another party was fele£ted from among the farmers of Agter
Sneuwberg, as being beft acquainted with this eaftern part o f
the country. Six colonifts and fix Hottentots, in addition to
our own ftrength, were deemed fufficient to enable us to perform
this part of the journey with fafety.
Direiting our courfe to the fouth-eaftward, we came to a
chain of four falt-water lakes, lying one immediately after the
other. Three of them were fully as large as,: and one fmaller
than, that near Swart Kop’s river; but there was very little
water in any of them. The bottoms were covered with a
cruft of fait that in the thickeft part did not exceed an inch.
Immediately under the fait was a thin coating of red fand, and
below the fand a ftratum o f foft impalpable blue clay two feet
deep ; the next three feet confifted of a coarfe friable yellow-
iih clay, containing fmall. chryftals of fait; under this was a
fmall quantity of water, refting upon a covering o f rotten purple
flate half an- inch thick; and below this a dry reddilh-
colored foil that did not apparently contain a particle o f fait.
Clofe to the margin o f the third falt-pan were feveral fprings
o f clear water, having a bitter earthy tafte; and along the rills
that fell from thefe into the pan, grew tall reeds and ruihes
into the very centre among the fait. The others were entirely
naked, without a bufli or ihrub on their banks. The furrbund-
ing country was alfo deftitute o f plants, and the furface was
ftrewed over in many places with thin pellicles of fait. The
quantity of game on the neighbouring plains, confifting chiefly
of elands and fpringboks, was to us a fuificient inducement to
pitch
pitch our tents near the falt-pans; but we were difturbed the
whole night by the roaring of lions.
Continuing oUr route to the eaftward, on the tenth we'entered
the divifion of the Tarka, under the point of a lofty
mountain called the Bambos-berg, which alfo forms a part of
the higheft ridge that croffes the. continent near the fouthern
angle of Africa. The Bambos-berg is a double range, and is
completely impaffable either with waggons or on horfeback.
In order to have got beyond them with horfes, it would have
been neceffary to return to the northward and to crofs the
Zuure-berg. To the eaftward, no paflage over them has yet
been difcovered in any of the expeditions that, with different
views, have been made through Kaffer-land. The country,
therefore, behind the Bambos-berg, at the feet of which the
Orange river flows, may be confidered as very little known,
and on that account it was a fubje£t of no fmall regret to fome
of the party to be denied a paflage over the mountains. * It
was found Imprudent alfo to continue Our route to the eaftward,
a horde of Bosjefmans, commanded by one Lynx, confifting
of five hundred people, having pofted themfelves near a
point of the Bambos-berg. We were obliged, therefore, to
turn off to the fouthward, dire£tly through the Tarka.
In one o f the mountains that terminates this divifion to the
eaftward, we difcovered a cavern full of the drawings of different
animals generally of the larger kind, fuch as elephants, rhi-
nofcerofes, hippopotami, and, among the reft, one of the camer
r 2 lopardalis.