CHAPTER XX. 
RESIDENCE AND TRANSACTIONS AT KLAARWATER ; AND PREPARATIONS FOR 
RESUMING THE JOURNEY INTO THE INTERIOR. 
January Is/, 1812. The commencement of a new year seldom fails 
to occasion reflections on the lapse of time ; and when, in the even- 
ing, this day was recorded in my journal, I felt what any person 
similarly situated would, I believe, naturally feel, somewhat anxious to 
look into the Book of Futurity ; so far in it, at least, as the termination 
of my present journey. But now^ that this period is past, I clearly 
see and confess the wisdom of the dispensation by which that book 
has been so inscrutably closed. Anticipation would have weakened 
the impression of every agreeable occurrence, and have strengthened 
that of all my troubles and difficulties. Than to possess such know- 
ledge as this, better is it to remain from day to day in ignorance of 
what shall happen on the morrow. How many times may I have 
exclaimed to myself, with peculiar aptness, ' Sufficient unto the day 
is the evil thereof.' Frequently, when surrounded by difficulties, 
have I long continued struggling through them, supported only by 
the hope and expectation that the morrow, or the morrow, would end 
them. Draw but the picture of one solitary European, wandering, 
unsheltered, over the vast plains of Africa, deep in the interior eleven 
