rthrow them. These
"perched blocks," however, have not, like the _blocs perches_ of
Western Europe, been left by ancient glaciers or icebergs, for it seems
still doubtful whether there has been a glacial period in South Africa,
and neither here nor in the mountains of Basutoland could I discover
traces of ancient moraines. They are due to the natural decomposition of
the rock on the spot. The alternate heat of the day and cold of the
night--a cold which is often great, owing to the radiation into a
cloudless sky--split the masses by alternate expansion and contraction,
make great flakes peel off them like the coats of an onion, and give
them these singularly picturesque shapes. All this part of the country
is as eminently fit for a landscape painter as Bechuanaland and the more
level parts of Matabililand are unfit, seeing that here, one has
foregrounds as well as backgrounds, and the colours are as rich as the
forms are varied. For I must add that in this region, instead of the
monotonous thorny acacias of the western regions, there is much variety
in the trees; no tropical luxuriance,--the air is still too dry for
that,--but many graceful outlines and a great diversity of foliage.
Besides, the wood has a way of disposing itself with wonderful grace.
There is none of the monotony either of pine forests, like those of
Northern and Eastern Europe, or of such forests of deciduous trees as
one sees in Michigan and the Alleghanies, but rather what in England we
call "park-like scenery," though why nature should be supposed to do
best when she imitates art, I will not attempt to inquire. There are
belts of wood inclosing secluded lawns, and groups of trees dotted over
a stretch of rolling meadow, pretty little bits of detail which enhance
the charm of the ample sweeps of view that rise and roll to the far-off
blue horizon.

Beyond Marandella's--the word sounds Italian, but is really the
Anglicized form of the name of a native chief--the country becomes still
more open, and solitary peaks of gneiss begin to stand up, their sides
of bare, smooth, grey rock sometimes too steep to be climbed. Below and
between them are broad stretches of pasture, with here and there, on the
banks of the streams, pieces of land which seem eminently fit for
tillage. On one such piece--it is called Lawrencedale--we found that two
young Englishmen had brought some forty acres into cultivation, and
admired the crops of vegetables they were raising pa