folution of which, mixed up with the oily fat o f the large
broad tails of the iheep of the colony, and boiled flowly for
five or fix days, takes the confiftency and the quality of an
excellent white foap. This falfola grows in almoft every part
o f Southern Africa, but particularly on thofe plains known by
the name of Karroo, and in fuch abundance that, fuppofing the
plant, after being cut down and burnt, to be reproduced in five
years, the quantity of foda, or barrilla, that might annually be
made from the aihes would be fufficient, befide ferving the
colony, for the whole confumption of Great Britain: and as
enormous fums of money have always been, and continue to
be, drawn from England to pay the imports of this article, it
may perhaps be confidered as an objeit worthy of further
inquiry. According to the prefent fyftem, however, o f letting
out the government farms, and the high price of labor, none
of the country-people would find it worth their confideration
as an article to bring to market. The Hottentots, indeed,
might be encouraged to prepare i t ; but the great diftance from
Cape Town, the only market in the colony, and the badnefs of
the toads, will always operate againft a fupply of the natural
produfts of the country being had there at any reafonable rate.
Another fhrubby plant with glaucous fpear-ihaped leaves, is
generally met with growing among the falfola, the afhes of
which alfo give a ftrong alkaline lie ; but the foap made from
thefe is faid to have a blueiih color, and to be of a very inferior
quality to that made from the former. The plant was not in
flower; but it appeared to be the atriplex albicans, a kind of
orache.
The
• T h e hills that furrounded the plain of Geel-beck were com-
pofed o f a dark purple-colored flate; and among thefe were
feen prancing a fmall herd of that beautifully-marked animal
the zebra, and a great number of another fpecies of wild horfe,
known in the colony by the Hottentot name of qua-cha. This
animal was long confidered as the female zebra, but is now
known to be a fpecies entirely diftinCt. It is marked with faint
ftripes on the four quarters only; is well ihaped, ftrong limbed,
not in the leaft vicious, but, on the contrary, is foon rendered
by domeftication mild and tradable : yet, abundant as they are
in the country, few have given themfelves the trouble of turning
them to any kind of ufe. They are infinitely more beautiful
than, and fully as ftrong as, the mule; are eafily fup-
ported on almoft any kind of food, and are never out of fleih.
The zebra has obtained the charader of being fo vicious and
ungovernable as never to be completely tamed, perhaps only
from fome very imperfe£t and injudicious trials. The fuccefs
of an attempt to domefticate animals that are naturally fierce
or timid would require more perfeverance and patience, more
labor, and more addrefs, than feem to fall to the lhare of a
Dutch peafant. A vicious animal, taken from a ftate of nature,
is not to be tamed with the.point of the knife, nor with
ftripes; they are more impatient of pain than fuch as are
already rendered docile and accuftomed to the cruelties exer-
cifed upon them by man; and wounds and harih treatment
ferve only to make them more fierce and unmanageable. At
the landroft’s of Zwellendam I faw a male and female zebra
that, while young and attended to, were faid to have been mild
and docile; but by negleft, and probably by teafing, had
become