“In the strife to which we are now driven have care to commit no deed unworthy of a Christian and of a burgher of the Orange Free State. Let us look forward with confidence to a fortunate end of this conflict, trusting to the Higher Power without whose help human weapons are of no avail. “May He bless our arms. Under His banner we advance to battle for liberty and for fatherland. M. T. Steyn, State President.” CHAPTER XVII. THE COUNTRY OF THE AFRICANDERS. Some knowledge of the physical structure of South Africa is necessary to an understanding of its resources, economic conditions and the longstanding political problems which, to all appearance, are now nearing a final solution. Nature has divided that part of Africa lying south of the Zambesi River into three distinct and well-defined regions. A strip of lowland skirts the coast of the Indian Ocean all the way from Cape Town around to Natal, Delagoa Bay and still northeast to the mouths of the Zambesi. Between Durban, the principal port of Natal, and Cape Town this strip is very narrow in places—the hills coming down almost to the margin of the sea. Beyond Durban, to the northeast, the low plain grows wider. This belt of lowland is more or less swampy, and from Durban northward is exceedingly malarious and unhealthful. This feature is a prime factor in the physical structure of the country and has had much to do with shaping its history. The second region is composed of the elevated and much broken surface presented by the Drakensburg or Quathlamba range of mountains, reaching from Cape Town to the Zambesi Valley—a distance of sixteen hundred miles. In traveling inland, after leaving the level belt, at from thirty to sixty miles from the sea the hills rise higher and higher—from three thousand to six thousand feet. These hills are only the spurs of the principal range, some of whose peaks rise to an elevation of eleven thousand feet. Beyond the Quathlamba Mountains, to the west and north, is the third natural division of South Africa—a vast tableland or plateau, varying from three thousand to five thousand feet above the sea level. This region occupies about seven-eighths of the area of South Africa. To a bird’s-eye view of the country the physical scheme is exceedingly simple—a great plateau filling the interior, a belt of lowland bordering the Indian Ocean and one principal mountain range between the two.