This description may be supplemented by that of a scene of frequent occurrence, given in “Robert and Mary Moffat” by their son Mr. John A. Moffat.  He says:  “The public services were, of course, in the Sechwana language.  Once a week the missionary families met for an English devotional meeting.  It was also a sort of custom that as the sun went down there should be a short truce from work every evening.  A certain eminence at the back of the station became, by common consent, the meeting-place.  There the missionary fathers of the hamlet would be found, each sitting on his accustomed stone.  Before them lay the broad valley, once a reedy morass, now reclaimed and partitioned out into garden lands; its margin fringed with long water-courses, overhung with grey willows and the dark green syringa.  On the low ground bordering the valley stood the church, with its attendant mission-houses and schools, and on the heights were perched the native villages, for the most part composed of round, conical huts, not unlike corn-stacks at a distance, with some more ambitious attempts at house-building in the shape of semi-European cottages.  Eastward stretched a grassy plain, bounded by the horizon, and westward a similar plain, across which about five miles distant, was a range of low hills.  Down to the right, in a bushy dell, was the little burying-ground, marked by a few trees.”

In 1845, Robert Moffat narrowly escaped an accident that would have involved most serious consequences.  He was superintending the erection of a new corn-mill, and whilst seeing to its being properly started, incautiously stretched his arm over two cog-wheels.  In an instant the shirt sleeve was caught and drawn in, and with it the arm.  Fortunately the mill was stopped in time, but an ugly wound, six inches in length, with torn edges, bore witness to the danger escaped.  This wound laid him aside for many weeks, but finally he recovered from the effects of the accident.

For the next four or five years things pursued an even course at the Kuruman.  In 1846, Mary Moffat started on a journey to visit the Livingstones at Chonwane.  She availed herself of the escort of a native hunting party, and took her three younger children with her.  She passed through the usual dangers of such a journey, as the following extract from a letter written to her husband will show:—­

“I am very glad of Boey’s company....  I should indeed have felt very solitary with my lone waggon with ignorant people, but he is so completely at home in this field that one feels quite easy.  We do not stop at nights by the waters, but come to them at mid-day, and then leave about three or four o’clock.  We cannot but be constantly on the outlook for lions, as we come on their spoor every day, and the people sometimes hear them roar.  Just before outspanning to-day, Boey, being on horseback looking for water, met with a majestic one, which stood still and looked at him.  He tried to frighten the lion, but he stood his ground, when Boey thought it was time to send a ball into him, which broke his leg, by which means he is disabled from paying us a visit.”