CHAP. I. 
CHILDREN’S FEAST AT CAPE TOWN. 
13 
carrying flags, on which were inscribed the name of their 
school, with some appropriate motto or device. One flag, a 
very striking one to me, exhibited two hands—a black and a 
white one—clasped together. When the children had walked 
past the assembled authorities, they united in singing the 
National Anthem, after which the Lieutenant-Grovernor re¬ 
tired, and the children were conducted to their respective 
tents pitched in different parts of the ground. There they 
were regaled with an abundant supply of suitable refresh¬ 
ments, liberally furnished at the expense of the municipality, 
a pleasing evidence of the estimation in which the education 
of the poorer classes was held by the authorities of the place. 
But a still more gratifying fact was the entire absence among 
the children themselves of anything like estrangement or 
aversion on account of colour. The majority of the children 
were Africans, but there was also a considerable number of 
the children of Europeans, and many times my attention was 
attracted by a little sturdy woolly-haired negress holding the 
hand of a blue-eyed flaxen-haired girl, and both looking up 
with laughing faces and apparently loving hearts as they 
passed along. The same perfect cordiality was manifest 
when they gathered round the refreshments in the tents, or 
joined in the hymns which they sung before departing from 
the ground. 
Mr. Cameron, who to my great satisfaction had consented 
to join me in my expedition to Madagascar, soon completed 
his necessary preparations, and we left Table Bay on the 26th 
of May. In passing the southern extremity of the African 
continent, we found the sea higher than I had ever seen it, 
except in passing Cape Horn, and we now experienced greater 
inconvenience from the motion of the vessel than at any other 
part of the voyage. 
While passing the Mozambique Channel we had a heavy 
gale of wind, which our captain called a “ regular Mozam- 
