The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

ANGEA PEQUENA. 77something more tlian a mere indentation on the coast, for it ramifies to the rightand left for about 5 miles south of the entrance. It is accessible to the largestvessels, having a depth of from 40 to 50 feet, with excellent anchorage wellshelteredfrom the surf and from all winds except those of the north. Its greatdefect, like that of Walvisch Bay, is the absence of good water, although anintermittent watercourse, dignified with the name of the " Little Orange River,"occasionally reaches the baj'. Hence the place will have to be supplied from theCa-pe, until its increasing importance justifies the sinking of wells and formationof reservoirs on the coast in order to cajiturc all the water oozing from thesurrounding dunes.Hitherto Angra Pequena has not answered the anticipationsof its owners as a trading station. In fact its only articles of export are somecattle, fish, and mineral ores, so that it is not, perhaps, surprising that the solitaryGerman factory was completelj' abandoned in the year 1887.In the neighbourhood are the two valuable guano islands of Icliahoe, lyingnorth-west of the bay within a mile of the coast, and Halifax near the peninsula skirtingthe west side of the harbour. These, with a few other islets, have long beenregarded as dependencies of Cape Colony, and the working of the guano dejjositsis secured to British traders. Here are captured, in the months of October andNovember, myriads of penguins, cormorants, and other waterfowl ; but the originalstores of guano, lying several yards thick on the rocks, had been completelyexhausted by the speculators towards the middle of the present century.Sincethen the trade has been regulated ; during the breeding season all trespassers areW'arncd off, and the islands left in the peaceful possession of the birds, after whichthe gangs of workmen are admitted to collect the manure, ^^-hich in the year 1884was shipped to the total value of £20,000.In these waters numerous hands are also engaged in the capture of seals,multitudes of which animals frequent all the surrounding islets and reefs. Onthe shores of Possession Island, which lies in Elizabeth Bay, to the south of AngraPequena, the navigator MoreU found the carcases of cetaceans in such prodigiousquantities that he estimated them at upwards of one million. His theory wasthat the vast school had been suddenly overtaken and swallowed up by sometremendous whirlwind of sand.In the interior of Namaqualand the largest centres of population consistmerely of a few dozen huts, and most of these villages are only temporary settlements.The chief stations are those of the missionaries, such as Nishett's BathWannhad) on a wady flowing to the Orange, and Bethanij, in the hilly district(stretching eastwards from Angra Pequena. Bethany is regarded as the capitalof the whole of the Namaqua territory.In 1884 it boasted of four brick buildings,the mission house, the church, the palace of the tribal chief, and the localdealer's warehouse. An attempt has recently been made to found an agriculturalsettlement at a place called Holzenfels, on the north bank of the Orange, close tothe British frontier. Hopes are entertained that by means of irrigation canalsderived from the river these arid wastes may be gradually transformed to smilingoases and productive arable lands.