The Cape aloes, which is usually prized the highest in the English market, is that made at the Missionary institution of Bethelsdorp (a small village about nine miles from Algoa Bay, and chiefly inhabited by Hottentots and their missionary teachers). Its superiority arises not from the employment of a particular species of aloe, for all species are used, but from the greater care and attention paid to what is technically called the cooking of the aloes; that is, the evaporation, and to the absence of all adulterating substances (fragments of limestone, sand, earth, &c.), often introduced by manufacturers.
Mr. Moodie, in his "Ten Years' Residence in Southern Africa," gives a somewhat similar account.
Mr. Bunbury states that, about the neighbourhood of Graham's Town, three large kinds of aloe are very abundant, which form striking and characteristic features of the scenery; they grow irregularly scattered over the parched and naked faces of the hills, but most abundantly among the low broken ledges and knolls of sandstone rock, and are often seen spiring up above the evergreen bushes in the ravines, and crowning the cliffs. One kind grows to the height of a man. They are plants of a strange, rigid, and ungraceful appearance, but with very handsome flowers, which form tall and dense spikes, of a fine coral-red color in two of the species (A. arborescens and lineata?), and of an orange scarlet in the third (A. glaucescens?). When in blossom they are conspicuous at a great distance, and might easily be mistaken, when seen from far off, for soldiers in red uniforms.
The importance of this indigenous plant to the Cape Colony, may be estimated from the following figures:—
AMOUNT OF ALOES, THE PRODUCE OF THE COLONY, AND VALUE THEREOF,
EXPORTED IN THE YEARS ENDING 5TH JANUARY 1841, 1842, AND 1846.
| lbs | £ | |
| 1841 | 485,574 | 8,821 |
| 1842 | 602,620 | 11,877 |
| 1846 | 266,725 | 3,018 |
EXPORTS AND VALUE FROM THE EASTERN PROVINCE.
| lbs. | £ | |
| 1835 | 68,042 | 474 |
| 1836 | 30,808 | 285 |
| 1837 | 13,400 | 115 |
| 1838 | 28,867 | 306 |
| 1839 | 75,500 | 918 |
| 1840 | 82,478 | 1,145 |
| 1841 | 220,214 | 4,271 |
| 1842 | 283,305 | 5,003 |
| 1844 | 318,035 | 3,225 |
EXPORTS AND VALUE FROM THE WESTERN PROVINCE.
| lbs. | £ | |
| 1841 | 242,860 | 4,175 |
| 1842 | 379,315 | 6,874 |
| 1844 | 506,796 | 6,586 |