CHAPTER IX.

ROBERTSON, SWELLENDAM, AND SOUTHEY'S PASS.

From Worcester we went on to a little town called Robertson, which is also the capital of an electoral division. The country here is altogether a country of mountains, varying from three to seven thousand feet high. The valleys between them are broad, so as to give ample space for agriculture,—if only agriculture can be made to pay. Having heard much of the continual plains of South Africa I had imagined that every thing beyond the hills immediately surrounding Capetown would be flat; but in lieu of that I found myself travelling through a country in which one series of mountains succeeds another for hundreds of miles. The Cape Colony is very large,—especially the Western Province, which extends almost from the 28th to much below the 34th degree of latitude S., and from the 17th to the 23rd of longitude E. Of this immense area I was able to see comparatively only a small part;—but in what I did see I was never out of the neighbourhood of mountains. The highest mountain in South Africa is Cathkin Peak, in Natal, and that is over 10,000 feet. In the districts belonging to the Cape Colony the highest is in Basuto, and is the Mont aux Sources. The highest in the