Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/174

 ISn SOUTH AND EAST AFRICA. vicinity there is not a single village, and Mnlmeshunf, the nearest town, lies over 'iO miles to the south-cast, in a fertile wheat- growing inland district. The siipe- rior attractions of the capital have withdrawn all traffic from Saldanha Bay. North of the valley of the Great Berg, the mostly barren and arid plains stretch- ing northwards to Little Namaqualand are very thinly peopled. Even the capitals of districts, Piqudherg, C/(niin//iatn, the " furnace " of the Cape, and CaMnia, are more villages, where the stock-breeders of the surrounding pasturages come to renew their supply of provisions. Calvinia, standing over 3,000 feet above the sea, in an upland valley between the Hantam and Boggeveld ranges, is still connected by a good highway with the civilised regions of the Cape. But farther north stretch the vast solitudes of Bushmanlaud, whose only inhabitants are a few groups of Sans scattered round the lagoons. The district of Little Namaqua- land, which occupies the north-west corner of Cape Colony, between the Atlantic and the course of the Lower Orange, would also be left to the aboriginal popula- tions but for the great abundance of copper ores in the hilly districts. In the neighbourhood of the Vogel-Klip ("Bird-Cliff"), the culminating point of these highlan.ls (3,100 feet), an Engli^h company owning a territory 135,000 acres in extent has been work ng the " inexhaustible " mines of Ooh'ep since the year 1863. This source alone has yielded an annual supply of from ten to twenty thousand tons of ores containing about three tentl s of pure copper, more fusible than that of Chili. The great pit, already sunk to a depth of over 500 feet, has reached formations still more productive than those of the surface. The mines are worked by several hun- dred natives, Hottentots and Ilereros, under the direction of English engineers from Cornwall and Germans from Thuringia. Although lying 3,200 feet above the sea, Ookiep is connected with the coast by a horse or mule railway 90 miles long. The little haven of Fort NoUotli, where the ore is shipped, was formerly much frequented by American whalers. East of the Cape and of False Bay the territory stretching south of the coast range towards Cape Agulhas, southern extremity of the continent, is a region of pasture-lands containing only two unimportant little towns, Caledon and Bredm- ilorp. But the basin of the Breede River is more thickly peopled, thanks to the greater abundance of its rainfall. Worcester, capital of the Upper Valley, whose headstreams have their source to the north of the coast range, lies on the main line connecting Cape Town with Kimberley, and here the railway begins to ascend in order to reach the inland plateaux. Penetrating through a lateral valley traversed by the river Hex (" Witch River "), it rises by a series of curves to the crest of the terraces which skirt the plains of Worcester. Here it attains an elevation of 2,000 feet, and reaches its highest point (3,600 feet) 74 miles to the north-west of Worcester. A copious thermal spring rises in the vicinity of this place, and lower down the Breede flows successively by the towns of Hobertsoii and Sicellendam, the latter one of the oldest settlements in the colony, having been founded so early as the middle of the eighteenth century. Avenues of oaks radiate in various directions from the town towards the k/onfs or wild gorges which penetrate into the heart of the mountains, 'ihe village of Port Pcau/ort,