Page:Seven Years in South Africa v1.djvu/256

 the rain had washed away the soil and left deep gullies in the path. The waggon was in imminent danger of being overturned every few minutes, and it may be imagined that a progress under such circumstances was little to the advantage either of the baggage or my collection. As for ourselves the jolting was far too violent to allow any one of us to ride inside the waggon. The last hill into Hebron seemed to bring the peril to its climax; so steep was the descent and so sharp the curves that it made, that it was only by our combined efforts that we saved the waggon from being jerked completely over, or the oxen from rolling down the incline.

It was early on Easter Day that we were arriving at Hebron; the weather was cold and ungenial; the sky was overcast by leaden clouds drifted along by a keen south-west wind; it was just the morning to throw a chill over the most cheerful heart. Nor did the aspect of the remains of the once important diggings and station tend to enliven the spirits; ruins they could not be called, for the materials employed were of too transitory a character to allow the dwellings that were constructed to become worthy of such a description. The prospect would have been dreary at the best, but seen through the mists of a dank autumn morning, it was depressing in the extreme. Of the once populous Hebron, all that now remained was a shop or two, an hotel, a smithy, a slaughter-house, and a prison. Crumbling, weather-beaten walls of clay were standing or falling in every