King Williamstown is the head quarters of the Cape mounted frontier police, of which Mr. Bowker, whose opinion respecting Kafirdom I have already quoted, was at the period of my visit the Commandant. This is a force, consisting now of about 1,200 men, maintained by the Colony itself for its own defence, and was no doubt established by the Colony with a view of putting its own foot forward in its own behalf and doing something towards the achievement of that colonial independence of which I have spoken. It has probably been thought that the frontier police might at last stand in lieu of British soldiers. The effort has been well made, and the service is of great use. The brunt of the fighting in the late disturbance has been borne by the mounted police. The men are stationed about the country in small parties,-never I think more than thirty or forty together, and often in smaller numbers. They are very much more efficacious than soldiers, as every man is mounted,—and the men themselves come from a much higher class than that from which our soldiers are enlisted. But the troop is expensive, each private costing on an average about 7s. a day. The men are paid 5s. 6d. a day as soon as they are mounted,-out of which they have to buy and keep their horses and furnish everything for themselves. When they join the force their horses and equipments are supplied to them, but the price is stopped out of their pay. They are recruited generally, though by no means universally, in England, under the care of an emigration agent who is maintained at home. I came out myself with six or seven of them,-three of whom I knew

to be sons of gentlemen, and all of whom may have been so. So terrible is the struggle at home to find employment for young men that the idea of £100 a year at once has charms, even though the receiver of it will have to keep not only himself, but a horse also, out of the money. But the prospect, if fairly seen, is not alluring. The young men when in the Colony are policemen and nothing more than policemen. Many of them after a short compulsory service find a better employment elsewhere, and their places are filled up by new comers.

From King Williamstown I went to East London by railway and there waited till the ship came which was to take me on to Natal. East London is another of those ports which stubborn Nature seems to have made unfit for shipping, but which energy and enterprise are determined to convert to good purposes. As Grahamstown believes in Port Alfred, so does King Williamstown believe in East London, feeling sure that the day will come when no other harbour along the coast will venture to name itself in comparison with her. And East London has as firm a belief in herself, with a trustworthy reliance on a future day when the commerce of nations will ride in safety within her at present ill-omened bar. I had heard much of East London and had been warned that I might find it impossible to get on board the steamer even when she was lying in the roads. At Fort Elizabeth it had been suggested to me that I might very probably have to come back there because no boat at East London would venture to take me out. The same thing was repeated to me along my route, and even at

King Williamstown. But not the less on that account, when I found myself in British Kafraria of which East London is the port, was I assured of all that East London would hereafter perform. No doubt there was a perilous bar. The existence of the bar was freely admitted. No doubt the sweep of the sea in upon the mouth of the Buffalo river was of such a nature as to make all intercourse between ships and the shore both difficult and disagreeable. No doubt the coast was so subject to shipwreck as to have caused the insurance on ships to East London to be abnormally high. All these evils were acknowledged, but all these evils would assuredly be conquered by energy, skill, and money. It was thus that East London was spoken of by the friends who took me there in order that I might see the works which were being carried on with the view of overcoming Nature.

At the present moment East London is certainly a bad spot for shipping. A vessel had broken from her anchor just before my arrival and was lying on the shore a helpless wreck. There were the fragments to be seen of other wrecks; and I heard of many which had made the place noted within the last year or two. Such was the character of the place. I was told by more than one voice that vessels were sent there on purpose to be wrecked. Stories which I heard made me believe in Mr. Plimsoll more than I had ever believed before. "She was intended to come on shore," was said by all voices that day in East London as to the vessel that was still lying among the breakers, while men were at work upon her to get out the cargo. "They know

that ships will drag their anchor here; so, when they want to get rid of an old tub, they send her to East London." It was a terrible tale to hear, and especially so from men who themselves believe in the place with all the implicit confidence of expended capital. On the second day after my arrival the vessel that was to carry me on to Natal steamed into the roads. It had been a lovely morning and was yet early,-about eleven o'clock. I hurried down

with a couple of friends to the man in authority who decides whether communication shall or shall not be had between the shore and the ship, and he, cocking a telescope to his eye, declared that even though the Governor wanted to go on board he would not let a boat stir that day. In my ill-humour I asked him why he would be more willing to risk the Governor's life than that of any less precious individual. I own I thought he was a tyrant,—and perhaps a Sabbatarian, as it was on a Sunday. But in half an hour the wind had justified him, even to my uneducated intelligence. During the whole of that day there was no intercourse possible between the ships and the shore. A boat from a French vessel tried it, and three men out of four were drowned! Early on the following day I was put on board the steamer in a life-boat. Again it was a lovely morning, and the wind had altogether fallen, but the boat shipped so much water that our luggage was wet through.

But it is yet on the cards that the East Londoners may prevail. Under the auspices of Sir John Coote a breakwater is being constructed with the purpose of protecting

the river's mouth from the prevailing winds, and the river is being banked and altered so that the increased force of the water through a narrowed channel may scour away the sand. If these two things can be done then ships will enter the Buffalo river and ride there in delicious ease, and the fortune of the place will be made. I went to see the works and was surprised to find operations of such magnitude going on at a place which apparently was so insignificant. A breakwater was being constructed out from the shore,— not an isolated sea wall as is the breakwater at Plymouth and at Fort Elizabeth, but a pier projecting itself in a curve from one of the points of the river's mouth so as to cover the other when completed. On this £120,000 had already been spent, and a further sum of £80,000 is to be spent. It is to be hoped that it will be well expended,-for which the name of Sir John Coote is a strong guarantee.

At present East London is not a nice place. It is without a pavement,-I may almost say without a street, dotted about over the right river bank here and there, dirty to look at and dishevelled, putting one in mind of the American Eden as painted by Charles Dickens,-only that his Eden was a river Eden while this is a marine Paradise. But all that no doubt will be mended when the breakwater has been completed. I have already spoken of the rivalry between South African ports, as between Port Alfred and Fort Elizabeth, and between South African towns, as between Capetown and Grahamstown. The feeling is carried everywhere, throughout everything. Opposite to the town of East London, on the left side of the Buffalo river, and