and hospitable club. The residential quarter is happily
situated on elevated ground, swept by refreshing breezes from the
ocean. A large space is covered with good houses and well-kept lawns.
The public gardens are a great feat of horticulture. The arid and
sterile soil has been converted by liberal irrigation into a green
oasis, containing groves of palms and a varied tropical vegetation.
Needless to say the work is the achievement of a Scotch gardener.

The prosperity of this active commercial centre is due to the trade
carried on with Kimberley, of which it is the port. The value of the
diamonds produced at Kimberley was estimated for 1883 at
2,359,000_l._; 1884, 2,562,000_l._; 1885, 2,228,000_l._; and 1886,
3,261,000_l._ These amounts will be exceeded in later returns. As yet,
the price per carat shows no tendency to decline. The work of mining
for diamonds gives employment to a large amount of well-paid labour.
Some 2,000 white _employes_ are engaged at an average wage of 5_l._
9_s._ per week. Twelve thousand coloured men are working under their
direction, their earnings exceeding 1_l._ per week.

Port Elizabeth is the chief _entrepot_ for ostrich feathers. The value
of this article of export for 1886 was over half a million sterling.
The process of selling the feathers by auction is one of the most
singular business transactions at which it has been my lot to assist.
One of the buyers in attendance, on the occasion of our visit,
represents a London firm, and is said to be making an income of over
1,000_l._ per year. A spirited effort is being made to establish an
_entrepot_ for the Cape wines at Port Elizabeth. We visited the
extensive cellars under the public market, where a company has opened
a business, which it is intended to conduct in accordance with the
most approved methods of treatment in the wine-growing districts of
Europe.

A day was spent at Port Elizabeth, and two days of rapid sailing
before an easterly wind brought the 'Sunbeam' into Table Bay on the
morning of October 15, just in time to gain the anchorage before one
of the hard gales from the south-east, which are not unfrequently
experienced at the Cape, set in. Between Port Darwin and the Cape the
distance covered was 1,047 knots under steam, and 5,622 knots under
sail. The average speed under steam and sail was exactly eight knots.
In the fortnight, October 13 to 27, 3,073 knots, giving an average
speed of nine knots an hour, were covered