1772.
November.
growing on a drier soil, that seemed to concentrate their juices, spread a fine aromatic scent, which a gentle breeze wafted towards us from the chasm. At last, after three hours walk, we reached the summit of the mountain. It was nearly level, very barren, and bare of soil; several cavities were however replete with rain-water, or contained a little vegetable earth, from whence a few odoriferous plants drew their nourishment. Some antelopes, howling baboons, solitary vultures, and toads are sometimes to be met with on the mountain. The view from thence is very extensive and picturesque. The bay seemed a small pond or bason, and the ships in it dwindled to little boats: the town under our feet, and the regular compartments of its gardens, looked like the work of children. The Lion's Rump now seemed an inconsiderable ridge; we looked down on the spiry Lion's Head, and only Charles' Mount rose as it were in competition with the Table. To the northward, Robben island, the Blue hills, the Tyger hills, and beyond them a noble chain of mountains, loftier than that on which we stood, bounded our view. A group of broken rocky masses inclosed Hout baay (Wood bay) to the west, and continuing to the southward formed one side of the Table bay, and terminated in the famous stormy cape which king Manoel of Portugal named the Cape of Good Hope. To the south-east our view extended across the low isthmus between the two bays; beyond it wediscerned
