Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1900-10-30
SUCH is SOUTH AFRICA
Vivid Picture i'm Miniature of the Lower
Part OF the Dark Continent.

Vivid Picture i'm Miniature of the Lower
Part OF the Dark Continent.
You land in South Africa at the foot
of a mountain $500 feet high. They
call it Table Mountain, and the veil of
mist that, excepting on very clear days,
overhangs it, South Africans are
pleased to term the "Tablecloth." Pre-
sentdng front of solid rock, 1000 feet
In height, perpendicular as wall, and
for half a mile on top level, thisWoun-
tain offers the best natural signboari
on earth. Time and again have Brit
lsh firms attempted with fabulous sums
to secure it for ADVERTISING purposes,
but, as yet, there has been no such
DETACHMENT.
Table Mountain marks the tip end
of the Dark Continent. Below it nes-
ties the city of Cape Town, beautiful
bay stretching out in the foreground.
On the west the mountain breaks off
abruptly. and the railroad skirts about
it to the interior. On the east it slopes
off into a hilly picturesque formation
known as the Lions Back" and then
gradually rises into the Drakensburg
Mountains. This is the only great
mountain range south of the Zambesl,
and by noting its location one may I'M
derstand in trice just what South
Africa Is geographically. Steam'ng
along the east coast from Cape Colony
northward, you have the Drakensburg
In view nearly all the way to Beira, a
distance of 1000 miles. In Cape Col
ony and Natal the mountains in many
places dip the waters edge and witG a
field glass enc may see on their cragS
and peaks smoke curling up from the
native villages. In Portuguese terri
tory the mountains recede slightly
from the coast, and at Delagoa Bay
there is an intervening stretch of low
land twenty miles wide. At Beira this
has increased TO sixty miles. At the
Zambesi the Drakensburg ends.
To get irto the interior Of South
Africa from sny Of the five east coast
landing places-Port Elizabeth, East
London, Durham, Delagoa Bay and
Beira-one Invst cross a shor. extent
Of low land and then ascend steer
mountains. Having arrived there, the
traveller is conscious Of little or no
descent, five sixths of the whole inter
Tor being a vast plateau that extends
to the Zambesi on the north, the At
lantic Ocean ON the west, and varies
in altitude from 1900 to 5000 feet
above the sea.
A fringe of tropical country, where
bloom the magnolia and the rose.
where flourish the orange, pineapple,
lemon. guavo, grape, banana, the cot
ton and the tea plant; a long stretch
of mountains running parallel VITA
the Indian Ocean, the highest peaks of
which are capped with snow, and in
whose valleys wave tracks of wheat
and corn. A vast prairie, dotted here
and there with patches CT scrub wood
land, mission stations, and immense
farms with millions of sheep and cat
tie grazing thereon; a few thousand
hamlets scattered like GASES over
great landscape, made black by the
native Africans who live in thatched
huts, and wear but breech clout;
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 a jar of sweets; the remnants Of
once mighty geological garden. includ-
ing many leopards, beautiful and 1.-THE,
balloons, antelope, jackals and c~oco-
diles, less number OF hippopotami
and few nerds of buffalo, elephants
and giraffes; some iron ore, soma coal,
some copper, and little silver; forty
miles of gold and 100 acres If d;a-
monds. That is South Africa.-Ains-
lees Magazine.