginous sap which many of its cells 
contain. As the Summer rains had not commenced in the Transvaal 
these Vellozias were not generally in flower, and only on one stump 
did we find the purple flowers of this curious Monocotyledon. 
The monotony of the grass-veld was also broken by the nests 
of White-ants ( Termites ) dotted about over the plain, their earth- 
built mounds, two or three feet in height, being often opened out by 
the Cape Ant-Eater, or Aard-vark, a large animal of nocturnal 
habits which feeds on the ants in the termitaria. Occasionally we 
saw growing from the top of a ruined or forsaken nest a tuft of 
Agarics, due no doubt to the exuberant growth of the fungus which 
many of the termites cultivate for food, as do the leaf-cutting ants 
of the tropics. This curious habit of the white ants was first 
suggested by Smcathman 1 in 1781, and has recently been confirmed 
by Haviland 3 for several species of South African termites. 
Such is the character of the High Veld or Grass Veld stretching 
from the foot of the Drakensberg Range to Johannesburg. Passing 
1 Smcathman. Phil. Trans., Vol. LXXI., 1781. 
2 Haviland, G. D. Observations on Termites, Journ. Linn. Soc., 
Vol. XXVI., 1898, 
