A tremendous rain, which at the time I allude to had continued two days, had caused the rivers along the coast to rise from twenty to thirty feet, washing away both the cane from the fields and the coffee trees from the hillsides. In addition, it carved out impassable gullies in the roads, and choking up the rivers themselves with the carcasses of dead oxen, broken reeds and trunks of trees, flooded the surrounding lands, and brought everything to a stand-still. Notwithstanding the terrible driving storm, I did not like the poor fellow to die all alone, without a last effort to save him, so mounting one of my best horses, I rode as far on the way as Mr. Tom Milner’s, one of Natal’s oldest sugar planters, at Redcliffe, where I had to cross a stream at a drift close in front of his mill. When I arrived there, the water was running like a mill-race, but as Fenton Vacy lay on the other side, I determined to make an attempt to get through. In the _Field_, some time after, I read a full and accurate account of my adventure, names only being altered, written by a visitor who was stopping for a few days at Redcliffe, and as the article contains an accurate description of the class of rain storms to which Natal is occasionally liable, I shall take the liberty of reproducing it. The writer says: “After spending a few pleasant days at the Royal Hotel, D’Urban, I was told that a trip to Victoria County was the thing every one ought to do, and that the planters were always glad to receive visitors lately out from England. Accordingly, having had a horse lent me, I started on a little tour, intending to visit some of the principal estates. The chief caution the old hands gave me at D’Urban was, ‘Look out for the rains, and when they come, don’t attempt crossing any river by yourself,’ the soundness of which advice I had ample means of testing before my return. “The first river on my road was the Umgeni, stretching across which was an iron bridge, at this time a good forty feet above the stream, which was running rapidly but smoothly out to sea, distant some half mile or so. This bridge had been erected at great cost and trouble, and was pronounced to be strong enough to resist any flood. “After a day’s hard riding I arrived at a sugar estate in Victoria County, and received from its owner a pressing invitation to remain a day or two and look round the place.