2 A HUNTER'S WANDERINGS ch. 



make my way to the Diamond Fields, from which 

 place I rightly judged it would be easier to make a 

 final start for the interior than from the coast. 

 Accordingly, as I had too much baggage to allow me 

 to travel by Cobb and Co.'s coach, which was then 

 running, I looked out for a waggon bound for the 

 New El Dorado, which there was iittle difficulty in 

 finding, and after striking a bargain with a young 

 transport rider ^ named Reuben Thomas, who under- 

 took to convey me and my 300 lbs. of baggage to 

 the Diamond Fields for the sum of _^8, I finally left 

 Port Elizabeth two days later on, September 6th. 



The journey between the coast and the Diamond 

 Fields is so uninteresting that I will not weary my 

 readers with any account of it, as I wish to devote 

 my pages to narratives of my experiences in those 

 parts of the far interior at present but very imper- 

 fectly or not at all known to the general public. 



After a very slow journey of nearly two months, 

 we at last, early on the morning of the 28th of 

 October, reached our destination. As we had only 

 travelled at night, allowing the bullocks to rest 

 during the heat of the day, I had been able to do a 

 good deal of shooting in a small way, and in return 

 for an immense amount of hard walking, had 

 managed to bag one bushbuck ram, one duiker, one 

 springbuck, one klipspringer, and eight grey and red 

 rhebucks, all of which I had carried on my own 

 shoulders to the waggons. 



On the evening of the day on which I reached the 

 Diamond Fields, a great misfortune befell me, for a 

 small double breech-loading rifle by Reilly, with 

 which I had been shooting along the road, was stolen 



1 In the Cape Colony, carriers wlio convey g^oods from one part of 

 tlie country to another are called "transport riders." 



