pite of a
natural anxiety to carry out my theory, that the violent
"sou'-easters" are the "straighteners" in their case.

Cape Town is so straggling that it is difficult to form any
idea of its real size, but the low houses are neat and the
streets are well kept and look quaint and lively enough to my
new eyes this morning. There are plenty of people moving about
with a sociable, business-like air; lots of different shades
of black and brown Malays, with pointed hats on the men's
heads: the women encircle their dusky, smiling faces with a
gay cotton handkerchief and throw another of a still brighter
hue over their shoulders. When you add to this that they
wear a full, flowing, stiffly-starched cotton gown of a third
bright color, you can perhaps form some idea of how they
enliven the streets. Swarms of children everywhere, romping
and laughing and showing their white teeth in broadest
of grins. The white children strike me at once as looking
marvelously well--such chubby cheeks, such sturdy fat
legs--and all, black or white, with that amazing air of
independence peculiar to baby-colonists. Nobody seems to mind
them and nothing seems to harm them. Here are half a dozen
tiny boys shouting and laughing at one side of the road, and
half a dozen baby-girls at the other (they all seem to play
separately): they are all driving each other, for "horses" is
the one game here. By the side of a pond sit two toddles of
about three years old, in one garment apiece and pointed hats:
they are very busy with string and a pin; but who is taking
care of them and why don't they tumble in? They are as fat as
ortolans and grin at us in the most friendly fashion.

We must remember that this chances to be the very best moment
of the whole year in which to see the Cape and the dwellers
thereat. The cold weather has left its bright roses on the
children's cheeks, and the winter rains exceptionally having
this year made every blade of grass and leaf of tree to laugh
and sing in freshest green. After the dry, windy summer I am
assured there is hardly a leaf and never a blade of grass to
be seen in Cape Town, and only a little straggling verdure
under the shelter of the mountain. The great want of this
place is water. No river, scarcely a brook, refreshes one's
eye for many and many a league