That the country is a magnificent one, apart from gold, I have no hesitation in saying. Any country in such a latitude, and at such an elevation, well watered, with prolific soil, healthy and bracing, if ordinary comforts are attainable, could not fail to be. The scenery is in many parts, as I have previously described, very fine; there is abundance of timber, excellent prospects for cereals, and many kinds of ore exist which will come in for future development; and gold is there too. On that point I am perfectly satisfied; whether in large or small quantities, whether payable or unpayable, is a matter which can only be decided by years of careful prospecting and sinking of shafts, not by hasty scratching on the surface or the verdict of so-called ‘experts’ after a hurried visit. That gold was there in very large quantities is also certain, from the vast acres of alluvial soil, turned over, and the countless shafts sunk in remote antiquity. To carry out what is necessary for this possible future development, or, perhaps, to speak more correctly, resuscitation of this country, an easy access is indispensable, and the great check to this progress hitherto has been the absence of railways in South Africa on the eastern seaboard, the natural and easiest entrance to the country being in the hands of the listless Portuguese. Progress is impossible with Kimberley as a base of operations and a thousand miles trek over difficult and swampy roads before the scene of action is reached. In Western America the railway is the first thing, development comes next; and inasmuch as the Chartered Company have tried the converse of this—to put the cart before the horse, to use a familiar simile—they have met with innumerable difficulties at the very outset. Having entered the country by the weary waggon-road through Bechuanaland, and having left it by the now somewhat arduous Pungwe route, I can confidently affirm that this latter is the only possible route; and I now propose to describe it as it at present exists, feeling sure that in years to come, when the railway hurries the traveller up to Umtali, when the venomous tsetse-fly no longer destroys all transport animals, when lions cease to roar at night, and the game has retired to a respectful distance, a back glimpse at the early days of this route will be historically interesting.