Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-02-01
SOUTH AFRICA,
viva Picture in Miniature of the
Lower Part of the Dark Continent

From Ainslee's Magazine
You land in South Africa at the foot of 4,
mountain 5000 feet high. They call If
Iapie mountain, and the veil of mist that
excepting on very clear days, overhangs
H. South Africans are pleased to term M.
1abiecioth. Presenting front of solid
rock, 1000 feet in height, perpendicular rs
wall, ana for half mile on top level.
this mountain offers the best natural sign
beard on earth. Time and again have Rrit-
ish firms attempted with fabulous sums 10
secure 1t for advertising purposes. bur as
yet, there has been no such DETACHMENT
liable mountain marks the tip end of the
dark continent. Below it nestIes tho ci,,,
OF Cape Town. beautiful bay STRETCHING
out in the foreground. On the west tho
mountain breaks off abruptly, and the rail-
road skirts about it to the interior On tho
east it slopes off into a hilly. pictureso,,,
formation known as the Lions Rack
ana then gradually rises into the Drakers-
pIrg mountains. This is the only great
mountain range south of the Zambesi. ana
py noting its location one may understand
III d trice just what South Africa is geo.
graphically Steaming along the east coast
Iieiii Ndpe Colony northward, you have the
Dfakensburg in view nearly all the way 10
Belra, distance of 1000 miles In Cona
colony and Natal the mountains in many
places dip the waters edge. and with a field
glass one may see on their crags and peaks
smoke curling up from the native villages
In Portuguese territory the mountains 70
cede slightly from the coast and at Della
goa BAY there Is an intervening stretch of
iowiand twenty miles wide. At Beira this
has increased to sixty miles Al the zam1
best the Drakensburg ends
10 get into the interior of South Africa
LON any OF the 1--WE east coast landing
DlaCGS-BOrt hafh
pan, Delagoa Bay and Beira-one Tp1st
cross short extent of low land and tban
ascend steep mountains. Having arrived
there, the traveller is conscious of littlo' ~
no descent. hve-siXths of the whole interior
being a vast plateau that extends to- the
Zamhesl on the north the Atlantic ocean
on the west, and varies in altitude from
5000 to 5000 feet above the sea
A fringe of tropical country. whers bIoor,
the magnolia and the rose. where flourish
the orange, pineapple, lemon. gllavo, Crane
panama, the cotton and the tea plant; a
lcng stretch of mountains running parallel
with the Indian ocean, the highest peaks
or which are capped with snow and in
whose valleys wave tracts of wheat and
corn; vast prairie. dotted here and there
with patches of scrub woodland. mission
stations, and immense farms with millions
of sheep and cattle grazing thereon: a fezy
thousand hamlets scattered like GASES over
a great landscape. made black by the ma
tive Africans who live in matched huts and
wear but breech clout: a dozen large
towns where is heard the clang of the
American trolley car and the clatter of the
police patrol. and about which men cluster
as flies gather TO jar of sweets: the REM
hants of once mighty geological garden,
including many leopards, beautiful and
1.-THE, balloons, antelope. jackals and s>roco-
diles, less number of lnippopetami and a
few herds of buffalo. elephants and gratis:
some iron ore. some ccal,, some copper,
and a little silver; forty miles of gold and
100 acres Of diamonds. That is South AZ.
RIGA.