We left Graham's Town for Fort Peddie, on the 22nd of March, 1843, the waggon allowed by the Commissariat being only half the size of the one we obtained at Port Elizabeth. Just as we were about to start, we were ordered to halt and await further orders; and then I had to listen to a variety of reports. Some said another regiment had arrived at Cape Town, and we were to proceed to Natal; others whispered something about the Isle of France. At all events, important despatches had reached Graham's Town from the seat of Government. So there was I, in my waggon, hired and packet for Fort Peddie, the troops under arms, the commissariat preparations made for the march, the tents struck, etc, and a probability of all these arrangements being upset. At last, a mounted orderly arrived, full of important haste, and breathless, as becomes a herald of South African counter-orders. The detachment was to be detained--for an hour--I forget what for, something about a few extra men, or arms, and we were thus delayed till the afternoon, when we proceeded as far as we could, and pitched our tents on the top of one of many hills, between which the wind came rushing in gusts that threatened to withdraw our shelter from over our heads. My child I screened a little from the chilling wind by placing a saddle in an angle at her head--a novel addition to the couch of a young lady. The next day's journey led us over grassy plains, in which the mimosa, with its bright golden clusters, abounded; and on the third day from Graham's Town we reached Trumpeter's Drift. Here we were detained for two days, owing to the swollen state of the river. When we crossed it, we sent the waggons before us, ere we took our seats in the ferry-boats, as it is not an unusual thing to be wrecked in the Great Fish River, although seated in a ponderous waggon drawn by fourteen oxen. The following ingenious mode of crossing a river was once displayed by a Kaffir who had for some time stood watching the vain attempts of a party of soldiers to struggle across the stream at a time when to ford it was attended by considerable danger. After smiling at their efforts with that sardonic expression remarkable among these savages, he quietly raised a heavy stone, placed it on his head, and then walked, with perfect ease, through the torrent to the opposite side. Another instance of Kaffir ingenuity has been related to me. A missionary and his family were travelling in severely cold weather; now and then they lighted fires, warmed themselves, and then went on. The Kaffir drivers snatched brands from the fires, running on in advance, setting fire to the bushes on the roadside, returning to the waggons, again advancing, and so on, till they left a long line of fiery bushes in the track they had passed over. One of our waggons stuck in the mud on its way; the drivers shouted, the dogs barked, the oxen struggled, but all in vain till the soldiers lent their assistance.