in the rain, the salt is brought down. Here, at this place, there is but one crater;—whereas at other places of a like nature, as in New Zealand and Central America, I have seen various mouths crowded together, like disjected fragments of a great aperture down into the earth. Here there is but the one circle, and that is as regular as though it had been the work of men's hands.
Such saltpans in South Africa are common, though I saw none other but the one which I have described. The northern district of the Transvaal is called Zoutpansberg from the number of its saltpans,—and there are others in other parts of the country. I do not know that there is much else particularly worthy of notice in the neighbourhood of Pretoria, unless it be the wonderboom,—a pretty green over-arching tree, which makes for its visitors a large bower capable of holding perhaps 50 persons. It is a graceful green tree;—but not very wonderful.
