We arrived in safety at Harrismith, the first town of the Orange Free State, lying within a few miles of the top of the Drakensberg, and next day, after a splendid drive at a hand gallop all the way, over a road as flat as a bowling alley, with a perfect Jehu at the reins named Brandon, the heedless scion of a good old Irish family, came late in the evening to Bethlehem, a quiet Dutch town, with two or three English stores, where we rested for a few hours. Then inspanning again, on we drove past Senekal, a wretched little place of about 100 inhabitants, and Winburg, the centre of a fine grazing district, to Bloemfontein, the capital of the state. Here Mr. Brand, the President, since knighted (1882) by the English government for his services in the settlement of the Transvaal difficulties, after the war resided, as did also a bishop of the Anglican communion,[18] but as it was dark when we arrived, I saw nothing of the city. I heard, however, sufficient reports of the dreadful havoc that fever of a remittent type was making among the residents on the diamond fields to make me anxious to arrive there as quickly as possible. We started next morning in the moonlight at 3 o’clock, and drove through, some seventy miles, to Du Toit’s Pan in one day. A long, dusty, tiring day it was, and as if to prove that “coming events cast their shadows before,” we met three or four ox wagons bringing away sick diggers from the fields, who had been stricken down by the prevailing fever. The sun had long set when we neared Du Toit’s Pan, yet the camp, as seen in the distance was one blaze of light. The stores and canteens were open, thronged with customers, while the canvas tents of the diggers, some lit up with candles, some with wood fires, and others blazing with paraffin lamps, studded the surroundings of the mine as with a constellation of stars. When we arrived at Benning & Martin’s, _the_ hotel of the day, the scene was one which almost baffles description. Clusters of men, work being ended, crowded round the post-cart to see the new arrivals, others thronged the adjacent liquor-bars, while every one showed signs of hurrying bustle and feverish excitement. After some refreshment, I took a short stroll through the camp. Novel sights and grotesque scenes met my view at every turn, the lights in the tents throwing “shadows on the wall,” in some cases of the most laughable description. [Illustration: KIMBERLEY MINE—FIRST STAGE, 1871. ]