THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 
45 
church. It is one uninterrupted mafs or ftone, if we except 1776. 
fome fiffures, or rather impreffions, not above three or four , Novembcr ' 
feet deep, and a vein which runs acrofs near its North end. 
It is of that fort of ftone called, by Mineralogifts, Saxum con - 
glutinatum , and confifts chiefly of pieces of coarfe quartz 
and glimmer , held together by a clayey cement. But the 
vein which erodes it, though of the fame materials, is much 
comparer. This vein is not above a foot broad or thick; 
and its furface is cut into little fquares or oblongs, difpofed 
obliquely, which makes it look like the remains of fome 
artificial work. But I could not obferve whether it pene¬ 
trated far into the large rock, or was only fuperfxcial. In 
defeending, we found at its foot a very rich black mould; 
and on the fides of the hills, fome trees of a confiderable 
fize, natives of the place, which are a fpecies of ole a 
In the morning on the 20th, we fet out from the Pearl ; wedaef. 20. 
and going a different road from that by which we came, 
paired through a country wholly uncultivated, till we got 
to the Tyger hills, when fome tolerable corn-fields appeared. 
At noon, we flopped in a hollow for refrefhment; but, in 
walking about here, were plagued with a vaft number of 
* It is ftrange that neither Kolben nor de la Caille fhould have thought the Toiver of 
Babylon worthy of a particular defeription. The former [Vol. II. p. 52, 53, Englifh 
Tranflation] only mentions it as a high mountain. The latter contents himfelf with tell— 
ing us, that it is a very low hillock, un tres has monticule. Voyage de la Caille , p. 341. We 
are much obliged to Mr. Anderfon for his very accurate account of this remarkable rock, 
which agrees with Mr. Sonnerat’s, who was at the Cape of Good Hope fo late as 1781. 
His words are, “ La Montagne de la Perle , merite d’etre obfervee. C’eft un des plus 
u hautes des environs du Cap. Elle n’eft compofee que d’un feul bloc de granit crevafle 
“ dans plufieurs endroits.” Voyage aux Indes , Tom. II. p. 91. 
Mr. Sonnerat tells us, that Mr. Gordon, Commander of the troops at the Cape, had 
lately made three journies up the country, from which, when he publifhes his journal, we 
may expedt much curious information. 
mufquitoes 
