BEAUFORT. 103 



them, forming altogether a long cavalcade, which 

 created some little stir in this quiet and secluded vil- 

 lage, where we arrived after a journey of twenty-three 

 days from Cape Town. We found to our surprise 

 that we were a day out in our reckoning, for instead 

 of being Friday, as we imagined, it proved to be 

 Saturday, evening, a circumstance we could with 

 difficulty persuade ourselves to believe ; but " the 

 sound of the church- going bell," on the following 

 day, dispelled all doubt upon the subject. 



Beaufort is situated beneath the great chain of 

 the Nieuw-veld mountains, and being in direct 

 communication with the interior of that district, was 

 selected as the seat of magistracy, for the conve- 

 nience of residents in that part of the country; 

 Graaff Reinet, the principal seat of government, 

 being a hundred and thirty miles distant. Beaufort, 

 therefore, generally presents a scene of activity, 

 arising from the number of farmers, who on various 

 accounts have frequent occasion to visit the Dorp : 

 it is nevertheless a poor place, and ill supplied with 

 water from the springs in the- upper part of the vil- 

 lage, the quantity of which in dry seasons is scarcely 

 sufficient for its inhabitants, although their number 

 cannot exceed two hundred souls. There are only 

 two streets, containing altogether about thirty or forty 

 small houses. The church, the most conspicuous build- 

 ing in the place, is a small, neat edifice, calculated 

 to contain upwards of one thousand persons, to which 



