These African thunderstorms occur at different seasons in different
localities, and everywhere they are terrible. They do more harm by
their violence than the rain which accompanies them does good. During
their continuance (fortunately they never last long) the water comes
down in veritable sheets, rushing down slopes and mountain-sides in a
resistless flood, swelling rivers in a few moments from ditches into
torrents.
A storm in the mountains at times fills the streams leading out from
them to such an extent that with scarcely any warning the waters come
tumbling down in cataracts, the rivers rising to a height of forty feet
in as many minutes. A friend of ours with his partner had been trading
for years in the Zambesi country, and was bringing down a large quantity
of furs, feathers, and ivory to the colonial market. On reaching the
banks of a little river, remarking that it was running somewhat swifter
than usual, they entered it with their wagon, without any thought of
danger.
Suddenly, as they reached the middle, the waters came rolling down with
a roar like Niagara, sweeping away the results of two years' labour in a
moment; they barely escaped with their lives. We asked our friend what
he did at the time. "Why," said he, "we tried to express the situation
in words, but we could not do it justice, so we just sat down on two
ant-hills, laughing at one another and our luck." Several similar cases
occurred during our stay in the upland country. A coach with four
passengers was swept away in a moment while fording a swelling river at
night, the driver only escaping.
The boys were soon at work coaxing up a fire, with the help of some dry
wood we had in the wagon, and coffee was made. The meal was rather
dismal, for night had fallen, and the boys were looking anxiously at the
condition of the road, and the hopeless state of the wagon wheels, which
had sunk into the sloppy turf almost up to the hubs. There was no use
trying to go on that night, so putting out our swinging lantern, we lay
down to sleep.
At daylight we were awakened by the jolting of the wagon, and found that
our bodyguard had inspanned, and, having dug us out of the muddy prison,
had succeeded in getting us under way. Hastily making our toilets with
difficulty, we were thrown from side to side of the wagon at every
lurch; we jumped out and walked, finding the exercise preferable to the
jarring of the vehicle. Indeed, we walked most of the journey, and were
better for it. Enjoying an excellent breakfast, which again put us in
good spirits, we were beginning to think we should have a clear day, but
another spell of rain at ten o'clock came on. It continued raining all
day, with short intervals of sunshine. These were taken advantage of to
make short treks.
At four o'clock, as we were sitting in the fore part of our chariot
looking out at the drizzling rain, the front wheels slowly sank and
nearly disappeared in a deep mud hole, bringing the steaming oxen to a
full stop. In vain the driver cracked his long whip and yelled; we were
hopelessly stuck. I was sitting in front when the accident occurred,
and jumped out, landing in a deep mud hole. We slept that night at an
angle of nearly forty-five degrees, and when morning broke it was
welcome, as it brought with it some bright sunshine and prospect of
clearing weather.
It took five hours and the effort of the combined lungs of the party
upon the oxen, together with the inventive genius and experience of all
the members of our staff, to get us out of that mud hole. They
outspanned and inspanned three times before the wagon stirred, and a
hole had been dug big enough to bury us all in before the wheels were
released. At last, with a whoop and a yell and a groan, it was hoisted
out of its oozy prison and drawn onto the veldt, when the oxen were
outspanned and breakfast was eaten.
During several successive days, while travelling in the Orange Free
State, we passed hundreds of huge ant-hills. One might say there are
villages of these; they are formed together in thousands, they disappear
for a space, and are again met with. Some of them measure ten feet and
more in circumference, and are between three and four feet high, and are
filled with black and yellow ants. The clay becomes hard from the sun's
rays. An ox-wagon driver hews out an ant-hill forming an oven, in which
he cooks his bread, the clay burning like a slow fire, and with an
intense heat.
From this time on the weather was delightful; with the exception of one
thunderstorm it continued so during the six weeks we remained in the
wagon. We soon forgot the unpleasant experiences of the first few days.
In forty-eight hours the sun had dried the road, so that travelling was
comparatively easy, and we passed over the level plain, arriving in
Smithfield on the fifth morning after leaving Bloemfontein, where we
outspanned on a plateau adjoining the village. We here met with a lady
friend from the diamond fields, who invited us to visit her for a few
days; but we had now become attached to our gypsy life, and preferred
our own fireside.
Smithfield is a fair-sized village of the usual Free State kind,
possessing a few fine churches, a few streets of one-storey roomy
houses, and several stores. When our tented home began to move along
the road away from the village we trudged alongside of it as happy and
healthy as school-girls, and feeling as free from restraint as the
birds.