TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE HENRY DUNDAS, ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE, UNDER WHOSE AUSPICES, THE EXTENSIVE AND IMPORTANT COLONY OF THE CAPE OF GOOD HOPE WAS ACQUIRED AND ANNEXED TO THE BRITISH EMPIRE, BY WHICH OUR POLITICAL AND COMMERCIAL INTERESTS IN THE EAST-INDIES HAVE BEEN SECURED AND PROMOTED; THESE SKETCHES, ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED, BY HIS MOST FAITHFUL AND OBLIGED HUMBLE SERVANT, JOHN BARROW. CONTENTS. 308 From this chart it appears, that the extent and dimensions of the territory composing the colony of the Cape of Good Hope, now permanently fixed, are as follows: River Koussie to Cape Point, 315 Nieuwveldt Mountains to Plettenberg's Bay, 160 Mouth of the Tush-river to Plettenberg's baaken, 225 which gives a parallelogram whose mean length is 550, and mean breadth 233, English miles, comprehending an area of 128,150 square miles. This great extent of country, deducting the population of Cape Town, is peopled by about 15,000 white inhabitants, so that each individual might possess eight and a half square miles of ground. A very great portion, however, of this territory may be considered as an unprofitable waste, unfit for any sort of culture, or even to be employed as pasture for the support of cattle. Level plains, consisting of a hard impenetrable surface of clay, thinly sprinkled over with crystalized sand, condemned to perpetual drought, and producing only a few straggling tufts of acrid, saline, and succulent plants, and chains of vast mountains that are either totally naked, or clothed in parts with sour grasses only, or such plants as are noxious to animal life, compose at least one half of the colony of the Cape. These chains of mountains and the interjacent plains are extended generally in the direction of east and west, except indeed that particular range which, beginning at False Bay, opposite to the Cape Point, stretches to the northward along the western coast as far as the mouth of Olifant's river, which is about 210 miles. The first great chain of mountains that runs east and west incloses, between it and the southern coast, an irregular belt of land from twenty to sixty miles in width, indented by several bays, covered with a deep and fertile soil, intersected by numerous streamlets well clothed with grass and small arboreous or fruitescent plants, well wooded in many parts with forest trees, supplied with frequent rains, and enjoying, on account of its proximity to the sea, a more mild and equable temperature than the more remote and interior parts of the colony. The next great chain is the Zevarte Berg or Black Mountain. This is considerably more lofty and rugged than the first, and consists in many instances of double and sometimes treble ranges. The belt inclosed between it and the first chain is about the mean width of that between the first and the sea; of a surface very varied, composed in some parts of barren hills, in others of naked arid plains of clay, known to the natives, and also to the colonists, by the name of Karroo; and in others of choice patches of well watered and fertile grounds. The general surface of this belt has a considerable elevation above that of the first; the temperature is less uniform; and from the nature of the soil, as well as the difficulty of access over the mountains, which are passable only in few places, this district is much less valuable than the other. The third range of mountains is the Nieuwveldt's Gebergte, which, with the second, grasps the Great |