Abraham Bogaert, a Danish visitor, described the town in 1702.
The castle,
with its "bastions built of heavy stone and armed with large cannon" was
the home of the governor and other senior officials.
The town, lying a good musket shot to the west of the Castle, stretches from
the sea to Table Mountain, and at the back touches the outermost slopes of
the Lion Hill. It has wonderfully increased the number of its houses since the
Company chose this place for a settlement ....
All are built of stone .....
They look very well from far offbecause of the snow-white lime with which
they are plastered outside, and many shine with Dutch neatness ....
It now
boasts of a Church, built in the Dutch fashion and adorned with a fair-sized
tower, in which on Sundays the Word of Truth is preached. I I
Bogaert also described the company's garden, "the new hospital, which is
tolerably extensive," and the lodge, "where the slaves of the Company live,
of whom the number at times runs well into five hundred."12
The countryside, too, was dependent on external trade, but it was re-
mote from the bustle of the port and dominated by its most successful
landowners. The visitor of I 702 was impressed by the Stellenbosch settle-
ment: "It is incredible how by the zeal of the Dutch this place has grown