In dry weather all the larger rivers in Basutoland are sluggish, calm tracts of water, the smaller streams mere silvery trickles, bubbling happily in and out amongst the stones on their course, but they all rise rapidly, and in an almost incredibly short time become roaring torrents, most dangerous, nay even impossible to ford. Both to see and hear a river "coming down" is a thing never to be forgotten. The roar of the first big volume of water as it comes is not a pleasant sound to the traveller crossing "the drift," the sight still less pleasant if he is not already across. There are no bridges in Basutoland, and many of the drifts are steep and unpleasant, even in fine weather, when there is only a normal quantity of water in the river. In the time of the old chief Molapo, women invariably went to the top of Leribe Mountain, a large table-land, to dig for clay with which to plaster their huts. Upon one occasion they found some pretty stones, which they gave as playthings to their children. Some Europeans happening to see these stones, at once recognised that they were diamonds of considerable value, and endeavoured to buy them (one was reported to be "as large as a big man's thumb"), but Molapo, hearing of it, ordered the stones to be returned to the place where they were found and re-buried in the clay; nor would he, in future, allow any one to revisit that spot. In order to keep a constant watch upon the place, he had a village built close by, whose inhabitants were to inform him of any one attempting to disobey his commands. The village is still there, and the spot is guarded as jealously as ever. Very few people know of this, and I do not suppose that more than two Europeans could find the place where those diamonds lie buried. The Basuto have such a dread of their country becoming overrun with white men that they most jealously guard its wealth. The land is theirs, they say. If the white man thinks it has gold and diamonds he will take it from them. This is not the only spot in the country upon which a constant watch is kept. There is gold quartz to be found in some of the river beds, and they are guarded. There are reefs here and there through the western part of Basutoland which certainly indicate gold, and they, too, are guarded. A friend of mine one day, in walking up a hill, picked up a piece of quartz and took it home to show her husband. The next day she was politely asked by the chief of the district why she had been picking up his stones, and would she be so kind as not to take any more from that spot. It was, of course, very politely put, but it showed how much the chief knew, and that he dreaded that knowledge being carried out of the country.