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.