On one passage down we were anchored at East London, and a breeze of wind came on from the sea. Seven sailing-ships went on shore that night, one, a brig called the _Nant-y-Glo_, driving close past us. At that we decided to slip and go to sea without loss of time; we did so, but, picking up the cable next day when we were fast to the slip rope in the cutter, the ship drifted down on us, fouled the rope with her propeller and capsized us all into the water. That was one of the occasions when I saw Manning run. Curiously enough, we let go another anchor, and when we picked it up brought up the other cable that we had slipped foul of it, so all was joy once more. But the boilers were in that sad condition that it was necessary to go in for thorough repairs. We had had to delay our sailing from Cape Town for four days through bad leaks, on one occasion; and as the Company had just got the contract for the Zanzibar mail we went in for a thorough overhaul. This was towards the end of 1872, and a good two months were spent over the operation. When it was finished, we found the _Natal_ painted yellow, the better to withstand the anticipated heat of Zanzibar. Before we started the first voyage on the new route, we made a trial trip to Saldanah Bay, and took up with us as visitors many of the principal people in the Cape, including Mr. Molteno, the premier, and his two sons. I wonder if one of those sons, now an M.P. and director of a steamship company, remembers firing one of our twelve-pounder signal-guns under my tuition? It was a very jolly trip, and we all enjoyed ourselves immensely. We changed our chief officer about this time, and got in his place an officer named Barker, a man of no striking personality but a good fellow, who always went about the deck humming, and had a most curious voice.