A CAPE CART JOURNEY. 47 



Barrow (afterwards Sir John Barrow, of the Admi- 

 ralty), most diligent and observant of officials, at 

 that time private secretary to Earl Macartney, first 

 British Governor of the Colony ; then the approach 

 of the turbulent Boers — most of them the lawless 

 freebooters of Bruintjes Hoogte, leather-clad hunters, 

 armed with immensely long flint "roers. " — in Van 

 Jaarsfeld's insurrection two years later, when they 

 lay encamped before the town for a month, at that 

 very Sunday River drift where we had crossed, 

 threatening to hang the Landdrost and garrison. 

 Then the forced march from Algoa Bay, upon the 

 road we ourselves had followed, of gallant General 

 Vandeleur, with his clean-shaven, queued, stiff- 

 skirted troops, and the retreat of the Boers before 

 them. Then the voluntary and courageous expedi- 

 tion of Landdrost Maynier, unarmed, into the 

 Sunday River bush country to pacify the insurgent 

 Hottentots, at that time united in arms with the 

 Kaffirs, and wreaking vengeance upon their ancient 

 oppressors, the Dutch. Still later the risings of 

 Bezuidenhout and Hendrik Prinsloo, and that 

 fearful scene of execution of Boer rebels at Slaghters 

 Nek. Brave old Sir Andries Stockenstroom, the 

 fiery veteran, Sir Harry Smith, and many another 

 notable character, passed before me. All these, 

 and a hundred other moving incidents and striking 

 figures of bygone times, came thronging irresistibly 

 to my imagination. The internal history of the 

 Cape Colony, of which so little is known even to the 

 colonists themselves, would, I am convinced, if 

 pubHshed, present one of the most striking, most 

 picturesque, and most exciting themes ever placed 

 before the reading public. 



