Title
A Voyage to the East Indies: Page 39
Description
and sailors Ninety three very ill; & kept many with lesser scorbutic Complaints on board, where they got plenty of Necessaries, Fruit etc. & soon grew healthy and strong. . The Cape of good Hope is the southern Extremity of Africa, which name was given it by the Portuguese, on their Arrival here, after several Attempts in which they were defeated by heavy Gales of Wind etc. They here form’d a Settlement but were driven out, as they were from allmost all their Acquisitions to the Eastward of this in the Indian Seas, notwithstanding their great Merit and extreme Indefatigability had entitled them to the sole, and uninterrupted Possession. The Dutch have possess’d it since the beginning of last Century. The Natives of this Part of Africa, call’d Cafrania, are suppos’d to possess the least Share of Sensibility or rational Feeling of any of the Inhabitants of the Globe. An invincible Indolence has been always observ’d Amongst them & an Ignorance as, inveterate; in Short they may be said to hold the lowest Place in the human System. Neither does the external Figure supply the other Defect. They are of a most disagreeable Colour, not so black as the Natives of Guinea or any other Part of Africa, nor of the more pleasing Copper Colour of the South Sea Inhabitants. They endeavour to [end page 39]
