324 
SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
fo the Vaal river, or what was called "the So- 
vereignty," and even to proceed Eastward to 
Delagoa Bay. 
This determination of the clans of Uys, Mool- 
man, and Potgieter, appears to have induced 
Eetief to follow their track, and he at once sent 
exploring parties from the Sand river, who at 
length succeeded in finding two or three paths 
across the Quathlamba or Drakensberg, which 
might be made passable for wagons ; for, up to 
that time, every attempt to cross that range of 
mountains by wagons, from the Zuurberg to 
the West, as far as the Oliviers Pass, at the ex- 
treme North East extremity of the district, 
had failed. 
We now adopt the words of the Honorable 
Henry Cloete, in detailing the remainder of 
the early history of the Natal settlement, as 
incomparably the best and truest account ever 
presented, 
" Eetief," he says, " succeeded with his party 
in crossing at one spot, and reached Port Natal 
in safety, where he met with a hearty reception 
from the British emigrants ; who, strange to say, 
had also formed themselves into a little inde- 
pendent community. For, upon Capt. Gardiner, 
of the navy, arriving among them, and asserting 
a magisterial authority, under the provisions 
of an extraordinary law passed by the British 
