BETHANY TWICE ABANDONED BY THE BHSSIONAKIES. 305 



of the inhabitants, the devastation of the locust — which had 

 destroyed every particle of vegetation — and the black and 

 parched appearance of the soil, it now looked wild and dreary 

 in the extreme. The lengthened shadows of evening threw 

 an additional gloom over this once busy scene of cheerful 

 industiy. Oh, changes, mysterious and incomprehensible! 

 Surely God, in his infinite wisdom, will not permit the han- 

 diwork of his servants, raised only by years of perseverance, 

 toil, and privations, to perish without some recompense! 



Bethany, if I am not mistaken, became a scene of mission- 

 ary labor as early as 1820. The enterprising and venerable 

 Mr. Schmelen then officiated here, but he found it necessary, 

 after a time, to abandon the place. Subsequently to his de- 

 parture it remained deserted for upward of twenty years, 

 when, in 1843, it was once more tenanted, and this time by 

 Mr. Knudsen, who, in his turn, as seen above, was obliged to 

 move off elsewhere. 



After leaving Bethany, water and pasturage became every 

 day more scarce. All the vleys and pools of rain-water were 

 dried up. The Koanquip River, however, long befriended us, 

 as in its bed we generally managed to obtain a supply of 

 grass and water for our cattle, which now amounted to sev- 

 eral hundred head. 



But the labor and fatigue of watering the latter was im- 

 mense. No person who has not been circumstanced as we 

 were can form the least conception of the trouble, care, and 

 anxiety that a large drove of cattle occasions. Perhaps, 

 after having dug for twenty consecutive hours — and this I 

 have done more than once — the water is found insufficient 

 in quantity, or (which is almost as bad) the ground falls in, 

 or the cattle themselves spoil it by their wallowing and ex- 

 crement. 



These native cattle are the most troublesome and disgust- 

 ing brutes possible ; for, after having spoiled the water bj'- 

 their own wildness and wantonness, they rush furiously 



