at its pretty town of Funchal, to see some of its charming surroundings; a passing peep at Teneriffe, which is now receiving so much attention in Europe as an attractive health resort; a few days’ run of exhausting heat through the tropics; a visit to Saint Helena, enough to allow of a drive to Longwood, and a look at the room, where the first Napoleon breathed his last—­leaving there the legacy of the shadow of a mighty name to all time—­on this “lonely rock in the Atlantic”; a few days more of solitary sailing over a stormy sea, a daily look-out for whales, porpoises, dolphins, flying fish, sharks, and albatrosses; a glance upward, night after night, into the starry sky, to gaze on the Southern Cross, so much belauded, and yet so disappointing in its appearance, after the extravagant encomiums lavished on it; and at length, on the early morning of May 24, I safely reached Cape Town.

[Illustration:  Decorative]

[Illustration:  Decorative]

Cape town.

To produce the most favourable impression of any new place, it is essential that it should be seen for the first time in fine weather.  Places look so very different under a canopy of cloud, and, perhaps, a deluge of rain, or when they are bathed in the sunshine of a beautiful day.  Happily for me, my first view of Cape Town was under the latter genial aspect.  I need scarcely say, that I was, in consequence, quite charmed with my first sight of this celebrated town, the seat of Government of the Cape Colony.  What made the scene more than usually striking to a traveller, fresh from the sea, was, that it was the Queen’s birthday, and the day dawned with a most perfect specimen of “Queen’s weather.”  Cape Town was literally en fete.  The inhabitants thronged the streets.  I was astonished at the great variety of gay costumes among the motley crowd—­English, Dutch, Germans and French, Malays, Indian Coolies, Kafirs, and Hottentots—­a tremendous gathering, in fact, of all nations, and “all sorts and conditions of men.”  There was a grand review of all the military branches of the Service, in which His Excellency the Administrator, General Smyth, surrounded by a brilliant staff, received the homage due to the British flag; and, as her representative on this occasion, to Her Majesty’s honoured name.  The review was followed by a regatta in the afternoon.  It was quite refreshing to a new arrival, like myself, to observe the enthusiastic evidences of loyal feeling everywhere exhibited in the capital of the Colony to our Queen, the beloved and venerated head of the British Empire.

[Illustration:  Government house, Cape town.]