CAPE TOWN

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 153, 24 March 1939, Page 9 (Supplement)

CAPE TOWN

Southern Doorway of the Dark Continent OLDEST city of South Africa, and the most beautiful. Cape 'flown basks in sunshine on the shores of Table Bay, shadowed by the noble mountain that was of old the halfway milestone in the mediaeval sea-road, beloved of tourists, of whom many return in later life to retire there, in the mild and bracing atmosphere of the African coast.

THE city is built on low ground along the south-west shore oi Table Bay. South, dominating the city, stands the walled plateau of Table Mountain, its precipitous cliffs extending some two miles,

and rising 3500 feet above the city. North-west ol the city stands a second and lesser, but -withal an imposing, barrier'the Lion Mountain, its two main peaks being Lion’s Head and Lion's Rum]). Between

this mountain and the great Table runs a deep and memorable defile, the Kloof, through which runs the highway to the seaward suburbs. Thus walled and embayed, Cape Town nestles, a picturesque and colourful scene, between the high hills and the sea. The city is much of the same size as Wellington. Of its population, about a third is made up of Asiatics and African natives, the remainder being of the mixed stock of Holland and of England.

New Zealand has a common bond with Cape 'flown in that Sir George Grey, that great and unfortunate statesman who adopted New Zealand as his country but was so bitterly disappointed in all his endeavours to advance her progress, was also Governor of the Cape Colony. From 1854-61 Cape Town was his home. In Africa, too, he narrowly missed greatness. He checked a formidable Kaffir rebellion. won the confidence and respect of Boers, English and natives and persuaded both the jreopie of Cape Colony and of the Orange J'Tee State that they had common interests. He brought South Africa to the point of federation, a federation which would have saved much subsequent bloodshed—but the biome Government would have none of the scheme at that juncture, and so continued all that sequence of blunders and misunderstandings that stained red the history of the Cape. Besides being the greatest port of the Union, Cape 'flown is, of course, the legislative capital and a cathedral city under an archbishop of the English Church. It is the gateway to Africa, the portal of the dark continent.