“We at last surmounted this pass, which could only be effected by putting oxen to the wagon, which being trained to the task, and by nature more patient than the horse, slowly but certainly get up the mountain with the heaviest load. Where one span, or team, is found insufficient, it is frequently the case that two are put on, and as many as thirty-two oxen may be seen crawling up the mountain, at a distance resembling an immense caterpillar. The road from Hottentots Holland to the Palmut river is broken and irregular. The river which we had now to ford was but of little depth. The greater part of the summer it is nearly dry, but in the winter it is frequently impassable from the violence and depth of the torrents. This circumstance occasions great impediments in travelling through the colony; a delay of many days is frequently experienced, and even whole families, who have left their homes for the purpose of going to a Church only a few miles distant, have been detained many days on the banks of one of these torrents, without the possibility of getting across: at the same time no house being near, they have been under the necessity of making their bivouac, in and under the wagon; the boor furnishing them with provisions by means of his gun, from which he is seldom separated, and which is his never failing companion in his journies.
“A most remarkable circumstance grew out of this uncertainty, as to passing the rivers, while I was a resident in the colony. Some farmers, residing within a few miles of Stellenbosch, were in the habit of going thither to church on the Sunday, and having to pass a river on the way, were frequently detained in the manner above mentioned. In consequence of this inconvenience, they determined to purchase a piece of land, on which they might, as they could collect the means, build a church for their own immediate neighbourhood; accordingly they collected amongst themselves 23,000 guilders—at that time about £330 sterling—and bought a considerable piece of ground with it. Having apportioned as much of this as they judged necessary for the church, the parsonage house, glebe, &c., &c., they divided the remainder into lots, for dwelling houses and gardens, and put them up to auction with a view of getting back some of the purchase money. Extraordinary as it may appear, it is nevertheless a fact, that the remnant of a piece of land, the whole of which had been purchased for 23,000 guilders, thus divided into small lots, fetched by auction the enormous sum of 163,000 guilders. It was of course the vicinity of the intended church, and the prospect of a town rising round it, which gave this immense increase of value to the land; and what encouragement does this hold out, even to worldly speculators, as to the expediency of building churches. We have heard it stated that the million sterling, which some years since, was appropriated by parliament for building churches, has brought in an immense interest in the shape of taxes of various descriptions levied upon the houses which have been built, and the population which has been collected round them; and if to these are added the produce of the excise, the gain must be very great—no money whatever, perhaps, ever brought in so large a return as this did.
“But the circumstance becomes deeply interesting in a much higher point of view. It shews the earnest desire even of the Cape Boor for religious instruction—and ‘that the fields are indeed white unto harvest while the labourers are few.’
“The Palmut river was not at this time very deep, but the water came up nearly to the bottom of the wagon. The dogs which accompanied the party had in consequence a very narrow escape from being drowned. In order to prevent their feet from being cut by the rough roads, and to keep them fresh against the time when their services might be called for, they were generally put in baskets in which their beds were made, and hung under the wagon, but so close to the bottom of it, as to prevent their jumping out. Upon this occasion they had been forgotten, and on passing through the river there was barely space between the surface of the water and the bottom of the wagon, to enable them to keep their noses out of it. Three inches more and they must have been lost. Towards evening the windings of the Palmut River, and the fine outline of the Swartberg mountains—the one contrasted with the deep shade thrown over the land, and the others with the bright blue sky, formed a magnificent picture.
“We passed the night at the house of a Dutch farmer, named Uric, where we were most comfortably accommodated. He was a very industrious man, and although a cripple from rheumatism, and only assisted by two slaves, had succeeded in the course of two years in building a house, in planting a large vineyard, and providing for his children and grand-children.
“On the 26th, having procured oxen for the purpose, we began to ascend the great Hac-hoek (or the great high corner) the road passing over a range of mountains diverging from the great chain of the Swartberg, and running towards the sea near Cape Lagullos. The view from the summit of this pass was highly picturesque. On the left, the grand chain of the Swartberg which runs along the coast from False Cape to Algoa bay was seen receding and losing itself in a vivid blue distance. At the foot of the Hac-hoek, on the eastern side, runs the Both Riviere, which in the summer like almost all the smaller Cape rivers, is little more than the bed of a winter torrent. Here we found again a labourious settler, living on a farm on the left bank of this river, in which but a very few years before he had considered himself with his large family as in a state of independence. He had built a mill just below his house, and by a lateral cut he had brought the water to turn it. This had cost him infinite labour to effect, but it answered admirably. His garden, containing abundance of fruit trees, and about two thousand vines, was contiguous to the mill, and was watered by the stream that turned it. But the river increased in the course of one night to a fearful torrent, which destroyed his garden and vineyard, ruined his mill, and covered the soil near his house with such a deluge of sand and rocks as to render it almost unfit for future cultivation. The worthy man was for some time in a state of despair, declared himself ruined, and saw nothing before him but a miserable old age. He however exerted himself with renewed energy, selected another spot for a mill and garden on the opposite side of the river, and his efforts have been crowned with success: only a very few years had elapsed when we saw him, with his mill restored and in use, and an extensive garden with a vineyard of twenty thousand vines. We found him in the full enjoyment of his well merited prosperity, an example of patience and industry to all his neighbours.
“After passing the Both Riviere the country lost its precipitous character, but was intersected by deep ravines extending from the base of the mountains to the sea on the S.E. coast, the hills sloping gradually into them, their sides abounding in verdure, but with few trees. The vallies were in general well supplied with water, and consequently fertile, better calculated for vines than corn, although the latter grows in abundance where there is moisture.
“We arrived in the middle of the day at Caledon, a town which may be supposed by its name to have had its origin under the British Government. It is situated in the Brandt valley, and near the hot baths. It was founded in 1810, and had at this period a very imposing appearance, with its church, town house, and magistrates’ houses; the other dwellings have also a pretty appearance, being white-washed and neatly painted. There is but little taste displayed in point of architecture, in which the Dutch taste is not only prevalent but exclusive.
“We here were most hospitably received and entertained by the chief magistrate, Mr. Frawenfeller, and passed a day with him in viewing the baths, the hospital, and the leper establishment. This hideous disease of leprosy is held perhaps in greater horror by the Dutch than by other nations, who are careful to keep those affected by it as separate as possible from the population; in which they are undoubtedly right, provided the afflicted are not made to suffer from these restrictions, which, from the information obtained here, was not suspected to be the case.