July 4 Saturday – This was a travel day. At 8 a.m. the Clemens party arrived at Victoria West Road (now Hutchinson), some 419 miles northeast of Cape Town [Philippon 23]. Sam sent a postcard of July 4th “salutations” to Hartford lawyer and friend, Henry C. Robinson [MTP].

He also wrote four lines in German on a postcard to Miss Annie E. Trumbull, also of Hartford [MTP]. Note: These two postcards were likely mailed from Hutchinson, as the party did not arrive in Cape Town until the next day.

Parsons writes of the stopover, using Sam’s notebook entries:

Nearly a third of the journey accomplished, the party woke to look out on “an arid plain, flocks of sheep in the distance. Tents; scattering huts; niggers — one, about 14, with her first baby on her hip.” They were at a railway junction and refreshment stop, Victoria West Road…where Mark noted a “yellow wench at the coffee table by the track, in a pink waist & yellow teeth. Quite pretty, but not as pretty as she thought she was. Penguin eggs” [“Traveler in S.A.” 35].