CHAPTER VII.
RIDE FROM TULBAGH TO THE PAARL, AND THENCE TO STELLENBOSCH.
A p r i l 1 9 th . Early this morning we took leave of Mr. Ballot,
at whose house we had experienced the most friendly attention.
Although strongly urged to remain a day longer, as the weather had
every appearance of being rainy, we unfortunately resisted his persuasion,
and took our departure; but scarcely had we lost sight
of the house, before the rain commenced. It continued to fall
• without intermission the whole of the day; yet still, under the
hope that it might soon clear up, we resolved to keep on our way.
At the entrance of the Roodezands Kloof (Red-sand Pass), we
stopped to pay a trifling toll, which is levied to defray the expense
of keeping this pass in repair. But it will readily be believed,
that no more of the money is laid out on that service, than just
sufficient to make it passable, when it is stated that these tolls
and repairs' are farmed out by the government to individuals for a
certain annual sum. Not far from this, over the mountains, there is
another pass, now called the Oude Kloof (Old Pass), formerly the
only road for waggons, although exceedingly steèp, and carried over
the very summit The repairs of this have been quite neglected,
and it is now made use of only by those who, to avoid the toll,
drive their cattle Over that way.
The new pass is by far the best and the easiest, by which the
country lying on the eastern side of the great western chain may be
entered ; and it is very possible to make it still more so. It is one
of the few chasms which completely divide the large ranges of
mountains of the colony : though it is probable that there may exist
several more than have been hitherto taken notice of. This-is the
only cleft of this description in the western range; but in that
which branches off from it at Winterhpek, and; joins the great
southern range at Swellendam, there are two,> through which the
Breede river at Mostert’s Hoek, and the Hex river at the Kloof of
that name, flow ; and which are both used by the colonists as passes.
In -the great southern chain, there is a very remarkable gap, through
which the waters of the Great Karro escape, and form the Gaurits
river ; but through this no practicable road has yet been made.
Roodezands Kloof is a narrow winding defile of about three
miles in length, just wide enough to allow a passage for the Little
Berg river, on each side of which the mountains rise up abrupt and
lofty. Their rocky sides are thickly clothed with bushes and trees,
from their very summits down to the water, presenting a beautiful
and romantic picture, adorned with every variety of foliage. Along
the steep and winding sides, a road * has been cut out, which follows
the course of the river, at a height above it generally between fifty
and a hundred feet ; in one part rising much higher, and in another,
descending to -the. bottom, and leading through the river,
which, at this time, was not more than three feet deep, although
* See the Vignette at the end of the ninth chapter o f this volume.
T