FOOTNOTES:
[22] Cuculus Indicator.
[23] Nectarina.
CHAPTER XIII.
FINAL ATTACK, AND CLEARANCE OF THE WATERKLOOF.
On the afternoon of Sunday the 12th of September, as we were leaving church, the 73rd regiment, from King Williams' Town, under Colonel Eyre, marched through the town on their way to join the force assembling for a grand and final attack on the Waterkloof. They encamped on the other side the river, on the Blinkwater road; though absolutely in rags, patched with every description and colour of cloth and leather, many a shirt tail dangling from under the lappels of their coats, they looked most soldier-like, and marched with the greatest regularity, the Rifle Brigade band playing them through the streets.
The following day a detachment of the 74th being ordered to reinforce Colonel Eyre's column, I unexpectedly found myself in orders to join him at day-break next morning, delighted, after having shared in all the former attacks, to be in at the last. At four in the morning of the 14th we left the barrack square by starlight, and marching through the sleeping town, halted outside the line of Colonel Eyre's camp-fires as day was breaking. The troops were already accoutred, and the tents struck, and in a few minutes we were advancing through the open bush along the foot of the Kromme to the Yellow-Wood River, where we remained two hours for breakfast. On one or two of the grassy ridges overtopping the forest on the mountain side mounted Kaffirs now and then showed themselves, watching our movements.
Three or four miles further on, we halted and bivouacked at the ruins of Nieland's farm, at the foot of the Pass where the severe engagement, under Colonel Fordyce, had taken place a year before.
The remaining three columns of attack, under Lieut.-Col. Napier, Lieut.-Col. Nesbitt, and Major Horsford, the two former under general command of Colonel Buller, on the north side of the Waterkloof, the latter at the extremity of the valley, were to move simultaneously at dawn next day in co-operation.
It was pitch dark, when, at four in the morning, we groped our way out of camp, the waggons and tents being left with a small guard under charge of an officer, and ascended a steep Pass which we had not visited since the severe struggle on the 9th September. As it became light, a few skulls and scattered bones were to be seen at the top of the path, though we must have passed many more lower down, where the fight had been hottest. After a stiff climb, halting frequently to breathe the men, who coughed violently, an oft remarked symptom of the telling effects of the hardships and exposures of the campaign, we reached the mountain summit, which was enveloped in a thick cold fog. We moved along the table-land towards the south scarps of the Waterkloof, the point of our operations, but the mist was so thick that we halted till the sun had fully risen, when it partially cleared off, and we observed an extended column of at least 400 Kaffirs moving along the narrow ridge connecting the Kromme heights, on which we were, with the peninsular and otherwise totally inaccessible Iron Mountain, to take possession of its towering krantz. Colonel Eyre immediately countermarching his column, moved us rapidly forward to the attack of the Iron Mountain, and we entered a little forest path leading along the connecting ridge, and so narrow that it barely afforded room for two abreast, continually obstructing the whole column for some minutes. After an hour's gradual ascent without opposition, we crowned the height, when the enemy, firing half a dozen shots, the balls whistling harmlessly over our heads, fled to the bush below, by paths so precipitous and narrow as to be impracticable for anything but Kaffirs and baboons, leaving behind them some two or three women and several horses, which we took. By this false move on their part, the enemy was placed in our hands; the Rifle Brigade being in the valley at the foot of the mountain in front, two parties were instantly despatched by the Colonel right and left to cut off escape by either flank. We made our way down by a path so smooth and steep that only the greatest precaution prevented a headlong career after the loose stones that bounded down before us into the deep valley; the ammunition and pack-horses sliding down on their hind quarters, and the rocket troop proving very troublesome from the difficulty of keeping the heavy apparatus off the horses' necks. The kloofs and forests thus enclosed, were completely scoured, and though the enemy by dispersing, and hiding in the thickest parts of the extensive thorny bushes, succeeded in a great measure in making their escape, many were killed, seventy-one women and children captured, secreted among the cavities of the rocks at the base of the krantz, and quantities of assegais, guns, and native ornaments taken. Half a dozen Rebels, Cape Corps deserters, killed in the attack of their stronghold, were hung on the nearest trees, as examples to any of their comrades who might chance to come that way.
At the ruins of Brown's farm, in the valley of the Waterkloof, Major Horsford's column, which had marched up the valley, joined ours. They had killed a good many Kaffirs, captured some horses, burnt and destroyed many huts, and stormed and destroyed a gunsmith's shop in the rocks, fortified and loop-holed, and well-stocked with tools and materials for the repair of fire-arms.
The whole valley was smoking from end to end with burning huts, as were the heights above us, crowned with the 60th and 91st, scarcely visible from their distance.
After a two hours' rest the main column moved up the valley to the head of the Waterkloof, two parties being detached to our right, one to attack a small body of Kaffirs collected above us, and commanding our intended ascent; the other up the south scarps to intercept the flight of any dislodged parties in that direction.
After a stiff pull up the Pass, we found the 60th Rifles posted in the bush along the path covering our ascent, and on the open ground above, several more companies of that regiment and the 91st, with many old friends. Crossing the Horseshoe Flat, we entered the belt of forest dividing it from the Kromme range beyond, and found the well-remembered path lined by the 60th Rifles, who, as we passed, presented us with cigars and brandy-and-water, on the very spot where, on former occasions, we had been treated by the Kaffir Rifles to volleys of bullets. A short, but at that advanced hour, most weary march across the open ground, brought us, after dark, to our bivouac on a bleak bare ridge, where, from the rocky nature of the ground, we broke nearly all the pegs of our patrol-tents without eventually succeeding in pitching them. The following morning, by daylight, we were on the move, and separating into four bodies, again scoured the kloofs on the south side and head of the Waterkloof, and crowned the Iron Mountain, throwing rockets into the inaccessible retreats, killing several Kaffirs and burning numerous huts. The Fingoes skirmished with unusual activity, being in great awe of the Inkosi Ameshlomani (the Four Eyed Chief), as both they and the Kaffirs called Colonel Eyre, from the circumstance of his wearing spectacles, to which they attributed his great vigilance and sharpness; whenever they exhibited the slightest hesitation to obey the order to enter the bush, he rode right at them, laying his jambok about their shoulders, and drove them before him into the cover. They did not, however, entertain the same respect for everybody, for, on another occasion, when a young Levy officer tried the same discipline, he was unceremoniously tumbled off his horse and pitched into a thorn-bush!
At the gorge of the Waterkloof, Colonel Eyre with his Staff and escort rode on, leaving the Column with me, with orders to rejoin the main body, four miles up the Waterkloof valley. We proceeded to the entrenched field-works just thrown up at Nels, where we halted at ten, A.M., for breakfast. The officers' pack-horses having been sent with one of the other columns, by a more practicable road, we had nothing to eat, but Captain Jesse, R.E., commanding the camp there, kindly brought us a loaf, a cold leg of mutton, and a bottle of Cape wine, absolute luxuries to fasting men. Thence we marched up the valley, which at this season, spring, was as fragrant as beautiful with flowering plants and bushes, the Boer-boon, covered with thick clusters of crimson blossom, conspicuous above every other. The larger trees along the rocky stream were alive with monkeys leaping from bough to bough. We rejoined the column at Brown's farm, and a party of Fingoes arrived at the same time with a despatch from the Governor-General, who, on the heights above, was personally directing the whole of the movements. We ascended the valley—a long line of red-coats, Riflemen, Highlanders, Artillery, Mounted Irregulars, and Fingoes; the Kaffir prisoners, with the pack-horses and mules bringing up the rear. At a point where the valley branches off into two, we took the south branch, and the Fingoes were sent up the mountain on our right to scour the bush. They continued ascending the green slopes, till scarcely visible, and then entering the forest at the foot of the perpendicular basaltic rocks, sharp firing at once began; tracing their progress by the wreaths of smoke that curled up above the dark trees, we regulated our movements below by their advance. Heavy firing was heard in the mean time from the north side of the valley. After gradually working our way to the top of the kloof, the Fingoes emerged from the forest, which ended abruptly at that point, driving before them a score or two of Kaffir women and children, and a few sore-backed horses. The women, like those before taken, had their woolly hair entwined with the claws and teeth of wild beasts, and wore karosses of hide, finely dressed, and dyed black with mimosa bark, of which all the larger trees here had been stripped. The unexpected meeting of these fresh prisoners with those previously taken was an affecting sight to witness. All were in a most wretched state of emaciation and weakness, having been nearly starved for want of food, and subsisting entirely on leaves, roots, and berries; their arms and legs were more like black sticks than human limbs. Cruel as their capture may appear, it was in reality a respite from misery and starvation, and moreover was rendered absolutely necessary, for, in their way, they were no less enemies to the tranquillity of the country than the men, acting as sentinels, commissaries, and spies, bringing food (which they might not touch), ammunition and information from our very towns and camps, most materially thwarting our efforts to bring the war to an end. The Tottie women did not appear to consider it at all a misfortune to be taken, for being unaccustomed to a bush life and its precarious means of subsistence in such times, they preferred a dry bed in a jail, with prison diet, to liberty and starvation. Our Fingo allies wished to put the prisoners to death; and were sulky at not being allowed to carry out their notions of warfare. A female prisoner, unable to keep up with the rest, was shot dead by one of these fellows before we had the least idea of his intention; so instantaneous was the act that my horse nearly stumbled over her body as it fell in the path. It required all the exertions of the officers to prevent further cruelties, nor was a stop put to them, till several of these half-tamed savages were knocked down and made prisoners of. One of the Kaffir women, with a child of a few weeks old on her back, becoming too exhausted to carry it, deliberately threw it away; it was, however, picked up by an officer, and given to a Fingo, with orders to carry it to the camp; the fellow obeying with a ludicrous mixture of disgust and nonchalance to the intense amusement of his comrades. But next morning the infant was missing, when "Johnny" being questioned as to what he had done with it, replied with the greatest coolness imaginable, that it had escaped during the night.
On another occasion, one of them, when sentry over a Kaffir, was observed giving a knife to his charge, and making signs to him to cut the rheim which secured his feet to a gun-wheel; the Kaffir was in doubt for a little, but reassured by the friendly nods and signs of his keeper, severed the bands and jumped up, but only to be shot dead by the sentry, who reported the attempted escape of the prisoner.
These, and a few other like instances of barbarity which occurred, hardly any degree of watchfulness could have entirely prevented. It was also next to impossible, amongst a set of men always ready to screen a culprit, to bring home conviction to the real offender; and doubtless, many more cases of barbarity would have taken place but for the presence and exertions of the troops. Yet the Fingoes acted in accordance with the practice of savage warfare rather than from cruel or vindictive feelings; and had they and the Kaffirs alone been opposed one to the other, it is more than probable that every woman and child taken by either side would have been put to death.
After climbing the steep rocky hill at the head of the kloof, the men resting every few yards from exhaustion, we proceeded some miles further along the range, and again prepared to bivouac on the top of the mountains, but had scarcely taken up our ground, when torrents of rain descended, running into our patrol-tents before a drain could be dug round them. The men having only a single blanket, and that of course soaked through, sat all night by the fires in the storm; a keen searching wind sweeping over the mountain top, rendered the night so intensely chilling, that sleep was out of the question, and at four o'clock when the reveillé sounded, every one was glad to be moving. The wind and sleet at this hour were even colder than before, and though we scorched our clothes on one side at the fires, the other clung to us like so much ice. At the head of the Wolfsback Pass we came up to the 60th Rifles lining the bush. They were half frozen, and envied us being on the march. The mountain tops all round were again white with snow, and on the opposite heights we could see the other Division shelling the deep intervening kloof, an unbroken forest of great extent; the effect, as the shells exploded far below our feet, was very fine. We descended the steep pass in single file, winding through the narrow forest, and halted at Blakeway's farm, where we found the sun quite hot. The almond and peach trees in the deserted garden were covered with sheets of pink blossom. A party of Cape Corps had arrived a few minutes before, under Captain Carey, with 200 sheep which they had captured in the kloof.
In an hour we were again climbing the Kromme range by another path more to the eastward, and gaining the ridge, looked down on the other side into Harrys Kloof, in the bottom of which a small body of the 91st and Cape Corps were halted; the long narrow ridge separating it from Fullers Hoek beyond was smoking from end to end with burning huts. We continued ascending the ridge up to the heights, two companies below scouring the forest kloof as we advanced by a wood path so close, that though we marched single file, the whole column had to halt every twenty yards till the front could move on, the bugles sounding the halt and advance from front to rear by companies. We came to an immense collection of burnt-out Kaffir fires, and places for sentinels on points commanding most extensive prospects of the beautiful country below. All round where we stood was thickly covered with pellets of chewed root. In front there was some firing, and a few Kaffirs were killed, who lay in the thickets as we came up. In one part of the shady path, we came suddenly on the corpse of a rebel deserter hanging from a tree; the blood trickling from a bullet hole in his forehead ran down his face and dropped on his toes.
No sooner had we toiled to the heights, where a detachment of the 60th Rifles was covering our movements, than we again descended by another more difficult and more precipitous path, down which men and horses slid twenty or thirty yards at once into Harrys Kloof, which was penetrated, and crossed in five different directions.
At the bottom of the descent we set fire to a very large village of Kaffir huts, and captured some horses. Part of the column being sent up the kloof by a path on the right, the rest of us, under Colonel Eyre, passed through the smouldering village, its heat almost overpowering, and penetrated to the head of the kloof, which was one dense, dark, and tangled forest up to the heights on which the tiny figures of the 60th were barely visible against the bright sky. The whole column worked through it in every direction, guided by constant bugling; the company and regimental calls of the different corps, with "advance," "retire," "right and left incline," &c.,—being all issued by Colonel Eyre, who, with a bugler of each regiment at his side, thus conducted in the most splendid style the movement of upwards of a thousand men in different bodies, unseen, through an extensive mountain forest. A few head of cattle and some horses were taken, and some of the enemy killed.
Having re-assembled at the gorge of the kloof, we marched out about a mile further where the bush was more open, and at sunset bivouacked for the night, very glad to rest our weary limbs after the severe mountain work of the last thirteen hours. From the returns sent in at night to the Colonel, it appeared that our column had killed 36 Kaffirs, taken 168 prisoners, and captured 41 horses, besides cattle.
At six o'clock next morning, we marched in a heavy rain for our respective camps, the Rifle Brigade proceeding to Nels, and we making our way round the spur of the mountain to our little camp at Nieland's, which we reached wet through about mid-day, delighted once more to enjoy the luxury of a tent.
19th, Sunday.—Prayers were read by the senior officer to the column, drawn up in the centre of the camp.
For the two following days we waited orders from the Governor-General, riding round the neighbourhood, or shooting quail and partridge. At the edge of the forest by which we were encamped, we put up a couple of the wildest old pigs imaginable, which rushed through the thicket before we had recovered from the start they gave us. In the wood we came upon a covey or two of wild cocks and hens that took to wing like pheasants; but as heavy metalled rifles carrying balls of eight to the pound were not adapted for snap-shots in thick cover, we turned our attention to pig-stalking; the game however led us further than was quite prudent to follow without a larger party, and we were obliged to abandon the pursuit. These novel varieties of game, which may in time stock the Kromme forests for future sportsmen, were, it is almost unnecessary to say, the remains of the live stock of the deserted farm where we were encamped, and which, having been left behind in the flight of the owners, had taken to the bush for subsistence.
Soon after returning to the camp, one of the sentries reported a number of Kaffirs collecting on a piece of open grass above the wood, clothing the lower part of the mountain. On bringing our glasses to bear on them, they proved to be large baboons, trooping out of the forest in a continuous string, till we counted from 150 to 200; all seemed busily engaged in searching for and grubbing up roots, at which they continued till sunset, when they returned to the cover, following an immense grey-headed old fellow that walked most pompously at their head.
On the morning of the 26th, in accordance with his Excellency's instructions to Colonel Eyre, to make a final reconnaissance of the whole of the ground of the last three days' operations, in order to ascertain its complete clearance, we again climbed the Kromme Pass, though this time by daylight. As we ascended, the evidences of the fight became more frequent; rolling skulls, dislodged by those in front, came bounding down between our legs; the bones lay thick among the loose stones in the sluits and gulleys, and the bush on either side showed many a bleaching skeleton. A fine specimen of a Kaffir head, I took the liberty of putting into my saddle-bag, and afterwards brought home with me to Scotland, where it has been much admired by phrenologists for its fine development. The trees along the path were scored by bullet marks in every direction. At the point where our unfortunate Band-master had been dragged into the bush to a fate so horrible, we involuntarily stopped for a few moments. The ridges were again traversed as before; and Colonel Eyre, separating his column into three bodies, to search the kloof and forests in and about the Iron Mountain, sent me in command of the Light Companies of the 73rd and 74th, and a few Irregulars, to search and clear the rocky krantzes opposite, and rejoin him in the Waterkloof valley. We worked through the extensive bush both along the top and at the base of the krantzes, searching all the caverns and crevices with which they abounded, and rolling down into the wood, stretching from our feet to the base of the mountain, huge blocks of stone that cleared all before them. We forced our difficult way, clambering up and down rocks thickly covered with enormous aloes in full flower, and tearing through the thorny cover, guided only by constant bugling; catching peeps now and then, from a higher crag, or through an opening in the forest, of the main column in the deep valley, slowly moving through the bush, their bugles scarcely heard, as they sounded the halt, or advance, according to our movements.
High up on the opposite mountain, the 3rd Column worked its way like ourselves among the forest-clothed crags, scaling the steepest cliffs, swarming and scrambling among huge masses of detached rock, notwithstanding the heat of the weather, and climbing higher and higher, till so diminished, as to be visible only when the sun shone on their red coats. On the other side, we looked down on Colonel Buller's column, in the Waterkloof valley, throwing rockets into the inaccessible krantzes, and skirmishing through the bush. We found the bodies of two dead Kaffirs; numerous heaps of chewed root round the old fires on every part of the lofty ledge where we were; and in the crevices of the rocks all sorts of Kaffir ornaments and utensils; and came on a village of empty huts, to which we set fire; but no Kaffirs were to be seen, high or low, so we descended the steep side of the mountain into the Waterkloof, and rejoined the column already bivouacking in the bush. With the exception of a few dead bodies they had met with no signs of the enemy. The whole district was cleared.
Towards nightfall the tops of the heights that towered round us were hidden in the clouds, and a drizzling rain came on, which drove us under the shelter of the scattered bushes among which we had made our bivouac. The moaning wind, that bent the tops of the higher trees, soon increased to a gale, howling along the valley, while the cold driving rain swept over us in the most pitiless manner, and with a steady determination that augured a night of it. It was in vain the shivering horses turned their tails to the storm, or the drenched and shapeless heaps of humanity, stretched on the ground, pulled their wet blankets more closely round them; for the pelting storm and searching wind were not to be avoided, and a day of excessive fatigue to the men was succeeded by a night of sleepless discomfort. We were but a degree better under our patrol tents; for though they kept the rain off above, in a great measure, the ground was so flooded, that we lay in pools of water, while myriads of fleas, (we were on the site of an old kraal, of which, however, they were the only remaining sign,) driven from the wet ground, took refuge in unusual force on such portions of our bodies as were above water mark. Our only consolation (for we had one) was that it was too cold and wet for any snakes to be about, though the valley was said to abound with them. It did not require the "rouse" to awaken us, even at the early hour of three next morning; we were too glad to be moving, and busied ourselves in feeding and saddling our shivering horses, collecting firewood, and helping our benumbed servants to pack up the patrol-tents and saddle-bags; the rain still coming steadily down, and the darkness such, that we had the greatest difficulty in finding anything once laid down on the ground. We marched up the valley, toiling up a clayey path, or rather stream of mud, leading up to the heights, which were so completely covered by clouds, as to render it difficult to find our way; the cold intense. Crossing the "Horseshoe," we descended the steep ridge leading down into Fullers Hoek, not a living Kaffir to be seen anywhere. In the Hoek we found the 91st, under Major Forbes, bivouacked on the long grass, their drenched clothes clinging so closely to them, that they looked as if they had passed the night in the river. Half a mile further on we halted. Fancy men dripping from every thread, kneeling in the mud, with eyes watering from the thick smoke, and puffing away at a heap of wet branches, surmounted by a kettle of cold water, or with benumbed fingers trying to strike a light, and you see us halted for breakfast. In another hour we were again on foot, and after a march of twelve miles, passing on the way through the Blinkwater Camp, reached Fort Beaufort, the 73rd encamping on their former ground, while we waded the river waist-deep, and marched to the barracks.
Two days afterwards, returning from Ely, where I had been sent with an ammunition escort, we met Colonel Eyre's column en route for the Amatolas, whence they shortly afterwards expelled Uithaalder, killing about thirty of his people, and taking several stand of arms and 150 head of cattle; burning his Laager, and erecting a permanent defensible Post in its place.
Having a day to spare, I rode out to Lieuwe Fontein, of which Post my brother had, some time previously, been appointed Commandant, with a garrison of 74th and Mounted Levies. We had excellent buck shooting in the open bush around the station, and killed a singular diver on the vley, with curious palmated feet, the three toes being quite detached, and in form and appearance like beautiful leaves. The situation, like most of the frontier Posts, was one that would have afforded a man of contemplative mind ample opportunity for undisturbed reflection, being twelve miles from the nearest dwelling, and not a living soul approaching the place the day long, excepting twice a week, when the post-riders met there, and the weekly train of waggons outspanned under the walls. At night, after the gates were locked and the keys brought in to the Commandant, he might sit till daylight without hearing a single sound to break the oppressive silence, except the measured tread of the sentinel and the occasional howl of a hyæna or jackal. Next evening the solitude was relieved by the arrival of the up and down mails; two small clouds of red dust rising above the scattered clumps of bush, grew nearer and nearer, till at last the two parties of mounted men were seen descending the opposite hills at the same time, and rapidly approaching the Post, their arms glittering in the setting sun. As they remained within the Post till daylight, I rode back to Beaufort with an escort; the cool refreshing morning air fragrant with the perfume of flowering shrubs. On the way I had some good sport, getting shots at a beautiful pair of blue cranes, a flock of wild duck on a vley, some wild Guinea fowl running along the road, and at some monkeys. The mail was, unfortunately, rather late getting in that morning.
About a week after this I accompanied an escort going to the fortified camps in the Waterkloof. The Rifle Brigade were quartered there, and with the 60th and 91st, which occupied the forts on the heights, effectually held what we had taken with so much labour; not a Kaffir was left in the whole neighbourhood; officers daily went out from the camps shooting alone in places where, a month before, a column would have been attacked. The valley, in many parts, smelt most pestilentially from the number of dead Kaffirs in the bush. A puppy dog, belonging to H——, brought the arm of one into his tent unobserved, and began to play with it under the bed, a fact of which his master was soon made disagreeably conscious.
October 17th.—Lieut.-Col. MacDuff, lately appointed to the 74th Highlanders, which had lost two commanding officers in so short a time, arrived at head-quarters, and assumed the command of the regiment and the garrison. We were glad once more to have a Colonel at our head, and, not less so, one who had seen good service and hard fighting on other fields.
A few days subsequently, as we were sitting under the wide verandah in front of the mess-room, the sleepy noontide stillness of the town was suddenly broken by the "alarm" and "assembly" sounding from our barracks; the "boot and saddle" from the Cavalry stables; and the cow-horn rally from the Fingo kraals. The Kaffirs had swept off a herd of cattle out-grazing, wounded one of the native police, and shot the horse of another. In a very short time I was trudging away as of old, with a party of Infantry and Levies to Post Victoria, which we reached before sunset. Here the mounted men came up with the pursuit, dispersed the enemy in all directions, and retook the whole of the cattle, our only casualty one man wounded.
I sent the cattle back to Fort Beaufort, and bivouacked for the night with the Infantry at the ruins; but it was not to be a night of undisturbed repose. We had hardly lain down when we were most savagely attacked by musquitoes; and a slapping of faces and lighting of pipes began on all sides. Having at last successfully dodged them by laying a branch over my face, and thrusting my hands into my pockets, I flattered myself with hopes of sleep, but a suspicious rustling among the plucked broom under my head, made my blood run cold at the idea of its being a cobra capello, and I rolled away on the other side; having got a lighted brand from the fire, one or two of the men getting up to assist me, everything was turned over with our ramrods, but no snake was found. The same noise, however, began again soon after I lay down, but persuading myself that it was some lizard or insect, I at last went to sleep. In the morning, under the warm stuffing of the saddle that had been my pillow, a fine puff adder lay coiled up.
On our way back, at sunrise, we blazed away right and left at bush buck, and pheasants which we put up in scores. The bush was very beautiful, glowing with the fragrant golden mimosa and the snowy jessamine, mingled with the blue plumbago, the cluytea, and geranium; the ground too covered with mesembryanthemum, was one sheet of glowing pink. Along the deserted grass-grown road, doves, everywhere abundant, were unusually numerous, running along the ground before us and flying on from tree to tree like flocks of tame pigeons. On gaining the more open country we found ourselves again among the young locusts, now considerably grown, and turned to a reddish brown. The scattered bushes, stripped of every leaf, were loaded with them, hanging like swarms of bees from every branch and twig; for acres together the ground was literally alive, and the "veldt" behind them bare to the very earth. The evil became worse as we approached Beaufort, where the cattle, from their numbers, were almost starving, for it was hazardous driving them to any great distance, and already they went so far from the town that a considerable part of the day was lost in taking them to and from pasture.
November 3rd.—The town to-day was thrown into excitement by a serious fray between two rival clans of Fingoes; the "casus belli" was not easy to discover, but a young lady appeared to be at the bottom of it. The extensive green flat between their kraals and the burial ground was covered by two long extended lines of men armed with "keeries," opposed to each other, and advancing or retiring as one or the other gained a temporary advantage; each Fingo carried a kaross, or blanket, over the left arm, as a shield, and a second keerie, held like the old quarter-staff, exhibiting great skill and adroitness in parrying and delivering the tremendous and resounding blows; running, stooping, and wheeling rapidly about with their whirling staves and waving blankets, yelling in savage defiance; while hosts of young women on both sides, armed with large stones, filled the air with well-directed missiles. The scene was most novel and exciting, and every one entered heartily into it.
The stronger party having driven their adversaries back on their kraal, began an attack on the huts, when the prettiest light infantry practice imaginable followed; the attacking force taking advantage of every rock, bush, and bank, their keeries in their left hand ready for a charge, assailed the defenders with showers of stones, thrown with astonishing force and precision, while they in turn kept up so hot a fire from the shelter of their huts, assisted by the women and children, that for some time neither gained much advantage, till, encouraged by a tall active young fellow, whose face and naked body were covered with blood and wounds, the assailants rushed into the kraal, laying about them right and left, knocking down and clearing all before them. The Commandant of the garrison arriving at this juncture, ordered the two principal Chiefs to put a stop to the affray instantly. One of them, a grey-headed old man, with a short grizzly beard, ran from one to another, issuing his orders to his 'captains,' and soon the tumult ended, though the belligerents were in a very excited state. Several of the champions had been stretched senseless on the ground, one or two of whom afterwards died, and most were covered with blood. There could not have been fewer than 300 men, besides women, engaged in the affray.
KAFFIR WOMEN.
CHAPTER XIV.
EXPEDITION ACROSS THE GREAT ORANGE RIVER AGAINST THE BASUTO CHIEF MOSHESH.
Nov. 9th.—The surmises of some impending movement, which for several days had formed the chief topic of conversation, were confirmed by the arrival of an order from head-quarters for the assembling, on the 20th inst., of a force of 2500 troops at Burghersdorp, a Dutch town, two days' march beyond the Orange River.
The object of the expedition was to demand satisfaction from the Basuto Chief, Moshesh, whose "Great Place" lay some hundred miles beyond the Orange River, for the constant and increasing depredations and attacks of his tribe, and of the neighbouring minor Chiefs, his vassals, on the Boers of the Orange River Territory, and on the Barolong Chief, Moroko. The latter was a staunch ally of our Government, but did not dare alone attempt reprisals on a Chief so much more powerful, while the former, as being under British rule and protection, were prohibited from avenging themselves.
The cattle of both had been swept off by hundreds, and their herdsmen killed, by this dreaded Chieftain. He openly derided the power of the British, and after taunting Moroko for his blind adherence to friends who were not able to assist him, whose long-talked-of coming was a fable, "an old story they had heard ever since they were children," threatened him with immediate and total destruction unless he at once gave up all further connexion with us, and joined him at Thaba Bossiou. He also boasted of having already conquered three nations—the Corannas, Maulatees, and the Griquas, and had only to take the trouble of marching to Thaba 'Nchu to "eat up" the Barolongs, as themselves knew; as for the English, whose power was an idle bugbear, he could settle them any day. Many of the Boers living on the borders of his country were fleeing from their farms, in apprehension of war, or from the insecurity of their flocks and herds, while Moroko lived in daily expectation of being swept from the face of the earth, with his whole tribe.
The force with which it was intended to demonstrate to the Basuto Chief that the coming of the English was no idle tale, was to be composed of the 2nd Queen's, the 74th Highlanders, detachments of the 43rd Light Infantry, the 73rd and Rifle Brigade, the 12th Lancers, a demi-battery of Artillery, and the Cape Corps.
It was hoped by his Excellency that such a demonstration might bring the contumacious Chief to his senses, without proceeding to extremities.
Our column, under Colonel MacDuff, consisting of two guns, 74th Highlanders, and detachment of Cape Corps, was to march from Fort Beaufort on the 11th. The intervening two days, during which our detachments were relieved, my brother's among the rest, were fully occupied in preparing the requisite outfit for an expedition of nearly three months in the desert. In addition to the daily issue of rations, which was not sufficient of itself to maintain an able-bodied man in full exercise, both officers and men carried with them private supplies in the waggons; the officers messing by companies, i. e., a Captain and two Subalterns, had a box in common for their supplies, whence they drew every three or four days, or when necessary. Mine contained, in tin cases—
| 40 | lbs. | coffee, |
| 30 | " | sugar, |
| 20 | " | biscuit, |
| 25 | " | meal, |
| 20 | " | rice, |
| 10 | " | pea-meal, |
| 10 | lbs. | candles, |
| 5 | " | salt, |
| Half-a-dozen bottles pickled red cabbage, | ||
| 10 | lbs. | gunpowder, |
| 12 | doz. | bullets, |
| with 1 case brandy. |
The pickled cabbage was an excellent and most necessary substitute for vegetables, which were not to be had for love or money, in consequence of which scurvy had already appeared among the men. Besides the two pairs of serviceable boots, and three pairs of socks, which each man started with, we took barrels of both in the waggons, as also plenty of leather for supply and repair on the march. As we went from store to store in the town, purchasing the thousand and one lesser necessaries required for such a journey, as much interest and excitement were displayed by the townspeople as if we had been going to the Great Lake, and as much was felt by ourselves at the prospect of visiting new tribes and a new country, and whether engaged in active warfare or not, at any rate of seeing for ourselves those vast and wonderful herds of wild game, lions, zebras, ostriches, springbok, gemsbok, blesbok, and wild beasts, which from school days we had pictured in imagination roaming over those boundless plains.
On the 10th, all our preparations completed, the last waggon loaded, and the last soldier hauled away from his "doch an dhurris" with friends, both black and white, the column fell in, the Rifle Brigade Band struck up, and we marched out of the town, accompanied for the first mile by all the officers of the garrison, and a crowd of men, women, and children, of all colours. We halted the first night at the entrance of the Blinkwater Poort.
The third day, after seeing nothing but a few deserted farms, we reached the ruins of Fort Armstrong, destroyed by General Somerset at an early period of the war, when in possession of the Hottentot Rebels. The place consisted of a strong square tower, surrounded by some score of wattle and daub houses, standing on a singularly isolated, or rather peninsulated hill. Of this the Hottentots of the Kat River Mission had taken possession, turning out the European occupants, in a most inclement night, to escape as best they might across the mountains to Whittlesea; themselves living in the most disgraceful licentiousness and depravity, offering indignities to the English women, plundering the farmers, and revelling on the spoil.
General Somerset, in order to break up this nest of robbers and traitors, appeared before it on the 23rd of February, 1851, with a force of troops and Burghers, offering them, at the last moment, terms of capitulation, which, however, they scorned, though they acted on his humane counsel, and sent their women and children from the Fort out of the way of danger. On their removal he at once attacked the place, shelling the Fort, which he stormed and carried; in two hours reducing it to ruins.
Between 30 and 40 of these misguided creatures were killed, 160 taken prisoners, 100 stand of arms, besides several waggons, captured, and about 400 women and children; the General's only casualties being three killed and twenty wounded. The place presented at the time of our visit a most desolate appearance; nothing remained but bare walls, shattered and fire-scorched, the ground strewed with fragments of the dismantled Fort, exploded shells, and broken furniture.
We encamped at sundown close to Elands Post, where we were joined by a company of the 74th Highlanders quartered there, their place being taken by a company of the Rifle Brigade that had accompanied us thus far for the purpose.
At four o'clock the following morning, we commenced the ascent of the steep mountain in front of us; the view becoming at every step more and more beautiful, till at the summit of the Pass there opened upon us a glorious panorama, stretching from the forest at our feet to the blue hills beyond Graham's Town; Elands Post, nestling in its wooded nook below, dwindled to a white speck, and the Kat River winding away down a lovely valley till lost in a sea of bush covering the solitary expanse. A little further on we came in sight of the rear-guard of the Fort Hare column, the distance of a day's march being preserved between each; soon after their red coats had disappeared over a still higher ridge, we encamped, early in the afternoon, on the Sarropit's Hill to rest and feed the oxen. Before us rose the Elandsberg Mountain, with its grand towering cliffs of gray basaltic rock, from which sloped away the greenest and smoothest grass, a relief so delightful after the brown burnt up pastures of the valleys, that the eye rested on it with untiring pleasure. Next morning we were again off at four o'clock.
To avoid a repetition that may be as tiresome as the reality, it may suffice to mention, once for all, that during this expedition we were on the march every morning at that hour, often earlier; accomplishing from five to ten miles before breakfast, according to the distance between the springs in our route.
So steep was the ascent of the next steppe, that even with double teams and terrific jamboking, it took well nigh two hours to get some thirty waggons up a single mile. At the top of this range the face of the country completely changed; not a tree or bush was to be seen; undulating green plains lay on every side.
After two days across this kind of country, having only seen six rheebok in a wild rocky poort, we halted about a couple of miles from Whittlesea, a miserable forsaken-looking collection of Fingo kraals and small houses standing in the middle of a bare brown plain, enclosed by hills still browner and more bare. On the same plain, and about a mile distant, the white houses of Shiloh, a Moravian Missionary station, peeping from clumps of orange trees, looked very pretty, heightened in some measure from contrast with the surrounding sterility. Whittlesea has been rendered famous by the series of attacks it sustained, and gallantly withstood, under Captain Tylden, R.A., who no fewer than thirteen times defeated and put to flight large attacking bodies of Tambookies and Rebel Hottentots. This was our most remote Post; and here we were joined by the Grenadier Company of the 74th, which for some little time had been encamped at the Settlement.
We left the plain by another steep hill, having been gradually ascending from the time of leaving Beaufort; through the whole distance, and as far as we went up the country it was a series of steppes rising higher the further we penetrated. At the top of this hill we entered on a vast plain, stretching away to the foot of the bare rugged mountains in the far distance. Colonel Eyre's column was again seen about four miles ahead.
We encamped for the night at the Brak River, on the open plain; a dreary lonely spot. Close to our camp were three kraals, in which as many Tambookie herdsmen and their families were living. They were quite naked and very wretched looking. The women brought us goats' milk, in grass baskets, for sale. Their idea of the value of money, which they were very anxious to get, lay in the number of pieces, refusing a sixpence for a basket of sour milk, but accepting two silver three-penny pieces with sparkling eyes.
After marching about four miles next morning we came to Kamastona, the 'great place' of the friendly Chief, Kama. His dwelling, a high substantial building, stood in the centre of the village, which was a large collection of kraals, enclosed by earthen out-works. Its situation and appearance were rather striking, standing totally isolated on the plain, with a background of bare scarped mountains rising in rugged grandeur to a great height. Two miles further, and similarly situated, lay another circular village, a Tambookie settlement, their cattle and goats spread over the plain under a guard of armed natives, whose wild appearance was heightened by the surprise and wonder with which they regarded us.
The grass herbage was now succeeded by karroo plains, covered with a kind of dwarf heath which the cattle and horses had to put up with. We crossed the Zwart Kei, at Stoffel Venter's, a Dutch Boer's farm, lonely enough to satisfy any hermit; the sound of the bagpipes brought out a family of lazy-looking Dutchmen, with pipes in their mouths and hands in their breeches pockets, with one or two fat women, who waddled out and bumped down on the bench outside the door, followed by a knot of bare-legged dirty children, looking as phlegmatic as their seniors.
For miles along the vast plain, which was interspersed with isolated mountains and rocky hills, we beheld in the distance the lofty and singular mountain, called "Twa Taffel Berg," with its two table-topped summits.
After seventeen miles we crossed the Honey Klip River, running between high jungley banks, and halted for the night; but before the waggon-train with our tents could get up, a thunder storm, which for some time had been brewing in dark indigo clouds, burst over our heads, and we were soaked to the skin by a tremendous down pour of rain, which completely flooded the ground.
Since our departure from Elands Post, where we took leave of trees and shrubs, we had been entirely dependent for fuel on the dry dung of cattle and wild game, scattered over the plains; following in the rear of the other Column, which left but small gleanings behind it, our men had to go far a-field, often wandering, after a long day's march, a mile or two from the camp to get sufficient to boil their coffee. Indeed, so scarce and valuable was this commodity, that many used their pockets and haversacs as receptacles for such portions as they were lucky enough to pick up by the way.
It was a ten miles' march next morning before we came to water for breakfast. The heat was very great, and increased to an overpowering degree on entering a narrow rocky defile, called Klaas Smidt's Poort, out of which, after a three miles march, we emerged on a measureless level plain, bounded only by the outlines of blue mountains, which danced hazy and indistinct in the heated air. In this cheerful situation was a solitary Dutch farm-house; all around littering, untidy, and neglected, with three or four huts to match for the Fingo servants. Mrs. Grant's Glenburnie was a pattern of neatness in comparison. Several of the inmates, for it was a Laager, afterwards galloped over on rough little horses to our camp, which was pitched two miles beyond. Their astonishment at the bagpipes, and not less at the dress of the Pipers, was extreme, crowding round them with childish wonder, as they goodnaturedly played reels, marches, strathspeys, and pibrochs; unconsciously to themselves, they were little less objects of curiosity in our eyes, differing so much from the Anglicised Boer of the colony; stout heavy-built fellows, in short round jackets of purple or sky-blue moleskin, with huge broad-brimmed white hats, wrapped round with a band of black crape, which a Dutchman wears not as a sign of grief but a sort of finish to his beaver; stockingless feet thrust into rough home-made veldt-schoenen, with a heavy spur on the left one; a small jambok hanging from his wrist; a clumsy roer; cow-horn powder-flask at the side, and an untanned leather bullet-pouch—these, with a green-stone pipe sticking in the mouth or out of the waistcoat pocket, completed their equipment. The only subject on which they became at all animated, was guns and shooting; they were as much pleased as surprised at the practice of some of our best shots with the Minié rifle at ant-heaps at 1000 yards range. Though the roer, from its large bore and weight of metal, carries a great distance, it is not at all an accurate weapon, as might be expected from its extraordinary make and finish; an immense shapeless stock, a rough flint lock, and an ivory 'sight' as large as a domino.
After trekking over miles the following morning we halted for breakfast at the foot of the Stormberg mountains, another steppe, or range, stretching east and west as far as the eye could see. The road up being steep and winding, the effect was very peculiar, as at every turn portions of the column were seen one above another, while the long train of waggons and the distant rear-guard were still creeping along the plain below. We had a broiling climb of it; on gaining the top, a vast green plain was again before us, and after some miles further we camped near a large vley of thick muddy water. The night, in this elevated region, was as cold as the day had been hot in the sultry plains, and though we piled every available article on our beds, we could not keep warm. On striking a light next morning at the 'Rouse' to dress and pack up by, the walls of the tent glistened and sparkled with frozen moisture, and the water in the basin was covered with a coating of ice as thick as a half-crown. The poor horses felt the cold severely; their bodies drawn together quite benumbed, and the moisture from their breath hanging in hoar frost about their nostrils. The mountain tops all round were white with snow. It was, no doubt, the sudden change of temperature, together with our light dress, that made the cold so particularly severe, as I have felt far less inconvenience in a Canadian winter, with the mercury frozen in the thermometer.
After an eight miles march the sun became exceedingly hot as we descended slightly towards the Stormberg Spruit, a tributary of the Orange River; by the time we got to our halt, in a wild bare spot, called Sanna Spruits, close to a chaotic assemblage of singularly fantastic rocks, we were very glad to get under the friendly shade of their overhanging masses. They were completely overrun with the 'dossies,' supposed, by the way, to be the 'coney' of Scripture, and on the highest point were a number of beautiful blue ibis. We shot several at first, but afterwards they kept far out of range, circling round and round in the air, at a great height. The Boers call them "wild turkeys," from the curious red head, which is quite bare and hard, and looks just like sealing wax. The bird is about the size of a large game-cock, with a long curved red beak and legs of the same colour, the general plumage of an iridescent green and purplish blue, with brown wing coverts. Having got into camp much earlier than usual, we were enabled to make soup and wash our shirts. About the middle of the day following, we fell in with horns of hartebeest and springbok here and there by the wayside, and a few hours later, saw a small herd of each scudding across the plain a couple of miles off. The heat became intense, we were choked and blinded by clouds of fine sand, and after a long and weary march, came to a halt in a barren scorching karroo at the foot of a rugged hill. The silence and absence of life were most oppressive.
On the 22nd, after eleven days march we reached Burghersdorp, where we could see, long before we came up, the tents of Lieut.-Colonel Eyre's column, which was encamped about half a mile from the town. After pitching the tents, our men were soon scattered far and wide over the plain, gathering dung. The cavalry marched in next morning.
Though within ten minutes' walk of the town, no one would have guessed its proximity, as it was built in a gorge between two hills, the bare plain immediately around presenting no more signs of life than the deserts we had just passed through. Built within the last three years, the little town boasts of several large and capital stores, two inns, and a large thatched Dutch church, with pea-green doors and window frames. The stores, in which everything one could think of was to be bought, saddlery, groceries, ironmongery; Gunter's preserves, Dutch cheeses, Crosse and Blackwell's pickles; clocks, roers, ploughs, rifles, crockery, stationery, wines, spirits, Bass's pale ale; fiddles, mirrors, pots, pans, and kettles; ostrich feathers, cases of gin, tobacco, and ten thousand things besides, were filled all day long with a crowd of officers of all arms and corps with leather-patched uniform, mahogany-coloured faces, and long beards, trying on boots, buying preserved meats, and stuffing their pockets with bundles of cheroots, boxes of lucifer matches, and pots of cold cream to anoint their sun-blistered noses. Then there were Dutchmen, in purple trowsers, saluting each other in the politest manner possible, lifting the craped hat with the left hand and shaking the proffered fist with the other, discussing politics and cattle, their vrouws and daughters busy purchasing dresses or household supplies; while Bushmen and Griquas elbowed their way in and out for bottles of Hollands.
As the only chance of getting fresh vegetables was to eat them at the inns, they were filled with officers, devouring green food like so many herbivora, making up for the past and laying in for the future.
The camp was besieged all day long by visitors; rough Boers, with strings of colts for sale; townspeople on foot; and respectably dressed, well-mounted Dutchmen, with very pretty girls in pink or sky-blue riding habits, who rode up and down the lines, stared unceremoniously into the tents, and when the 'warning,' 'dinner pipes' or 'assembly' were played, flocked round the unfortunate "Piper of the day" with as much astonishment as if he had just dropped from the moon, drawling out the constant exclamation "Allamachtig! Allamachtig!" We were all struck with the great respect shown by the young Dutchmen and boys to their seniors, lifting off their hats whenever addressed by them.
A party of officers went out shooting a few miles from the camp, and fell in with some herds of game, my brother and Captain Knox, 73rd, each bowling over a springbok; and Gawler, 73rd, bringing back a fine blesbok behind his saddle. We were now in the height of summer; the sun was most overpowering. The sandy plain danced in the hot air like the top of a kiln; inside our tents, though covered with blankets, the heat was insupportable; and without there was not a tree or a rock to be seen that could shelter us from the scorching rays. To add to our discomfort, the place was overrun with tarantulas, or, as the men insisted on calling them, "triantelopes," and scorpions, which we constantly found in the tents, and occasionally in our bedding or boots. Two puff adders were killed, which the men had found under their blankets in the morning.
On the 27th, his Excellency, the Governor-General, arrived with his Staff and escort, all the Dutch in the place going out to meet him a mile from the town, and firing a feu-de-joie. As nothing gives a Boer greater pleasure than firing off his roer with as heavy a charge as it will carry, it was kept up a long time, in a very independent manner, and in all parts of the town at once. His Excellency afterwards rode down our ranks.
The camp being pitched in line, was more than a mile long, and it was quite a walk from our tents on the extreme left to those of the Artillery on the right flank. In the close and sultry evenings, when sauntering up and down the long street of illuminated canvas, it was amusing to see the attitudes and employments of the different inmates of the wide open tents; here a solitary individual, in shirt sleeves, his candle stuck in an empty bottle, writing on the top of a box; there a quiet party playing a rubber; in the next a couple of Subalterns, joint occupants, stretched on their rough beds, reading the last Grahams Town Journal, or the soiled and crumpled fragment of an old English newspaper; in some, orderly-officers, cap and sword on the table, snatching a few moments' broken slumber; dinner parties in others, and loungers everywhere, from whose tents issued wreaths of smoke and sounds of merry voices. Turning into another street, one saw knots of Sergeants squatted cross-legged, writing "orders," from the dictation of the Sergeant-Major, and Adjutants scribbling away among busy clerks; while sentries paced in front of quiet, solemn looking marquees, the abodes of Colonels, Quarter-Masters-General and other "big wigs." Further on were tents full of tailors and shoemakers, repairing the wear and tear of former marches and preparing against others to come; commissariat contractors weighing and issuing forage and rations; and farriers shoeing horses by candlelight. Outside the lines, round a hundred smouldering fires, where the men collected, not for warmth, but to light their pipes, were endless parties of soldiers of all corps and uniforms; then long lines of horses, and neatly ranged saddles; and beyond all, the guard tents and sentries, with a perfect village of waggons.
At "tattoo" a sudden stir runs through the camp; picquets are inspected and reports collected by orderly-officers, who have mysterious interviews in the marquees; the trumpets and bugles ring out the "last post;" and the Pipers play "Farewell to Lochaber," recalling many a distant and very different scene; the fires are deserted; the different parties break up and disperse; in ten minutes more the bugles sound "lights out," and the men's tents shine white and cold in the pale moonlight.
All the time we were at Burghersdorp we had constant sand-storms, filling the air with a red cloud, and colouring everything inside our carefully closed tents with the same rusty hue as outside. With the westerly wind came a wonderful flight of locusts, passing over for hours and literally darkening the air.
On the 28th, his Excellency inspected the whole of the troops; the line, at "open order," in front of the camp, extending about a mile in length, and we were formed into Brigades for the ensuing march. The First Brigade, under Lieut.-Col. MacDuff, 74th Highlanders, consisted of the 2nd Queen's, the 74th Highlanders, and a rocket battery. The Second under Major Pinckney, 73rd regiment, of the 43rd Light Infantry, the 73rd, the Rifle Brigade, and a rocket battery (Colonel Eyre commanding the Division), and a Cavalry Brigade under Lieut.-Col. Napier, composed of the 12th Lancers, Artillery, and Cape Corps. The heat of the sun was so great that several of the men fainted as we stood on parade, and one had a sun-stroke. Later in the day we were visited by violent whirlwinds, that whisked some of the tents into the air among clouds of sand and small gravel, levelling many others in their course.
The Cavalry marched for the Orange River; and at daylight next morning the Second Brigade followed, the First bringing up the rear the morning following.
At 9 o'clock, when we halted for our morning meal, we were thankful to get under the shadow of the waggons: a man of the Rifle Brigade had a coup-de-soleil. A twenty miles' trying march through a burning desert country brought us by sunset to our halting place, near a small vley; but we had no sooner got our tents up than a whirlwind threw half of them down again, enveloping us for a few minutes in such a cloud of sand, that we could not see a yard before us. The water in these stagnant pools, that simmer all day in the sun, and at night are used as baths by herds of wild game, is the most villanous mixture of mud, dung, and green scum that can be imagined; as thick as pea-soup, and full of aquatic insects. Even where the water was clear, we often found it so brak as to be even worse than in its gruel form; and of the two descriptions of salt and sweet brak, we hardly knew which was the worst; the brandy used to neutralize its bad effects, dysentery and diarrhœa, turning it as black as ink in a moment.
CROSSING THE ORANGE RIVER.
The march of next morning again lay through a burning sun-baked plain, without a single object to vary the monotony of its barren desolation, the only sign of life being an occasional paauw or koran. But at the end of about seven miles a wonderful and glorious change met our delighted eyes; from a low undulating ridge we suddenly looked down on the broad silvery expanse of the Great Orange River, flowing between richly wooded banks of warm red earth and rock, in front of us three or four lovely green islets adorning its bosom. The transition from the dreary sterility of the burning plains of the last twenty-one days, shady trees in lieu of bare karroo, and miles of clear sparkling water instead of muddy vleys, was most delightful, independently of the natural beauties of the scene itself.
The tents of the Second Brigade and the Cavalry, which had already crossed, were seen on the plain on the other side the river. Halting at the top of the road leading down a high bank to the drift or ford, the men were ordered to take off their boots and trews, and pack their ammunition pouches in their blankets. The effect was most absurd,—nearly 1000 men standing in the ranks in column of companies, with bare legs, their unmentionables on their heads or round their necks, and their boots and socks dangling from the muzzles of their firelocks. The waggons, with the wheels rheimed, were let gradually down the bank by drag-ropes. Thus we crossed the river, at this point nearly a quarter of a mile in breadth; the water reaching to the men's middles, and to our saddle-flaps. The current was strong and rapid, rushing with great force between the legs of man and horse, endangering their equilibrium, and carrying some score of dogs far down the current. The sensation occasioned by the swiftly running stream was most bewildering. I felt at first as though I were darting up the river at railway speed, then so giddy that I clutched my horse's mane to prevent myself falling off.
All having crossed, the first thing we did after pitching our tents by those of the other Brigade, was to rush to the river and plunge into its cooling flood, swimming and splashing about under the shade of the weeping willows that dipped into it; every body in a perfect frenzy of delight, many actually lying in the water smoking, and the whole breadth of the river covered over with heads, as if by wild fowl; for every man in the Division bathed twice or thrice over in the course of the day.
The shade of the large olive trees and willows, was hardly less grateful than the deliciously cooling stream. The sultry tents were deserted, except by those on duty, and all flocked to the green shady banks of the river, where we remained till sunset. The shrill ringing of the cicada resounded in every branch all day long. Many of the men turned out unsuspected fishing-tackle, and having cut rods from the trees, very soon caught abundance of fine fish. They were of two kinds; a sort of coarse mullet, and a long ugly fish, with a blue skin and a number of fleshy filaments hanging from his under jaw. The Dutchmen called them barga; they were excellent eating, and ran from one to four pounds weight. Near the drift and on the opposite side of the river, was a small house and garden, to which Bruce and I, with our trews and boots round our necks, waded across, partly to explore, and partly to see if there were any vegetables to be had; the stones were so dreadfully sharp to our feet that before we were half way over we repented; but as a hundred eyes were upon us, we kept manfully on, though with many ohs! and ahs! The people were very kind and obliging, but there was little to be got for our trouble. Along the edge of the river are found numbers of agates, and cornelians, with green serpentine, and we picked up a great many of them; mine were subsequently cut and polished by Sanderson of Edinburgh, and turned out very good specimens.
This magnificent river is more than eleven hundred miles in length, rising in the Blue Mountains, and flowing right across the continent into the South Atlantic. With great regret, we left this Elysium of the desert next morning at daylight, and were again trekking across the arid plain northwards. Our halt was at a place called Ranakin, though why it should be called anything at all, more than the rest of the desert, from which it in no way differed, we could not imagine.
The mail from the Colony came in soon after we had pitched our Camp, bringing English letters and news, in which I found myself gazetted to a Company. The heat had all day been excessive, and was succeeded at nightfall by a storm of dry thunder and lightning, as L—— called it. The flashes, of a blue and rose-colour, were very vivid; the camp one moment as light as day—showing the long line of white tents, the distant sentries, and every moving figure—and the next as dark as pitch.
We inspanned at the usual hour the day following, and trekked through a dreary stony country; a solitary Dutch farm-house, about eleven miles distant, was the only sign of life visible far or near.
Finding the first vley dried up, we had a twelve miles' march before breakfast. Two or three Dutch Boers, probably belonging to the lonely dwelling in the distance, made their appearance on horseback, with their vrouws or daughters behind them, riding astride like the Kaffir and Fingo women, and jogged along with us for some distance, ignorant of the amusement they afforded the men. The conversation turned chiefly on the disturbed and dangerous state of their country, and they told us that all their native servants had gone off two nights before.
Another heavy thunder storm suddenly burst on us, accompanied with such torrents of rain that we were soon wet through; the sluits running like rivers, and the plain so flooded, in less than an hour, as to resemble a lake; the men constantly plunging into the deep gullies. Though disagreeable enough, with our clothing soaked through and clinging to our bodies, it was much less so than the steaming condition we were thrown into when the sun broke out again.
The Governor-General, with the Cavalry Division and Second Brigade, we found already encamped on the opposite side of the Caledon River at the Commissie Drift, which we reached in the afternoon, their tents stretching for a great distance along the edge of the high steep bank.
We waded through the rapid stream, which is confined between high wooded banks like the Orange River, and marching through the camp, pitched our tents in Brigade on the extreme left.
For the next three days that we remained here in standing camp, we had constant heavy showers that completely flooded the lower ground within and round the camp, though the weather was warm and the heat of the sun between the storms very great.
Our reduced commissariat was replenished from the neighbouring and very appropriately named station of Smithfield, where a large magazine had been previously formed, guarded till our arrival by the Burgher force of the Field-Cornetcy.
The fishing here was better than at the Orange River, and the banks were soon lined with anglers, many of whom were very successful. Some of us caught from 40 lbs. to 50 lbs. weight of mullet and barga, with worms or locusts, the latter lying in thousands along the banks. Many agates and cornelians were picked up, and one or two pieces of onyx; sardine, opal and chalcedony are often found; but we saw none. The hippopotamus formerly abounded in this stream, but has entirely disappeared.
Among the other luxuries of these rivers ought to be included that of firewood, a valued boon to the men, and a great improvement to our beef and meal scons, which had a rather peculiar flavour when done over a cow-dung fire.
On Sunday morning the whole Division paraded at 6 A.M. for divine service, forming in "contiguous column of brigades," on the left of the camp; a missionary of the English Church from Smithfield read the prayers.
Though two days before we had waded across the river only knee deep, it had on the 6th risen nearly fifteen feet; the boiling eddying flood bearing along in its resistless course masses of grass and broken branches, with huge trees tumbling over and over in the whirling pools. Many of the men amused themselves by swimming about in mid-current, getting astride the floating trunks, and sailing rapidly down the stream. The quantity of drift-wood greatly interfered with the operations of the pontoon under the charge of Lieutenant Siborne, R.E., in getting over waggons with supplies. The cattle, after being forced into the water with great trouble, were swept a long way down the river, many of them sticking for a time in most ridiculous positions in the trees growing on the bank.
On the morning of the 8th, the Head-Quarters and Second Brigade having left the camp an hour before, we marched at 6 o'clock, arriving, after some miles, at the first halting place just as they were quitting it. We passed two solitary Dutch farms, for which, as usual when such raræ aves came in sight, five or six officers dashed off across country at full gallop to forage for their respective messes, provided with empty bottles for goat's milk, and plenty of small change; overtaking the column again, with perhaps an enormous cabbage and a couple of old fowls with bleeding necks hanging from the saddle, or a bunch of onions, and a handkerchief full of eggs. Late in the day a good many springbok were seen, which we 'jagged' for some distance, getting plenty of long shots; but the sight of a large wildebeest, or gnu, cantering leisurely along the plain, drew off all the hunters in pursuit of the nobler game. Having already done up my horse and expended all my ammunition, I could only follow him with a wistful gaze. He was a splendid fellow, as large as an ox, and came so close past me, as I led my horse back towards the column, that I could have hit him with a stone. Mortified as I was at my ill luck in having at such a moment an unloaded rifle and empty pouch, I stood fixed in admiration as he came wildly bounding along, his massive bristling head bent down, whisking his white tail, while his fierce eyes and recurved horns gave him a most formidable appearance.
We had fairly entered the game district, and as our Brigade was in front the following morning, some of us rode on about a mile ahead, so as to come on the herds before they were alarmed by the approach of the column. Very shortly after daylight we spied a large herd of springbok at half a mile distant, and following a slight hollow gained five hundred yards before they discovered us, when away they went, springing twenty feet at a bound, and we after them in full chase, firing away right and left. Two of them being wounded and appearing every moment likely to fall into our hands, led us on for a considerable distance, when finding further pursuit useless we pulled up. We were miles away from the column, which was nowhere to be seen; there was nothing whatever to guide us, and as in our windings and turnings, we had lost all idea of our course, we could only guess what direction to steer. The silence was awful, not a living creature was to be seen besides ourselves, and we felt as small as we looked in the vast plain stretching before and around us in endless undulating ridges of brown grass. After a time we saw a large herd of black looking animals grazing two or three miles distant, which our glasses showed us were wildebeest. For several hours we rode steadily on in a north-westerly course, and at last, to our great delight, beheld, a few miles off, a point or two to the north, the white tops of the waggons outspanned. When we rode in to bivouac, having bagged a fine rheebok by the way, the Brigade was falling in after an hour's halt.
Having leave from the Colonel Commanding to rejoin the column at the evening halting place, we exchanged our horses for the fresh ones led by the servants; and replenishing our ammunition from the pack saddles, set off with three or four companions in the direction of the herd of wildebeest. We soon fell in with several large herds of springbok, though they were too wild to allow of our coming within rifle range; a few blesbok, the largest of the antelope tribe, were sighted, but were equally wary. From a low ridge we now saw the most magnificent sight; on an immense plain hundreds of wildebeest grazed in herds scattered far and near, with springbok and blesbok. I shall never forget the exciting interest with which, for the first time, we saw these noble animals feeding in herds on their native plains, or the thrill of pleasure it gave us as we watched them through the telescope cropping the short brown herbage, switching the flies from their dark glossy sides, and impatiently stamping their delicate taper legs. As we lay concealed behind some large stones, we observed the rest of our party stealing unperceived round the principal and nearest herd, so that presently it was between us. Gazing at us as we rapidly approached, they angrily tossed their heads, bounded into the air snorting and making most extraordinary noises, and went off full gallop, the waving mass of manes and tails flying before us with the thundering of a thousand hoofs over the sun-baked earth, which was covered so thickly with the skulls of gnu and antelope, as to make it dangerous riding. A fine old bull, with long white tail and mane, being detached from the rest, was followed by three of us for several miles, after which I found myself quite alone in the pursuit. Every few hundred yards he would turn round and stare at me, snorting and throwing up his head; when I dismounted and fired, he kicked up his heels into the air, wheeling about in the most fantastic and absurd style, and off he cantered again, his tail whisking round and round without ceasing; every now and then as if seized with some sudden whim, he would spring into the air and go off harder than ever, flinging out his heels right and left. In our course we passed through several astonished herds with which he appeared to have no acquaintance. Suddenly I found myself in a perfect nest of large holes, the burrows of wild-dogs, when the undermined earth breaking through, my horse rolled over, the old wildebeest, not 300 yards off, looking at us as much as to say, I knew how it would be. Without rising, I fired at his forehead; the ball struck one of his horns with a sharp crack, he butted savagely at the ground and flew off full speed. My next bullet hit him in the neck, when he rushed right at me, my horse running back in affright and pulling the rein off my arm. I dropped behind an ant-heap as he charged, and firing a pistol in his face which made him swerve a few feet, his impetus carried him a hundred yards beyond me, so that before he could wheel round, I was on horseback again and reloading. He darted off in a new direction, but had not gone far before a shot in the leg brought him rolling to the ground in a cloud of sand; but my triumph was short, he was up and off again, though by this time only able to trot quietly along; marking his track with drops of blood. Sure of my game, I had just dismounted to give him a finishing shot, when, to my astonishment, bang went a score of rifles at him from just over a little ridge in front, and the balls came pinging right over my head most unpleasantly close. We had come suddenly on the Column, and not many yards over the rise I found a crowd of officers collected round the dead gnu. His tail was cut off and presented to me. The Colonel having lent his private mule waggon to convey the carcase to camp, I had it taken there and it was skinned and cut up; the meat, though totally devoid of fat, proved of excellent flavour, and supplied the soup kettles and frying pans for the next two days. We had often heard that the brain of the wildebeest harbours gentles or grubs, to which its wild extraordinary vagaries are attributed, and being anxious to ascertain the truth of such a strange phenomenon, the head was opened by Dr. Fasson, R.A., in the presence of a number of officers. In the very centre of the brain, still quite warm, there was found a large maggot, which when put on the table wriggled across it with great activity. How such an animal comes there in the first instance, how it exists, and propagates, and whether it really causes the mad antics of the wildebeest, are questions worthy the attention of naturalists.
Our tents had not long been pitched when hundreds of wildebeest appeared not a mile off. Our Commanding Officer, and all who had fresh horses, were off in a few minutes, and right in the midst of the herds. After some hours' excellent sport we brought in several calves and one cow wildebeest; the veal was very good. A wounded bull charged at Stapleton, of the 43rd, and striking his horse about the shoulder, sent him and his rider flying and rolling over on the ground.
An officer of the 2nd, who had formed one of our hunting party of the early morning, was still absent. At "tattoo," none of the others, who had straggled in during the evening, having seen anything of him, great fears were entertained for his safety. In the morning a party of Cape Corps was sent back to look for him, and we marched off in column of brigades. Though there was an hour's interval between each brigade's starting, the tail of the waggon train of each reached nearly to the head of the body in its rear, the whole being in sight at once, winding slowly along the brown barren ocean-like expanse in a continuous line of nearly five miles long.
In the evening, as the setting sun crimsoned the warmly tinted rocks of the higher hills, whose base was already veiled in shade and blue haze, we halted, after twenty miles' weary march, at Sanna Spruits, in one large encampment, placing outlying picquets of Cavalry on the rising ground; the lances and pennons seen against the glowing sky gave the groups a most picturesque appearance. Two or three ostrich eggs were found in the sand, and brought into camp; they made excellent omelettes. Next day the face of the country slightly improved, the grass approached nearer to green, and a fine range of blue mountains was seen in the horizon, some like domes with pointed minarets, others sharp serrated peaks, and one or two resembling chimneys.
The scanty vegetation of the plains was varied now and then by patches of orange, purple, and pink mesembryanthemum; the beautiful hæmanthus, and brilliant convolvulus; also by small yellow and scarlet poppies, with sharp prickly leaves like the thistle.
We were greatly astonished at the frogs which haunted the dry sandy desert, far from any springs or water. They were enormous fellows, as big as a sheep's haggis, and of a bright green; when we stirred them up with a ramrod, they snapped at it like a dog, following it round and round, and showing fight in the fiercest manner.
Chameleons were common, and some of the scenes among the men who stood amazed at their changes were very amusing. The variety and quantity of lizards was something incredible.
Immense green grasshoppers kept rising from the ground on the line of march, fluttering before us with brilliant scarlet wings, and as in the colony, the lights in our tents at night constantly attracted the strange looking 'mantis religiosa' or praying insect. It is an old story that the Hottentots once worshipped them, and our men used occasionally to chaff them on the point, offering them specimens for the purpose, which invariably put the Totties into a furious rage.
In peculiar states of the atmosphere, the mirage once or twice made our thirsty mouths water in the broiling afternoon, by its tantalizing illusion of large lakes looming in the distance.
Late in the day two distant specks, like a couple of little boats out at sea, were observed approaching the column, and soon proved to be Tolcher, the missing officer, and a Boer, who had fallen in with him near Smithfield, the place we had left three days ago! One night he had passed on the open plain, and had been thirty hours without food or water when he fortunately met the Dutchman, who took him to his farm for the night, and brought him on after us the next day. As always happens in such cases, now that he was safe back, everybody who had before deeply deplored his fate, heartily abused him for his stupidity in losing himself.
We had now fairly entered Moshesh's country, and no more firing was allowed, lest he might construe it into an act of hostility. About nine in the morning we halted at the deserted remains of an old Basuto village, consisting of round huts thatched with dry grass, and stone cattle kraals, similar to the sheep pens on our mountains at home. The huts differ in several respects from those of the Kaffirs, being smaller, slightly pointed on the top, and entered by a sort of porch, the door so low as to compel one to enter on hands and knees. Nine miles further, we came to the Lieuw Rivier (Lion's River), and halted on the opposite bank, after wading waist deep through the narrow rushing stream. We found the banks on both sides so steep and awkward that before the waggons could be moved, the whole force of Sappers and Miners, and a fatigue party beside, had to cut the banks away with spades and picks, and even then, with double teams of oxen, and a legion of whips stretched across the river, all going at once, five hours did not bring over more than half the train, the rest remaining for the night, with a strong guard, on the other side.
Now that we could not shoot, the game became tantalizingly plentiful. The plain was scarcely ever without small herds or single animals. Our track was seldom more than the half-obliterated marks of some trader's waggon of the year before.
The supplies of dung for fuel were very materially interfered with by millions of black beetles, called 'dung rollers,' a kind of scarabæus, which swarmed day after day on every part of the plain. A fresh deposit was instantaneously attacked by these untiring scavengers, who were incessantly at work, rolling the dung into large balls, bustling about, and running breech foremost, with their load between their hind legs, as fast as they could go, apparently to nowhere in particular, and fighting most fiercely with each other for pieces of "fuel" twice as big as themselves, the vanquished one going off in a great hurry to get another ball to roll, none seeming to know his own.
During the day we passed several small deserted villages; the evening closed in with one of the thunderstorms of the country, as terrific as any we had witnessed.
On the 13th, after some hours' marching, we descried a column of smoke in the extreme distance, rising from the foot of an isolated table-topped mountain on our right. It was said to be the celebrated Thaba Bassou, or Bossigo, the stronghold of the Basuto Chief, Moshesh, supposed by them to be impregnable. It is accessible only at one or two points; very strong and defensible. The Chief's residence was distinctly seen on its summit. Some miles further on we came to the Wesleyan Missionary station of Platberg, a little cluster of three traders' houses, a chapel, and eight roofless dwellings, formerly occupied by the Bastaards, under Carolus Batjee, who, for having sided with the Government, was driven hence, with his people, by Moshesh, from whom they held the land. The Missionary and two English traders had been suffered to remain. After having accomplished a march of one hundred and one miles in six days, (from the Caledon River,) we encamped on a fine green plain immediately in front of the little station, which stood, with its orchards of peach trees, at the foot of a long flat-topped hill.
In the afternoon Moshesh's two sons, David and Nehemiah, arrived at the camp with a few followers, having swum the Caledon with their horses; but his Excellency declined seeing them, as 'he only treated with ruling chiefs.' From what we could learn, Moshesh was not likely to make any opposition; his sons walked round the camp with the Assistant-Commissioner, took great interest in everything, and in their remarks and questions showed a degree of information and intelligence that perfectly astonished us. They were young fellows of about one or two and twenty, of ordinary stature, quite black, and very much of a Fingo cast of countenance. Both spoke English most fluently and correctly, having been educated at Cape Town, and talked of our Peninsular War, of which they had read in Napier's History! They went into many of the officers' tents; closely examined all the rifles and pistols they saw, and were especially taken with some large conical and Minié bullets, talking earnestly with each other in their own language. Promising to return next day with their father, they took their leave in the evening with great politeness. Their wild-looking attendants, black as night, armed with battleaxes, and covered only with a short skin kaross on the left shoulder, led up their horses like regular grooms, following them, on their way home, at a respectful distance. Mr. Owen, the Assistant-Commissioner, accompanied them to Thaba Bossigo. At night there was another terrific storm of thunder and lightning.
The day following we had the luxury of sitting under the shade of the trees in the Missionary's garden, a transition most delightful from the burning plains and stifling heat of the tents. The Barolong Chief, Moroko, who had ridden over from his village, on the neighbouring mountain of Thaba 'Nchu, accompanied by two of his sons and three Councillors, rode into Camp to pay his respects to the Governor-General. They were well-dressed in European clothes, and attended by about a hundred mounted Barolongs in rags and old karosses, armed with roers, battleaxes, and assegais. The strange cortège brought every one out of the tents to look at it, and as the old Chief rode through the Camp to the large state marquee of His Excellency, he appeared quite astonished at the number of troops, six hundred having been the largest force that had ever before crossed the Orange river. He was dressed in a blue surtout, with a double row of very large brass buttons, and had on a large white hat with the usual crape band. His hair was slightly grizzled, and his appearance that of a quiet respectable old gentleman. His sons were two fine tall young fellows. They all halted and dismounted about thirty paces from the marquee; when, leaving their horses, the Chiefs and Councillors advanced to His Excellency's Interpreter, who having received their message, shortly returned with the Quarter-Master-General, and informed them his Excellency would not see them till the morrow, whereupon they bowed, and remounting rode to the ruins of the little village, off-saddled and bivouacked for the night. Some of us visited them soon afterwards, and found the old Chief, who had changed his dress of state for a large tiger-skin kaross, sitting under the wall of an old house cross-legged on a large grass mat, smoking within a circle of stones, which no one was permitted to enter except the Councillors and his sons, who assumed the title of Princes, and evidently thought a good deal of themselves. Both spoke English very well, and one was reading an English hymn-book; but presently the "Princes" condescended to ask for some tobacco, and were much pleased with half a dozen pieces of 'cavendish;' and hinted, very unmistakably, that a little tea and sugar would be agreeable! All wore round their necks a curious flat sort of spoon of bright iron, with which they clean their nostrils and scrape the perspiration from their faces; and also, in a little ornamented sheath of buckskin, a steel bodkin, with which they make their grass baskets and karosses. After some trouble, I concluded a bargain for one of each of these articles, as curiosities, when one of the young chiefs telling me to point out which I fancied, ordered the two men who wore those I wanted, to take them off, each receiving the tobacco and sixpences agreed for. It was more difficult to obtain one of their battleaxes or "Chakas," whether so called from the bloody and cruel Chief of that name, or he from them, I know not. The handle, from two feet to two feet and a half long, and with a large knob or head, is of solid rhinoceros horn, and has an iron blade, varying in form and size, fixed in it. After a long consultation in the Serolong tongue with his Councillors, the old Chief told his son to inform me that if I wanted it to take to my country and show it to the Queen and my own people, respecting whom they had asked many amusing questions, I might have one (he had picked out one with a mended handle) for some tea and sugar, and as many shillings as all his fingers, which he held up. We finally agreed for six shillings and some tea, for which his Royal Highness the heir apparent came over to my tent. Several officers tried afterwards to obtain similar curiosities from the Barolongs, but they would not part with more. It may be as well to observe here, that by a form of prefix common to all the neighbouring tribes, the words Morolong, Barolong and Serolong, stand respectively for an individual, the people, and their language.
The following day the Paramount-Chief, Moshesh, arrived with his Sons, Chief men and Councillors, and an armed escort of about 100 men, though a larger number had been left just out of sight of the camp over the rising ground, probably as a precautionary measure. Three tents had been pitched for him and his Staff at some 300 yards from the camp, whither they repaired; the chiefs and great men dismounting in front, and the rest off-saddling in the rear of the tents.
After a long interval, the Chief came out of his tent, dressed with great care, in a smart forage cap, blue coat, and gold-laced trowsers! and, followed by his sons and retinue, walked slowly across to the marquee of the Governor-General, who received him in uniform, with all his Staff. The following is a translation from the Basuto, of the substance of what passed:—
Gov.—I am glad to see you, and make your acquaintance.
Mosh.—I also am glad to see the Governor.
G.—I hope we meet in peace?
M.—I hope so too; for peace is like the rain, which makes the grass grow; while war is like the hot wind, that dries it up.
G.—I shall not talk much now. I wish to know if you have got my letter, demanding the horses and cattle?
M.—I have received the letter, but know not where I shall get the cattle. Are the 10,000 head you demand, a fine for the thefts of my people, in addition to the cattle stolen?
G.—I demand only 10,000 head, though your people have stolen many more. This is a just award, and must be paid in three days.
M.—Do the three days count from yesterday, or to-day?
G.—To-day is the first of the three.
M.—The time is short, and the cattle many. Allow me six days to collect them. I have not power over my people to make them do it.
G.—If you are not able to collect them, I must go and do it; and, if resistance is made, it will be war, and I shall not be content with 10,000, but shall take all I can.
M.—Do not talk of war! for, however anxious I may be to avoid it, you know that a dog, when beaten, will show his teeth.
G.—It will therefore be better that you should give up the cattle, than that I should go for them.
M.—I wish for peace, but have the same difficulty with my people, that you have in your country; your prisons are never empty, and I have thieves among my people.
G.—Then bring the thieves to me, that I may hang them.
M.—I do not wish you to hang them, but to talk to them. If you hang them, they cannot talk.
G.—If I hang them they cannot steal. But I am not here to talk. I have said, if you do not give up the cattle in three days, I must come and take them.
M.—I beseech you not to talk of war.
G.—I have no more to say. Go, and collect the cattle as quickly as possible, or I shall have to come to Thaba Bossigo.
M.—Do not talk of coming to Thaba Bossigo. I will go at once, and perhaps God will help me.
After leaving the Governor-General, but before quitting the camp, Moshesh sent to beg that this day might not count in the three, to which his Excellency assented.
16th.—At six o'clock, the whole Division was reviewed by the Commander-in-chief, "marching past," and performing various evolutions and movements. A party of Engineer officers being ordered to proceed with a small escort to the drift on the Caledon River, some miles in front, to survey its practicability, and the nature of the country, in case of our further advance, I got leave to accompany them. After riding about four miles, we came on three villages very near together, all inhabited, and with numerous herds of cattle, and many horses feeding around. As we approached both unexpectedly and rapidly, we had, what would have been otherwise impossible, a full opportunity of seeing the natives at their accustomed employments, as we passed within pistol shot. The men were smoking, sitting and standing in groups, and looked dumbfoundered at seeing us; the women, who were pounding corn, or hoeing their millet and sweet cane, fled with their children, on our sudden appearance, to their huts in the greatest consternation, never having seen so many white men before. As we rode through the herds of cattle, the terrified keepers, whose only covering was a narrow belt of dressed hide round the groin, jumped up from the long grass, and with a short assegai drove in the cattle as fast as they could go.
Having sent one of our escort into the river at the first drift, which was running very strong, it was found too deep for waggons, infantry, or artillery, and we proceeded seven miles further up along the bank. Our guide, a trader, having come to the extent of his former travels, was quite out of his reckoning. At the next drift, we surprised a party of a dozen girls and women bathing, and filling their calabashes. They gave a yell of alarm as we suddenly appeared on the top of the bank, and rushing out of the water up the opposite path all dripping, made off to a large village perched on the top of a rocky hill about a mile off, constantly looking back to see if we were pursuing. Their dress was of the same primeval description as that of the men, coverings of skin, and they wore in addition large white necklaces.
We saw the small French Missionary station of Berea; and at some distance Moshesh's Great Place on the Thaba Bossigo. After the drift had been carefully examined by Siborne, R.E., who swam his horse across the swollen stream, and Tylden and Stanton had taken the necessary points and bearings for their survey of the country, we returned along the base of a fine hill, on which were two or three little villages of stone kraals and round huts, from whence we saw several natives peering down on us. Shortly we were caught in a terrific storm of hail, thunder, and lightning, and had the greatest difficulty in keeping our road, and making the horses face the hail, which pelted down with such force as to hurt us very much, and render them frantic. No one can have any just idea of an African thunderstorm without experiencing it. The lightning ran along the ground, and the rain streamed down in such torrents, that we were all drenched to the skin in a minute, and sobbing with the sudden cold. As we rode across the flooded plain, the water flew from our horses' feet in sheets of spray, yet in a quarter of an hour the sun was out again as bright as ever. A party of civilians riding out from the camp, as soon as they caught sight of us with our Fingo escort, turned round, and went back at full gallop, tearing away before us as hard as they could go, to our great astonishment, and were very soon out of sight. On arriving at the camp, we were congratulated on our safe return, and found everybody in a state of excitement at the narrow escape of a party from the camp, that had been nearly cut off by a large mounted force of Basutos, in fact barely getting away with their lives! Our version of the matter changed the aspect of affairs entirely, and the fugitives laughed as heartily as any one.
One or two large snakes were killed among the ruins of the village, but the camp was free from them, although we had other visitors, tarantulas being very common; and after the second day, the whole of the tents within were literally blackened with common flies, which covered everything, hot or cold, the moment it appeared; in one or two, jerboas made night visits, rather astonishing us when the daylight showed the large holes and heaps of fresh mould left on the floor. B——n, who was particularly nervous about all small animals, seemed specially selected for annoyance; the holes filled up with stones and empty bottles overnight were succeeded by fresh ones, and he declared that his tormentors awoke him by dancing and cheering round his tent in the grey light of early dawn, and so alarmed him, that he dared not put his arm out of bed to throw a boot at them, but lay in a cold perspiration till people began to move about, when they disappeared.
The water here was no better than the nauseating stuff we had so often to drink in the field; and besides the usual thickening of aquatic insects, still more objectionable animals found their way to table in the muddy mixture. B—— one day very narrowly escaped tossing off a fine young frog in his tumbler of brandy and water.
The waggon drivers, &c., of whom, with upwards of 150 waggons and 2000 trek oxen, we had a perfect army in camp, as usual took advantage of the halt to lay in a stock of biltong; and every bush, waggon wheel, and dissel-boom, was covered with strips of raw meat drying in the sun.
Close to camp, and high up on the hill, were some fine rocks, where, under the shadow of their overhanging masses, we sat during the heat of the day, looking down on the busy camp, and scanning the plain for miles beyond. While thus occupied on the 19th, the last of the three days granted Moshesh, we descried large herds of cattle approaching from Thaba Bossigo. At three in the afternoon they were visible from the camp; and soon afterwards a body of mounted Basutos appeared, armed with assegais, stuck in a sort of quiver at the back, with battleaxes at the saddle-bow, and guns, keeries, and large shields of ox-hide, followed by a vast herd of cattle stretching across the plain, and coming on at a trot, driven by upwards of 500 natives. They were wild looking-fellows, with strange head-gear of jackals' tails, ostrich feathers, tiger skin, and gnu manes; with karosses, chakas, and clubs. Though differing in no respect from the Kaffir personally, their language or dialect is widely dissimilar, and sounded to us more musical. Our interpreters and Fingoes could not understand it in the least, though many travellers have affirmed the two languages are in reality the same. Their saddles were most primitive affairs, the stirrups, ingeniously contrived out of a broad strip of hide, divided towards the lower end for about six inches, and forming, with a piece of hard wood as a base, a triangle for the foot. All wore the bodkins and "lebakos," or iron strigils before mentioned, suspended from the neck by a strip of finely dressed skin. After the greatest difficulty, and with the assistance of Jary, 12th Lancers, I obtained one of each for the small consideration of five shillings in silver three-penny pieces, and eight sticks of Cavendish tobacco. They were all savage, surly-looking fellows, which might perhaps be attributed to the nature of their errand, though one could not expect any very pleasing expression in a people who less than twenty years ago were cannibals, and dressed their hair with human grease.
The cattle having been numbered, and found to amount only to 3500, Prince Nehemiah, who had come with them, was desired to inform his Governor, that unless the remainder arrived the following morning, we should be obliged to come and fetch them.
As an earnest of this threat, which produced no effect, the Second Brigade, with two companies of the 74th Highlanders, marched at daylight for the upper drift on the Caledon leading to Moletsani's country; and there formed a flying camp. But this demonstration not having the desired effect, the Governor-General followed at dawn on the 20th, with the Cavalry Brigade and two guns. Moving along the western and southern base of the Berea mountain, on the flat summit of which the enemy had collected their cattle, His Excellency advanced to parley with a party of armed Basutos, who immediately fired on him. Hostilities having thus commenced, the cavalry were advanced in extended order, and with a couple of rounds of shrapnel from the guns, drove them off. His Excellency, who, notwithstanding that his conspicuous appearance drew fire on him from all directions, continued the whole day coolly smoking his cheroot, and issuing his orders, then crossed the Rietspruit, a deep mountain stream, and took up a position on an eminence commanding the approaches of the other two columns, which were to join him here,—viz., the Infantry Brigade, after clearing the summit of the mountain, and the Cavalry by moving round its north and east faces. Colonel Eyre, having sent up a storming party of the Rifle Brigade, under Lieutenant Hon. L. Curzon, and the Light Company of the 73rd, under Lieutenant Gawler (who led their men up rocks almost inaccessible, under a heavy fire from the enemy, and drove them from their position), ascended the mountain, and sweeping the top, completely dispersed the enemy, capturing 1500 head of cattle. Unfortunately, Captain Faunce, Deputy-Assistant Quarter-Master General, and two or three of the 73rd, were surprised and cut down by a party of Basutos, several of whom having the white forage caps and the lances of the 12th (killed in Colonel Napier's column), were mistaken for our own troops, an error not discovered till it was too late to be remedied.
Simultaneously with the above movements, Colonel Napier's Brigade having proceeded along the valley on the north-east of the mountain, ascended it at a point where large droves of cattle were observed; and after some hard fighting—in which, more than once, they came to close quarters, hand to hand, with lance and battleaxe, twenty-five Lancers and two of the Cape Mounted Rifles being killed, with a great number of the enemy—captured 4000 head of cattle, besides fifty-three horses, and many goats, with the whole of which they returned to the flying camp.
When the Infantry Brigade joined his Excellency, the enemy, numbering between 6000 and 7000 horsemen, manœuvring with the regularity and precision of English troops, endeavoured to turn their right flank; attacking both front and rear simultaneously, but were repulsed with great loss in each attempt by the steady gallantry of the troops. However, in spite of their repulse, they pertinaciously returned to the assault of the bivouac on the hill-side, where the cattle had been driven for the night into some old stone kraals, and though suffering heavy loss, continued in thousands attacking the position on all sides at once, till after dark, when they were finally dispersed by a round of canister, and the weary troops, who since sunrise had never ceased a single moment from their arduous toils, lay down to rest. When day dawned next morning there was not a Basuto to be seen. The casualties on our side, owing to the overpowering force of the enemy, and the difficult nature of the ground, were very severe: Captain Faunce, Dep.-Asst.-Quar.-Mr.-General, and thirty-seven men, being killed, and Captain Wellesley, Asst.-Adjt.-General, Lieut. Hon. H. Annesley, 43rd, and fourteen men wounded.
The captured cattle being a great incumbrance, the infantry were sent back with them to the camp, his Excellency announcing his intention of resuming operations the following day against the Chiefs residence; a few cattle and horses abandoned on the plain were added on the route; but soon after arriving at the Caledon camp, a warrior bearing a flag of truce presented himself with a letter from Moshesh, written in Council at midnight, after the engagement. The epistle ran thus:—
"Thaba Bossigo,
"Midnight, December 20th, 1852."Your Excellency,—This day you have fought against my people, and taken much cattle. As the object for which you have come is to have a compensation for Boers, I beg you will be satisfied with what you have taken. I entreat peace from you. You have shown your power; you have chastised; let it be enough, I pray you, and let me no longer be considered an enemy of the Queen. I will try all I can to keep my people in order for the future.
Your humble servant,
"Moshesh."
His Excellency having seen fit to accept this submission, concluded a peace with the humbled Chief, and returned with his Staff—Colonel Cloete, Quarter-Master-General; Colonel Seymour, Military Secretary; Captain Lord A. Russell, Dep.-Asst.-Quarter-Master-General; Captain Hon. R. Curzon, Captain Hon G. Elliott, Captain Tylden, Lieut. Greville, Lieut. Lord C. Hay, and Lieut. Earle, to the standing camp at Platberg; and the troops afterwards arriving with the spoil, the cattle were distributed. One thousand head were given to Moroko, two hundred and fifty to Taibosch, and two hundred and fifty to Carolus Batje for their firm adherence to the government, and as a compensation for their losses in consequence; the remainder were granted as a boon to the Boers, who had suffered to a great extent by the plundering and robberies of the Basutos. The loud bellowing of the spoil, in which our own 2000 draught oxen joined, was so insufferable, that we were heartily glad to see them driven off by the Barolongs to Bloem Fontein, going full canter across the plain. There were so many young calves, which of course were obliged to be left behind, that one was allowed to each officer, and also to every soldier's 'mess,' and the camp was full of veal. There was a sale of captured horses, generally young colts, which fetched prices varying from eight shillings to eight sovereigns. One or two particularly 'choice lots' brought ten or twelve pounds.
On the 23rd, a Gazette was published in camp, printed at the Mission-house press, containing all the Despatches, and Orders connected with the affair. The force was ordered to return to the colony.
CHAPTER XV.
MARCH DOWN THE COUNTRY—TERMINATION OF THE WAR.
C——, who had been unwell from the time of our tremendous soaking the day we waded the Caledon river, when we had to remain two hours standing in wet clothes, waiting for the waggons crossing the drift, had become so ill as to be unable to march. The excellent missionary at Platberg, Mr. Giddy, had shown him the greatest kindness possible, doing everything in his power to add what comforts he could to the hard fare of camp life. He was now placed in an ox waggon, which, jolting and bumping over the rocky road, crept slowly on step by step of the long and weary journey homewards. At our first night's halt, the Assistant-Commissioner, Mr. Owen, who had ridden over to Thaba Bossigo, rejoined us. He had had a friendly interview with Moshesh, who gave him a capital breakfast, with European appliances of great variety; and among other luxuries, placed before him a bottle of port and a couple of large jars of Gunter's preserves! He strongly expressed his anxiety to maintain peace, and stand on an amicable footing with the Government; and when Mr. Owen mentioned his wish that the bodies of our brave men who had fallen, should be interred, he sent his sons with a few Basutos to dig graves, and assist Mr. Owen's party. The body of Capt. Faunce was recognised, and laid in a separate grave.
December 25th, Christmas day.—Scorched by the sun from above and the sand under foot, the long waving column moved slowly across the dead sun-baked karroo, and when late in the day it halted at Lieuw Rivier, we felt as though we would give all we possessed for a little of the ice and snow with which our far distant friends were doubtless at that moment surrounded. Some attempted the manufacture of a plum pudding with corn meal, black sugar, and currants boiled in a tin-tot tied up in a pocket handkerchief; but it was even a more miserable failure than the roast beef which, instead of being made into the usual soup, was placed upon the table like a piece of burnt leather. The generous liquor with which these luxuries were washed down, was Dutch gin and muddy water.
In the evenings, as soon as the glowing sun had sunk behind the distant ranges of pale purple mountains, the temperature was delightful. We collected in knots, and stretched on plaids or tiger-skins on the sand, enjoyed our pipes, watching the few light and brightly tinted clouds that floated airily in the warm sky; the droves of cattle and mules, and troops of cavalry horses returning from their short pasture; the busy camp before us, where, as the darkness fell, the glowing fires showed themselves; or the bright stars that shone out one after another in the blue heaven like so many globes of light. Moments such as these, compensated for the toil and heat of the day.
27th.—On arriving at our encamping ground, C—— was so much worse that a Medical Board was held on him at once, and leave to England recommended; before the rear of the column was up, we were off after the Governor-General's column, which had gone on in advance. Colonel MacDuff, in the kindest and most generous manner, tumbled everything out of his own mule waggon, and gave it up at once, to enable us to overtake and keep up with them. After a sharp trot of ten miles without any escort whatever, we were very glad to see his Excellency's little camp about a mile ahead. The whole plain at this point was completely whitened with endless flocks of migratory storks, apparently feeding on the locusts which were flying over in clouds. They were quite close to the waggon track on both sides. The unexpected appearance of a single horseman and waggon approaching across the solitary plain at such a late hour, brought out several officers, by whom we were most cordially and hospitably received, his Excellency also kindly sending to offer the invalid anything his better cuisine afforded.
At three o'clock next morning, we trekked along with the cavalry and mule train at six miles an hour, a change most delightful after the slow pace of the ox waggons. Numbers of springbok and blesbok were seen in every direction, and 'jagged' whenever near enough to render it easy to overtake the party again, which was a very different affair from catching up the infantry column. After a good thirty miles, we came early in the afternoon to the Caledon River, which, though running very strong, was just fordable for the waggons, and encamped on the opposite bank.
C——, who had eaten nothing for four days but a few teaspoonfuls of dirty brown arrow-root, made with muddy vley water, and sweetened with black ration sugar, grew rapidly worse, and towards evening became quite unconscious; all night long, as I watched under the waggon, he wandered, and talked incoherently of home.
When all were gone to rest, the most perfect silence reigned through the camp: the night was splendid,—the clear bright heavens were studded with brilliant stars down to the very horizon,—the moon glided along in silvery light over the vast plain, on which imagination pictured thousands of wild animals sleeping or feeding in undisturbed enjoyment,—till the creaking of the waggon, as poor C—— tossed about on his miserable bed, recalled one's thoughts to realities.
It wanted an hour to daylight, and the stars still shone with undiminished brightness, when suddenly the loud clear notes of the reveillé, never before welcomed, rung out from the head-quarter tent, and were taken up and repeated on all sides by the bugles and trumpets of each detachment; the general hum through the camp soon told that all were astir, and the toils of another day commenced.
The first few hours were delightfully cool and pleasant; but as the sun rose higher, it became less and less agreeable, and long before we came in sight of the distant belt of trees that marked the course of the Orange River the heat was again intense.
As the river was "up," and there were no means of crossing except by the pontoons and a large flat-bottomed ferry-boat, it was necessary to encamp on the bank during the tedious operation of getting the waggons over. The mules were first embarked, and as there were some 300, all of which objected most obstinately to going on board, it was not effected all at once. One by one the waggons were spoked to the top of the bank and let down by ropes, the boat accommodating one only at a time. All night long the waggons were going across by moonlight; the Dutchmen as well as the officers and men taking watches of four hours. Next morning, when it came to our turn to cross, the thoughtful and feeling soldiers, scarce speaking above a whisper, let down "the sick officer's waggon" with the greatest care. When about half way across the river, one of the long sweeps worked by the Lancers broke in two, and we were carried some distance down the rapid stream, and at last got entangled among the thick willow-trees below the landing place. A hawser was, with some difficulty, got ashore, and the fatigue party passing it from tree to tree, endeavoured to haul us to an opening, but the rope broke, and in a moment we were whirled round and drifting away towards a dangerous rapid in the middle of the river, the Dutchmen from the ferry screaming to us to keep away from the rocks. But it was much easier to say what to do, than to effect it with one lumbering sweep; in another minute we must all have been "gethan" (done), as the Boers prophesied, when a puffing snorting black head, with a rope between its teeth, appeared swimming bravely astern, and a dripping Fingo clambered into the punt with a cable from shore. We were again hauled up to the trees, through which the stream swept with resistless strength, carrying us against the large overhanging branches with such force as nearly to capsize the waggon out of the boat. Four or five Sappers with axes, under direction of Stanton, were in the tree in an instant; while others, swimming about in the boiling flood, cleared away the boughs, and at last we were moored to the bank, but it was so high and perpendicular, as well as thickly wooded, that the waggon had to be entirely unloaded (C—— being carried up in a stretcher), and several large trees felled before the waggon could be got to the top with the united efforts of four and twenty mules and some scores of fellows with tow-ropes and levers.
Night again came round, and still a third of the camp remained on the other side.
In the morning, as we breakfasted under the trees on the edge of the lofty bank, admiring the bright sunny river and its green islands, it was curious to see the cavalry horses swim across, following a mounted Totty. The stream had considerably abated, and they landed safely, and at a very little distance below the drift-path. His Excellency and Staff followed in the pontoon, and our march was resumed.
It was New Year's Day when we again reached Burghersdorp; brand-new waggons painted the brightest red, yellow, and blue, drawn by sleek spans of fat oxen, and filled with Boers, vrouws and children, dressed in their holiday clothes, were pouring into the town; others stood outspanned in groups, with tents pitched round them; the stores were all closed, and service was going on in the church.
Thirty miles a day soon brought us back to the Colony; our eyes were once more delighted with the sight of trees; the bush looked lovely; the mimosas were one sheet of golden blossom, filling the air with the most fragrant perfume; and jessamine, bignonia, and plumbago, with numbers of beautiful flowering bulbs, appeared at every step,—a change most grateful to all after the bare and arid wilderness we had so long been traversing.
On the 9th of January we reached the Blinkwater standing camp, where we met many old friends, and the same evening got to Fort Beaufort, where C——, whose shoulders were bleeding from the constant jolting of the waggon, was moved from his rough, narrow bed, to a four-poster at the little inn; and the kind-hearted Mrs. Mills replaced his awkward nurses.
No outbreak or disturbance whatever had taken place among the thoroughly dispersed Kaffirs, nor had any case of cattle stealing occurred during the long absence of so large a portion of the army.
The Waterkloof, so long contested and dearly won, was at length entirely evacuated by the enemy, and held, without molestation, by very small garrisons.
Seyolo, the T'slambie Chief, one of Sandilli's principal supporters, and a most warlike and active leader in the rebellion, was a prisoner at Cape Town, where, not long afterwards, I visited him in his cell.
Moshesh, the head of the Basutos, we had left at Thaba Bassou, humbled enough, and only too desirous to maintain peace.
In Tambookie Land everything was perfectly quiet, the Tambookies having settled down in profound peace, in their appointed location; and more than 800 applications had been sent in by the Burghers for farms in the unappropriated districts.
Kreli was suing for peace.
The Amatolas and Gaika district were entirely cleared of Kaffirs and Hottentots; Sandilli and the other Chiefs had fled beyond the Kei, and the whole tribe was dispersed.
Thus the war was now virtually brought to an end; the rebel tribes being everywhere vanquished or enfeebled, and the happy effects of restored tranquillity already began to be felt in the country. The settlers, who had fled to the towns for refuge from the outrages of the enemy, began to return to their devastated farms,—the neglected fields were once more under the plough—their ruined houses were again roofed in,—and even those unfortunate farmers, whom a second and a third war might well have driven to hopeless despair, took courage, and, like the phœnix, the promise of future prosperity once more rose from the ashes of their blackened homesteads.
Not long afterwards Peace was proclaimed, and General Cathcart was enabled to withdraw a large portion of the forces from the scene of their long and harassing campaign. The Rifle Brigade were ordered for home, and the 12th Lancers, 43rd Light Infantry, and 74th Highlanders to India.
After two days' rest, C—— was again placed in a mule waggon, and, with a small cavalry escort, we proceeded by easy stages to Grahams Town and thence to Port Elizabeth, reaching the little harbour on the fourth day. The change, and fresh sea breezes had a wonderful effect on the invalid. One day, a huge steamer hove in sight, which brought wondering crowds to the shore, and rapidly steaming in, proved to be the famed "Great Britain," when, after all the hardships, sufferings, and privations of the campaign, I had the satisfaction of seeing him in a comfortable berth homeward bound.
THE END.
LONDON:
SAVILL AND EDWARDS, PRINTERS, CHANDOS STREET,
COVENT GARDEN.