lower price than they had ever before been procurable. But this profitable monopoly she was not destined permanently to enjoy. Political ambition, not less than mercantile cupidity, actuated the Dutch when they resolved to appear in the Indian Ocean as competitors of the Portuguese. The English soon followed the example of the Dutch, and at first by individual enterprise, and afterwards by public companies patronised by their respective governments, the two nations prosecuted their trade and their conquests with so much success that under their combined encroachments the fabric of Portuguese power in the East fell almost without an effort for its preservation. The merchants were driven from their trade, the government was expelled from the larger portion of its possessions, and the two great maritime states of Europe were left to harass each other with their rival pretensions, and to dye every sea that was accessible to their fleets with the blood of their people.

In 1614 England attempted to form a settlement at the Cape, in order to facilitate her Eastern commerce. For this purpose a few convicts were landed on an island in Table Bay, but these either soon made their escape or were killed in affrays with the natives. In 1620 a fleet from Holland was depatched for the purpose of establishing a settlement, but the intention, for some unknown reason, was not then carried out, and it was not until 1652 that the effective colonization of the Cape commenced. In that year Van Riebeck appeared with three ships freighted with settlers carrying with them the seeds of African civilization. A treaty with the natives gave the strangers a small addition of territory beyond the original fort. In ten years the whole of the peninsula of the Cape was ac quired, including the neighbouring islands. These purchases of territory were effected with the chiefs of the district by fair and open agreement, and the price stipulated for was duly paid. The Dutch retained peaceable possession of their colony for 143 years. They were deprived of it in 1795, when a British fleet arrived in Simon's Bay, bringing letters from the Prince of Orange, directing the Cape authorities to place the colony under English protection. The French party being in possession of the government declined to comply. The orders of the Prince were executed by force, and the colony was retained but for seven years. At the peace of Amiens it was restored nominally to the Dutch, but in reality to the French. On the renewal of the war with France, its recapture was one of the first measures planned by our government, and it has since remained in our hands. The British title was recognised and con

This

Under the Dutch, the colony was in extent about 600 miles in length and 320 in breadth, and its inhabitants were computed at about 60,000, of whom 22,000 were Europeans and the rest natives. It may be interesting to know something of the old Dutch colony as it appeared to an intelligent traveller so far back as the year 1773. A Swedish physician, commissioned by his government to make scientific inquiries and to form botanical collections, visited the Cape and parts of the adjacent territory; and he thus enumerates its material and social deficiencies country has no lakes; no navigable rivers; no other fisheries than those near the shores of the ocean, or the mouths of rivers; no woods of any consequence or rcal utility not even one pleasant grove; no verdant nor flowery meadows; no chalk hills; no metals worth the labour of extracting from the ore; no looms; no manufactures; no universities; no schools; no post; no post-horses; no inns;-nay, in so extensive a country as this there are still in many places wanting both judge and courts of judicature, both clergy and churches, both rain from heaven and springs from the earth, together with many other useful and indispensably necessary institutions which both now and hereafter may merit the consideration and care of a well-informed and prudent government.'* A vast improvement, however, took place afterwards during the Dutch occupation, and, in consequence of the revocation of the edict of Nantes and the persecution of Protestants in Europe, many French and some German refugees emigrated to the Cape, and commenced the cultivation of the vine, which bas proved one of the greatest resources of the colony.

The Dutch colonists are free from any charge of wanton oppression of the native races, nor is there any reason for supposing that they carried on aggressive wars for the purpose of dispossessing them of their land. They were themselves repeatedly attacked, as British colonists subsequently were, by bands of depredators tempted across the frontier by the rich herds of cattle which wandered over unenclosed plains. These freebooters at first only received merited castigation; but a practice afterwards prevailed of reducing to slavery all who were captured, and of confiscating the lands of the tribe to which the marauders belonged. The number of Hottentot slaves thus acquired by the Dutch settlers was considerable. It is to the act of the British legislature for the abolition of

between the years 1770 and 1779,' by Charles Peter Travels in Europe, Africa, and Asia, made Thunberg,M.D.