writer imagined the high central country of Africa to extend
only to the twentieth degree of southern latitude, and to send
ou t merely someehains of mountains towards the south. Ritter
supposes the elevated region to reach, as we have seen, much
further, and to be continuous with the plains of the Orange
River. In every part of the eastern coast where travellers have
penetrated, or have acquired accurate accounts of the interior,'
similar geographical phenomena are said to have been found.
A low country lies along the coast of the Indian Ocean, greater
or - less in extent, through which vast rivers flow from the
west, carrying such quantities of water as to imply, in
the latitudes which they traverse, extensive regions of elevated
land for a perennial supply, and to give strong reason to suspect
the existence of great inland seas and lakes, of which
these rivers are the outlets. This supposition has indeed, ïriT
some instances, been confirmed. This,high plateau is bordered
in some places by lofty mountain-chains. 11 In all places it is
.observed that the inhabitants of the high and low countries
differ remarkably in their physical and moral characteristics;
The people of the high countries are greatly superior to those
of the low plains : the former recede further from the physio-'
gnomy and colour of the Negro ; and this observation hold*« gooJd'
even where, from sameness of language and other circumstances,
we have reason to conclude the same races to havè '
peopled both the higher and lower districts. |
Lichtenstien considered the Snow Mountains, or Sneeuwberg,
as forming the origin or starting point of the great longitudinal
chain which is the eastern boundary of high South-Africa.
From the elevated tracts about these mountains various rivers
take their rise, which flow southward towards Algoa Bay, as
well as other streams destined to an opposite direction, and
to become tributaries to the great Gariep. From this quarter
Barrow and Janssens describe the high wilderness, inhabited
by the Bushmen, as continued towards the elevated tracts
where the different branches of the Orange River commence.
The eastern country, from the Keiskamma to Dalagoa Bay,
is commonly termed the coast of Natal. Here, according to
the report of Captain Owen and his officers, the maritime region
is separated from the interior by a range of mountains,
nearly six thousand feet in height. To the eastward is the
country of the Amakosah Kafirs^ to the westward are the wide
plains occupied by the Bechuana and.the Amaztiluh. The country
of Natal is bounded to the northward by the Maputa and
other considerable rivers, which take their rise in the interior
and run to eastward into Dalagoa Bay. From the mpuths
of those, rivers the land runs out eastward as far as the mouth
of the Inhambane, and is ,termed the coast of Inhambane.
Thence, or from Cape; Corrientes, the ' most advancing point
towards the east, commencei the region of Sofala, which reaches
to the mouth of' the river" Zambesi, and from the Zambesi
northward to’ Cape Delgado, in the tenth degree of southern
latitude, is the coast ’^&osambique finom,Cape Delgado to
the Juba, under the equator, is the“c<fest,'of Zanzibar. Behind
this vast extent3 of maritime country the inland has been
visited but in-few places by European travellers; but wherever
an ingress has been gained, or where information has been acquired,
it appears that chains of mountains, and in soihe places
/liberal chains, run from north to, south, beyond which a high
plain extends towards the interior of the continent. Notices
iltampd by several travellers confirm the information which
led d’Anville to lay down, in his mapjof Africa, a lake or in-
land"sea in the high country behind the Mosambique coast.
Chains of mountains are likewise destSibm. which are said to
be of great elevation : O amonpgp them the most celebrated are
the mountains of Lupata, which, as Ritter, conjectures'rmay
be'.connected even- with the Alpsfof Abyssinia.', The high
countries are said to be inhabited in part by ferocious savages,
and partly occupied by empires* of great extent, the subjects
of which have attained a considerable degree of civilization.
In some parts there are vast plains, bvhr which nomadic tribes
wander with their herds, from whom it has been conjectured
that the Galla, as well as the Jagas, the invaders of Abyssinia
and of the empire of, Kongo, originated.
I shall proceed in the sequel to inquire, successively into
the- population of these different districts of Southern
Africa.