98 
AFRICAN HUNTING. 
paying his father for his being killed in my service. 
There is no use arguing with Kaffirs; when they 
take a thing into their heads, they are worse than 
mules, so I was obliged most reluctantly to leave 
the poor fellow behind. I was left in a pretty fix, 
with no one but the driver to manage four loose 
horses and as many loose oxen, as well as the wagon. 
I managed for a few miles, and then had the luck 
to pick up a boy to go with us to the Tngela for 
half-a-crown. In the evening two Dutchmen stopped 
at my wagon, who said the Kaffirs who had left me 
wanted gunpowder—a very usual remedy with them 
in many cases—and also told me that the Kaffirs 
intended to bleed the wounded man between the 
shoulders and rub in gunpowder. I fear they must 
have killed him amongst them all. 
On the 14th I reached the Tugela, where I was 
detained a fortnight for want of a proper pass, 
signed by a resident magistrate. On May 1st I got 
the pass, and crossed the river, which was very high. 
In the course of a few days I lost three of my horses 
from the lung sickness, and on the 10th my mare 
Bessie Bell sickened. I sent her off immediately to 
Lewis, requesting him to bleed her, and followed 
the next day with a sorry heart, to hear her fate. I 
was in time to see her alive. I loosened her halter, 
and she followed me about like a dog, looking most 
piteously. I could not bear to see her, and thought 
of shooting her, but, before I could make up my 
mind to do so, her miseries were ended. She was a 
