A WORTHLESS COUNTRY. 
239 
later on, is one series of uninterrupted blue skies. 
The air is so clear that the moon is visible the whole 
day, and the nights are delicious, just cold enough to 
hug your blanket close and sleep sound as a top; 
while the horses, oxen, dogs, cow and calf lie in a 
circle around the wagon, where they come of their 
own accord from custom and for safety. 
2 8th .—I have had weary work of it the last four 
days. The weather has been awfully hot, and the 
clouds of sand raised by the tramping of fourteen 
oxen, and driven against me by a head wind, all but 
smothered me alive in the wagon, and has made me 
as black as a chimney-sweep. I don’t think I shall 
get the grit out of my mouth for a week, as every 
particle of food is full of sand. There is no game 
or water. The country is utterly worthless, and will, 
I have no doubt, remain in peaceable possession of 
Kaffirs as long as the world lasts. It is an almost 
endless flat, with rank grass, thorns, brambles and 
worthless scrub-brush, and it reminds me of being 
on the line in a calm day. I must own yesterday I 
was quite down-hearted. After riding for several 
hours in front with the horses, in search of water, with 
a damp handkerchief around my mouth to prevent 
thirst, we at length came to a pit with about three 
inches of mud and water, but it was such stuff that 
the very oxen, after being eighteen hours in the 
yoke, would not taste it; and, in spite of our utmost 
efforts, trampled the little there was into mud. The 
Kaffirs throw in the most virulent 6 wait-a-while’ 
