The Worthington advance., 1876-08-17
A Lovely Country Whore all Climates Blend
and Animals Abound.

A Lovely Country Whore all Climates Blend
and Animals Abound.
The London Saturday Review devotes
q long article to a description of the
British Colony in South Africa, called
Natal, and extols the country highly.
1t says:
There is no inland navigation. The
conformation and varied surface ele.
vatlon OF the country admit of a great
diversity Of vegetable productions. AL
most every crop worth cultivating finds
here in one or another district its con.
genial earth and climate. Sugar, cof.
fee, and other tropical products ripen
well at the coast. The sea breeze pre-
walls greatly over the land winds, and
brings abundant n DISTURB in summer,
which is the season of most frequent
rains, the winter being very dry. The
mean temperature at Pietermaritzburg
is under 65 degrees. Thunderstorms,
with copious showers of brief duration,
alternately visiting different parts of
the country, preserve the freshness Of
its verdure throughout most of the
year. The quick upspringing of grass
and flowers, alter fire on the hill. side,
is charming effect of this summer
moisture acting on luxuriant soil.
The rivers are sometimes in flood, but
never run dry. A parching hot wind
from the interior is sometimes felt, but
it isless distressing than the visitation
OF that kind at Sydney and Melbourne.
The Review next proceeds to des-
cribe the flora of the country in glow
ing language.
Wild bananas and date palms adorn
these glades and groves, the former
bearing flowers of brilliant color shaped
like tho beak of bird. There are
quaint euphorbias, with club shaped
thick branches of green, fleshy sub.
stance, bearing no leaves, but small
tufts and red or yellows blossoms 4he
Natal plum, with it's fine crimson fruit
dark glistening leaves, and white flow.
ers RI sembling the jasmine.
The article winds up with this charm
ing account of the game of the coun-
try, which must delight immigrants
The wild animal life begins with the
elephant and the lion which are sell
dom now to be met with in the Natal
province. 1t treats of the leopard and
panther, called tiger by the Dutch
men the Hippopotamus and the buf-
fato three species of HyBna, which
they call wolves; the jackall, the
earth-wolf, and the wart-hog; the
ant.bear, or earth-pig, sometimes
named the Cape anteater ten species
of antelope, including the eland and
lartebeest the baboon, and a few
smaller beasts. Crocodiles and other
lizards, pythons, cobras, adders, and
less distinguished serpents, are found
in profusion. The birds of Natal seem
to be more agreeable woodland COM
pany but no complete enumeration is
here given, and of fresh-water fishes
there is little or nothing to be said.
Insect life would afford the curious
and sagacious naturalist an endless
subject of study. There are the man.
tis, awaiting his prey in the drollest
Quakerly attitude of rapt devoutness
and still abstraction the phasmids,
Disgusting themselves in the sem.
blance of dry twigs, or bits of stick,
or dead leaf, for the same insidious
purpose the butterfly, which repels
it's foes by discharging a yellow slime
with an offensive smell ; the big hawk
moth, which was once thought bird,
sucking honey from the oleander bios.
som; the marvellous procession of
caterpillars, marching four abreast,
the heads of one rank at the tails of
another before them, in unbroken or.
der for the length of 60 yards the
wasps that suspend their paper houses.
of many six.sided chambers, beneath
the overhanging thatched roof of some
colonial farmers building the ants
which devour every particle of sweet
or fat in whatever food the larder con
tains; and the formidable termites
constructing of hard plaster their long
covered galleries to approach the tim
bers of house or it's wooden fixtures,
that they may eat up all the inside
leaving thin shell to crumble at the
touch. These wonders of chronology
indeed, are not confined to Natal or tc
South Africa, but some readers ma,
possibly find them more interesting
than either the Dutch Beers or the
Zulu Kaffirs of colonial history.