It was in the middle of the winter when the settlement was located. Numbers flocked in from all quarters; some possessing a few cattle, but far the greater numbers possessing nothing but their hands to work with. They asked Captain Stockenstrom, their great friend, the lieutenant-governor of the frontier, and at whose suggestion this experiment was made, what they were to do, and how they were to subsist. He told them, “if they were not able to cultivate the ground with their fingers, they need not have come there.” Government, even under such rigorous circumstances, gave them no aid whatever except the gift of fire-arms, and some very small portion of seed-corn to the most destitute, to keep them from thieving. Yet, even thus tried, the Hottentots, who had been termed the fag-end of mankind, did not quail or despair. In the words of Mr. Fairbairn, the friend of Pringle, “The Hottentot, escaped from bonds, stood erect on his new territory; and the feeling of being restored to the level of humanity and the simple rights of nature, softened and enlarged his heart, and diffused vigour through every limb!” They dug up roots and wild bulbs for food, and persisted without a murmur, labouring surprisingly, with the most wretched implements, and those who had cattle assisting those who had nothing, to the utmost of their ability. All winter the Caffres, from whom this location had been unjustly wrested by the English, attacked them with a fury only exceeded by their hope of now regaining their territory from mere Hottentots, thus newly armed, and in so wretched a condition. But, though harassed night and day, and never, for a moment, safe in their sleep, they not only repelled the assailants, but continued to cultivate their grounds with prodigious energy. They had to form dams across the river, as stated by Mr. Read, before the Parliamentary committee, and water-courses, sometimes to the depth of ten, twelve, and fourteen feet, and that sometimes through solid rocks, and with very sorry pickaxes, iron crows, and spades; and few of them. These works, says Mr. Read, have excited the admiration of visitors, as well as the roads, which they had to cut to a considerable height on the sides of the mountains.