The night after he left Stanger the air turned bitterly cold, heavy grey clouds filled the sky, and hid the light of the stars.
"Now if I were not in Natal, I should say that there was a heavy fall of snow coming," said the White Man to himself.

"I have often seen the sky look like that in Scotland before snow." Then he reflected that there had been no deep snow in Natal for years, and, having drunk a "tot" of squareface and smoked his pipe, he went to bed beneath the after-tent of his larger wagon.
During the night he was awakened by a sense of bitter cold and the low moaning of the oxen that were tied to the trek-tow, every ox in its place.

He thrust his head through the curtain of the tent and looked out.

The earth was white with snow, and the air was full of it, swept along by a cutting wind.
Now he sprang up, huddling on his clothes and as he did so calling to the Kaffirs who slept beneath the wagons.

Presently they awoke from the stupor which already was beginning to overcome them, and crept out, shivering with cold and wrapped from head to foot in blankets.
"Quick! you boys," he said to them in Zulu; "quick! Would you see the cattle die of the snow and wind?
Loose the oxen from the trek-tows and drive them in between the wagons; they will give them some shelter." And lighting a lantern he sprang out into the snow.
At last it was done--no easy task, for the numbed hands of the Kaffirs could scarcely loosen the frozen reims.