Return to Smith Afrita 167 



ing with cold and quite demoralised, Mary and the 

 children were sitting on the cartel bed, the water 

 was running through the wagon, and the river was 

 rising fast. I did my best to get the oxen to pull, 

 but they had been too long in the water, and were 

 not a good span at best, so all I could do was to 

 get the wagon near the bank and gallop up to a Boer 

 farm for fresh oxen. At first the man said he had 

 no oxen, but when I told him there was a mother 

 and children in the wagon and that if they were 

 drowned it would lie at his door, he said he would 

 send the oxen if I would pay him 3, which I did. 

 He brought a fine team of fat oxen which, with our 

 assistance, got the wagon up the steep mud bank. 

 Had I waited at Heidelberg for daylight the whole 

 family would have been drowned ; as the two Kaffirs 

 were quite helpless and the children all small. 

 Mary was, as usual, calm and brave, but fortunately 

 she did not quite realise the great danger they were 

 in. We trekked down to Maritzburg, where I 

 hired a house from Offie Stepstone. It was a 

 miserable time I had nothing to do and was 

 spending money all the time, and I cursed the day 

 when I had to return to Africa, which was never at 

 peace. 



Among other things which I had imported to 

 take to Pretoria were implements, fencing material, 

 a steam engine and sawing plant, large water pipes 

 and sluice valves, also a brick and tile making plant. 

 My brother Fred who had nothing to do, took over 

 the latter and started making excellent ornamental 

 bricks, tiles, flowerpots, etc., at Isipingo, Natal. 



I started alone for Pretoria to try and save 

 what I could out of the wreck of my affairs. I was 

 outspanned at Sand Spruit beyond what is now 

 Volkerust, when I saw a storm gathering, so started 



