AUGUST 303 



far-away note of a plover calling towards the common. And there, 

 falling naturally into that sad scheme of colour, a key and answer 

 to the picture as it were, this live animal, with the milk trickling 

 from its udder, standing over the dead, itself as still as the dead. 

 Could it be painted as I saw it, that scene might serve as a 

 symbol of all loss, all sorrow, and all death. And yet it was made 

 up of a mare standing over a dead foal in a wet pasture nothing 

 more. 



We had great difficulty, by the way, in driving the pony from 

 the body of the foal, to which it broke back continually through 

 the ring of those who were engaged in its capture. 



Only once before in my life did I witness a pastoral scene that 

 left quite so strong a sense of desolation upon my mind. It was 

 in the uplands of Natal, in the year of the Boer rebellion, when a 

 snowstorm, such as had never been known, swept the country } 

 killing thousands of horses and cattle. I was travelling towards 

 the coast, walking with my companions behind the cart, so that 

 the mules might find it lighter to drag through the snowdrifts. 

 Presently we saw two waggons, that seemed to have a deserted 

 appearance, standing at a distance from the track, and went to 

 look at them. What we found is not easy to forget ! There was 

 a space between the waggons, where their owners had tried to 

 make a shelter for the cattle by tying a tilt from one roof-tent 

 and dissel-boom to the other. This had availed nothing against 

 the icy blast, however, for in the enclosure lay the oxen dead a 

 confused and motley-coloured heap of them. Or, rather, thirty 

 were dead. One still moved in the heap, and one, the last 

 survivor, stood over them, his great horns swaying to and fro, as 

 little by little the unaccustomed cold froze into his heart. At 

 the back of the nearest waggon, staring at the dead cattle and 

 wrapped round with sacks, sat a man and a woman, rude, unwashed 

 Boers. We asked them if the snow had killed the oxen, and the 

 man answered l ja' 



'They were all we had,' added the woman in an unemotional 

 voice. ' Now we are beggars.' 



