Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/137

PT/)RA OP SOUTH AFRICA. 101 husbanding of the resources, whole towns find at all times a su{>orubuiidjut quantity of good water. Cape Colony and the conterminous lands are one of the most salubrious regions on the globe, not only for the natives, but also for immigranta from Europe. Hence acclimatisation is effected without any difficulty, aud often even with bene- ficial results. Even in the inland districts, where the summer heats are at times almost oppressive, Europeans are able to work l)ctween sunrise and sunset as in their native land. Epidemics seldom prevail, nor have they ever been so virulent as in Europe or many parts of the United States. The Cape has never yet been visited either by cholera or yellow fever ; affections of the chest are also very rare, and the most ordinary complaints appear to be rheumatism and neuralgia. Before the opening of the Suez Canal, most of the functionaries and officers returning from India broke their journey at the Cape, where they spent some time to recover their health; now, however, the easy and much shorter overland route enables them to proceed straight to P^ngland. The few invalids who at present seek in the climate of Austntl Africa a remedy, or at least a temporary relief, from their maladies, come directly from Great Britain, and take up their residence chiefly in Capetown, Graham's Town, and 'Bloemfont^in. But while the pure atmosphere of these regions is efficacious for some ailments, its virtue is even more conspicuously felt by the whole race, which here acquires greater vigour and physical beauty. Both in the British colouit;s and the I)utch republics, European families thrive well, so that even without any fresh stream of immigration, the white population would increase by the natural excess of births over the death-rate. The vital statistics show that in not a few rural dis- tricts the birth-rate is three times higher than the mortality, a proportion unknown in the most favoured Euro])ean lands. , Flora of SfUTH Africa. The flora which has been developed under the favourable climatic conditions of Austral Africa, is one of the richest in the world. It would almost seem as if all the vegetable forms adapted for the temperate /one, right round the southern hemisphere, had been concentrated and crowded together by the continuous tapering of the African continent towards its southern extremity. According to Amiitage, the region of the Cape compriises at least about twelve thousand sixcies, that is to say, two or three times more than all the combined vegetable zones of Europe. On a single mountain in the ncighbourh<KKl of Paarl, to the north-east of Capetown, Drege counted in spring no less than seven hundred flowering vascular plants, so distributed over the sIojk's that each vertical space of about 1,000 feet constituted a perfectly distinct vegetable area. The typical 8]>ecies present a marked general rest niblance to those of Aus- tralia ; but although the latter continent is five times more extensive, penetrating northwards far into the torrid zone, its whole floral world is scarcely more diversified than that of the relatively contracted region of South Africa. Of