On returning to the waggons we direâed our courfe eaft-
erly, and rounded the mountains of the above-mentioned kloof,
by which means we approached the Orange river, where, with
an eafy current,, it flowed through a level part of the country.
We foon found, however, that it was impofiible for the waggons
to proceed far in this direction, and that in very few
places they could be brought near the banks of the river. We
therefore took to our horfes, and followed the windings o f the
river four days, in the hope o f meeting with a ford where it
might be paffed by the waggons. The firft day the water had
fubfided near two feet perpendicularly, and it continued to fall
for three days ; but the fourth day put an end to our hopes of
crofiing, by a fudden fwelling of the water to a greater height
than when we had firft approached it. The mountains alfo,
among which it puihed its current, began now to be fo rugged
that the banks were feldom a'ccefiible even on horfeback. Nothing
therefore remained for us but to return to the waggons,
and abandoning the idea of penetrating farther to the northward,
we contented ourfelves with ftriking off in the oppofite
direction towards the Kaffer country.
The general breadth o f this river, when free from inundations,
appeared to be about three hundred yards. In many
places it extended to five hundred, and in others was contracted
to two hundred yards. The volume of water was immenfe
and, in the narrow parts, forced its way with great rapidity.
Yet from this place to the embouchure on the weftern coaft
fuppofing it to be the Orange river, the diftance was not Iefs
than
than five hundred miles. On each fide o f the river, the furface
of the country was naked and barren as the Karroo, and infinitely
more difagreeable, being loofe' fand ; but at the diftance
of a couple of miles on the fouth fide, were plains well covered
with herbage. In feveral places the inundations had extended
beyond a mile from the river, as was apparent by the wreck of
large trees, roots, ihrubs, and ridges of fand, lying in a long
continued line. The elevation of the ground, at fuch points of
inundation, could not be lefs than thirty to forty feet above the
level of the river at its ordinary ftate.
The Orange river, like thè Nile, has its periodical inundations,
and, as well as that river, might be made by the help of
canals, to fertilize a vaft extent of adjoining country. The
Orange alfo has its cataracts. One of thefe made a prodigious
roaring noife, not far from one of the places where we
halted ; but it was not approachable without a great deal o f
fatigue and trouble. It is a remark that cannot fail to obtrude
itfelf on every traveller in Southern Africa, who may have attended
to the accounts that have been given of the northern
parts of the fame continent, that the analogy between them is
very clofe. Egypt and the colony of the Cape lie under the
fame parallels of latitude : they have the fame kind o f climate,
the fame foil, the fame faline waters: they both abound in
natron ; and the fame plants and the fame animals are common
to both. Egypt, without the Nile, would be a defart wafte,
producing only a few faline and fucculent plants like thofe of
the Great Karroo, where rain full as feldom falls as in the former
country ; and the fandy foil of the Cape, with the afliftance
Q_Q_ o f