The person most dominant among them is one Mrs. Jenkins, the widow of a missionary, who is said to rule them easily, pleasantly, and prudently. Mrs. Jenkins, however, cannot live for ever. But it is thought that the Pondos will of their own accord become British subjects even during the reign of Mrs. Jenkins. The mouth of the St. John’s River is in the country of the Pondos, and it would be greatly to the benefit of South Eastern Africa generally that a harbour for the purposes of commerce should be opened on that portion of the coast. CHAPTER XV. THE BASUTOS. Of the Basutos I have said something in my attempt to tell the story of the Orange Free State; but the tribe still occupy so large a space in South Africa and has made itself so conspicuous in South African affairs as to require some further short mention for the elucidation of South African history. They are a people who have been moved, up and down, about South Africa and have thus travelled much, who have come to be located on the land they now hold partly as refugees and partly as conquerors, who thirty years ago had a great Chief called Moshesh of whom some have asserted that he was a Christian, and others that he was a determined Savage, who are still to be found in various parts of South Africa, and who perhaps possess in their head-quarters of Basuto Land the very best agricultural soil on the continent. There are at present supposed to be about 127,000 of them settled on this land, among whom there would be according to the general computation about 21,000 fighting warriors. The fighting men are estimated to be a sixth of the whole tribe,--so that every adult male not incapacitated by age or misfortune is counted as a fighting man. To imagine, however, that if the Basutos were to go to war they could bring an army of 20,000 men into the field, would be to pay an unmerited compliment to their power of combination, to their commissariat supplies, and to their general patriotism. But as in late years they have bought a great many ploughs, as they are great growers of corn, and as they have become lovers of trade, lovers of money, growers of wool, and friends of the English,--as they are loyal English subjects,--we will not be indignant with them on account of any falling off in their military capacity. The Basutos are not Kafirs or Zulus. They are a branch of the Bechuanas a large tribe or rather race of Natives whose own territory lies west of the Transvaal, and between that and the great Kalahari Desert. I have already spoke of the Baralongs of Thaba ’Ncho as having come out from among the same race. Were I to say much of the Bechuanas I should find myself wandering again all over South Africa. I will therefore not pursue them further, merely remarking that they too are become irrepressible, and that before long we shall find ourselves compelled to annex one branch of them after another in connection with Griqualand West and the Diamond Fields.