Chapter Eight.Shows the Pleasures, Pains, and Penalties of Housekeeping in the Bush.“Don’t you think this a charming life?” asked Mrs Brook of Mrs Merton, who had been her guest for a week.Mrs Merton was about thirty years of age, and opinionated, if not strong-minded, also rather pretty. She had married young, and her eldest son, a lad of twelve, had brought her from her husband’s farm, some three miles distant from that of Edwin Brook.“No, Mrs Brook, I don’t like it at all,” was Mrs Merton’s emphatic reply.“Indeed!” said Mrs Brook, in some surprise.She said nothing more after this for some time, but continued to ply her needle busily, while Mrs Scholtz, who by some piece of unusual good fortune had got Junkie to sleep, plied her scissors in cutting out and shaping raw material.The two dames, with the nurse and Gertie, had agreed to unite their powers that day in a resolute effort to overtake the household repairs. They were in a cottage now, of the style familiarly known as “wattle and dab,” which was rather picturesque than permanent, and suggestive of simplicity. They sat on rude chairs, made by Scholtz, round a rough table by the same artist. Mrs Brook was busy with the rends in a blue pilot-cloth jacket, a dilapidated remnant of the “old England” wardrobe. The nurse was forming a sheep skin into a pair of those unmentionables which were known among the Cape-colonists of that period by the name of “crackers.” Mrs Merton was busy with a pair of the same, the knees of which had passed into a state of nonentity, while other parts were approaching the same condition. Gertie was engaged on a pair of socks, whose original formation was overlaid by and nearly lost in subsequent deposits.“Why do you like this sort of life, Mrs Brook?” asked Mrs Merton suddenly.“Because it is so new, so busy, so healthy, so thoroughly practical. Such a constant necessity for doing something useful, and a constant supply of something useful to do, and then such a pleasant feeling of rest when at last you do get your head on a pillow.”“Oh! it’s delightful!” interpolated Gertie in a low voice.“Well, now, that is strange. Everything depends on how one looks at things.—What doyouthink, Mrs Scholtz?” asked Mrs Merton.“I’ve got no time to think, ma’am,” replied the nurse, giving the embryo crackers a slice that bespoke the bold fearless touch of a thorough artist. “When Junkie’s not asleep he keeps body and brain fully employed, and when he is asleep I’m glad to let body and brain alone.”“What is your objection to this life, Mrs Merton?” asked Mrs Brook, with a smile.“Oh! I’ve no special objection, only I hate it altogether. How is it possible to like living in a wilderness, with no conveniences around one, no society to chat with, no books to read, and, above all, no shops to go to, where one is obliged to drudge at menial work from morning till night, and one’s boys and girls get into rags and tatters, and one’s husband becomes little better than a navvy, to say nothing of snakes and scorpions in one’s bed and boots, and the howling of wild beasts all night? I declare, one might as well live in a menagerie.”“But you must remember that things are in a transition state just now,” rejoined Mrs Brook. “As we spread and multiply over the land, things will fall more into shape. We shall have tailors and dressmakers to take the heavy part of our work in this way, and the wild beasts will retire before the rifle and the plough of civilised man; no doubt, also, shops will come in due course.”“And what of the Kafirs?” cried Mrs Merton sternly. “Do you flatter yourself that either the plough or the rifle will stop their thievish propensities? Have we not learned, when too late—for here we are, and here we must bide,—that the black wretches have been at loggerheads with the white men ever since this was a colony, and is it not clear that gentle treatment and harsh have alike failed to improve them?”“Wise treatment has yet to be tried,” said Mrs Brook.“Fiddlesticks!” returned Mrs Merton impatiently. “What do you call wise treatment?”“Gospel treatment,” replied Mrs Brook.“Oh! come now, you know thatthathas also been tried, and has signally failed. Have we not heard how many hundreds of so-called black converts in this and in other colonies are arrant hypocrites, or at all events give way before the simplest temptations?”“I have also heard,” returned Mrs Brook, “of many hundreds of so-called white Christians, whose lives prove them to be the enemies of our Saviour, and who do not even condescend to hypocrisy, for they will plainly tell you that they ‘make no pretence to be religious,’ though they call themselves Christians. But that does not prove gospel treatment among the English to have been a failure. You have heard, I daresay, of the Hottentot robber Africaner, who was long the terror and scourge of the district where he lived, but who, under the teaching of our missionary Mr Moffat, or rather, I should say, under the influence of God’s Holy Spirit, has led a righteous, peaceful, Christian life for many years. He is alive still to prove the truth of what I say.”“I’ll believe it when I see it,” returned Mrs Merton, with a decisive compression of her lips.“Well, many people have testified to the truth of this, and some of these people have seen Africaner and have believed.”“Humph!” returned Mrs Merton.This being an unanswerable argument, Mrs Brook smiled by way of reply, and turned a sleeve inside out, the better to get at its dilapidations. Changing the subject, she desired Gertie to go and prepare dinner, as it was approaching noon.“What shall I prepare, mother?” asked Gertie, laying down her work.“You’d better make a hash of the remains of yesterday’s leg of mutton, dear; it will be more quickly done than the roasting of another leg, and we can’t spare time on cookery to-day. I daresay Mrs Merton will excuse—”“Mrs Brook,” interrupted Mrs Merton, with that Spartan-like self-denial to which she frequently laid claim, without, however, the slightest shadow of a title, “I can eat anything on a emergency. Have the hash by all means.”“And I’m afraid, Mrs Merton,” continued Mrs Brook, in an apologetic tone, “that we shall have to dine without bread to-day—we have run short of flour. My husband having heard that the Thomases have recently got a large supply, has gone to their farm to procure some, but their place is twelve miles off, so he can’t be back till night. You won’t mind, I trust?”Mrs Merton vowed that she didn’t mind, became more and more Spartanic in her expression and sentiments, and plied her needle with increased decision.Just then Gertie re-entered the cottage with a face expressive of concern.“Mother, there’s no meat in the larder.”“No meat, child? You must be mistaken. We ate only a small part of yesterday’s leg.”“Oh! ma’am,” exclaimed the nurse, dropping the scissors suddenly, and looking somewhat guilty, “I quite forgot, ma’am, to say that master, before he left this morning, and while you was asleep, ma’am, ordered me to give all the meat we had in the house to Scholtz, as he was to be away four or five days, and would require it all, so I gave him the leg that was hanging up in the larder, and master himself took the remains of yesterday’s leg, bidding me be sure to tell George to kill a sheep and have meat ready for dinner.”“Oh, well, it doesn’t matter,” said Mrs Brook; “we shall just have to wait a little longer.”Nurse looked strangely remorseful.“But, ma’am—” she said, and paused.“Well, nurse!”“I forgot, ma’am—indeed I did—to tell George to kill a sheep.”Mrs Brook’s hands and work fell on her lap, and she looked from Mrs Scholtz to her visitor, and from her to the anxious Gertie, without speaking.“Why, what’s the matter?” asked Mrs Merton.“My dear,” replied Mrs Brook, with a touch of solemnity, “George Dally, our man, asked me this morning if he might go into the bush to cut rafters for the new kitchen, and I gave him leave, knowing nothing of what arrangements had been made before—and—and—in short, there’s not a man on the place, and—there’s nothing to eat.”The four females looked at each other in blank silence for a few seconds, as the full significance of their circumstances became quite clear to them.Mrs Merton was the first to recover.“Now,” said she, while the Spartanic elements of her nature became intensified, “we must rise to this occasion like true women; we must prove ourselves to be not altogether dependent on man; we must face the difficulty, sink the natural tenderness of our sex, and—and—kill a sheep!”She laid down the crackers on the table with an air of resolution, and rose to put her fell intent in execution.But the carrying out of her plan was not so easy as the good lady had, at the first blush of the thing, imagined it would be. In the first place, like other heroes and heroines, she experienced the enervating effects of opposition and vacillating purpose in others.“You must all help me,” she said, with the air of a commander-in-chief.“Help you to kill a sheep, ma’am?” said Mrs Scholtz, with a shudder, “I’ll die first! I couldn’t do it, and I wouldn’t, for my weight in gold.”Notwithstanding the vehemence of her protestation, the nurse stood by and listened while the other conspirators talked in subdued tones, and with horrified looks, of the details of the contemplated murder.“I never even saw the dreadful deed done,” said Mrs Brook, becoming pale as she thought of it.“Oh, mamma! much better go without meat; we could dine on cakes,” suggested Gertie.“But my love, there is not a cake or an ounce of flour in the house.”“Women!” exclaimed Mrs Merton severely, “we must rise to the occasion. I am hungrynow, and it is not yet noon; what will be our condition if we wait till night for our dinner?”This was a home-thrust. The conspirators shuddered and agreed to do the deed. Gertie, in virtue of her youth, was exempted from taking any active part, but an unaccountable fascination constrained her to follow and be a witness—in short, an accomplice.“Do you know where—where—theknifeis kept?” asked Mrs Merton.Mrs Scholtz knew, and brought it from the kitchen.It was a keen serviceable knife, with a viciously sharp point. Mrs Merton received it, coughed, and hurried out to the sheep-fold, followed by her accomplices.To catch a sheep was not difficult, for the animals were all more or less tame and accustomed to gentle treatment by the females, but to hold it was quite another thing. Mrs Merton secured it by the head, Mrs Scholtz laid hold of the tail, and Mrs Brook fastened her fingers in the wool of its back. Each female individually was incapable of holding the animal, though a very small one had been purposely selected, but collectively they were more than a match for it. After a short struggle it was laid on its side, and its feet were somewhat imperfectly secured with a pocket-handkerchief.“Now, ma’am,” cried Mrs Scholtz, holding tight to the tail and shutting her eyes, “do be quick.”Mrs Merton, also shutting her eyes, struck feebly with the knife. The others, having likewise shut their eyes, waited a few seconds in a state of indescribable horror, and then opened them to find that the Spartan lady had missed her mark, and planted her weapon in the ground! So feeble, however, had been the stroke that it had barely penetrated an inch of the soil.“Oh, Mrs Merton!” exclaimed Mrs Brook remonstratively.Mrs Merton tried again more carefully, and hit the mark, but still without success.“Itwon’tgo in!” she gasped, as, on opening her eyes a second time, she found only a few drops of blood trickling from a mere scratch in the sheep’s neck; “I—Ican’tdo it!”At that moment the unfortunate animal suddenly freed its head from the Spartan matron’s grasp. A sharp wriggle freed its tail and feet, and in another moment it burst away from its captors and made for a shallow pond formed by Edwin Brook for a colony of household ducks.Roused to excessive indignation by the weakness and boastfulness of Mrs Merton, Mrs Scholtz sprang to her feet and gave chase. The others joined. Hunger, shame, determination, disappointment, combined to give them energy of purpose. The sheep rushed into the pond. Mrs Scholtz recklessly followed—up to the knees—caught it by the horns, and dragged it forth.“Give me the knife!” she shouted.Mrs Merton hurriedly obeyed, and the nurse, shutting her eyes, plunged it downwards with a wild hysterical shriek.There was no mistake this time. Letting the animal go, she fled, red-handed, into the innermost recess of the cottage, followed by her horrified friends.“Oh! whathaveI done?” groaned Mrs Scholtz; burying her face in her hands.Mrs Brook and the others—all shuddering—sought to soothe her, and in a short time they regained sufficient composure to permit of their returning to the victim, which they found lying dead upon the ground.Having thus got over the terrible first step, the ladies hardened themselves to the subsequent processes, and these they also found more difficult than they had anticipated. The skinning of a sheep they did not understand. Of the cutting up they were equally ignorant, and a terrible mess they made of the poor carcass in their varied efforts. In despair Mrs Brook suggested to Mrs Scholtz, who was now the chief and acknowledged operator, that they had better cut it up without skinning, and singe off the wool and skin together; but on attempting this Mrs Scholtz found that she could not find the joints, and, being possessed of no saw, could not cut the bones; whereupon Mrs Merton suggested that she should cut out four slices from any part that would admit of being penetrated by a knife, and leave the rest of the operation to be performed by Dally on his return. This proposal was acted on. Four fat slices were cut from the flanks and carried by Gertie to the kitchen, where they were duly cooked, and afterwards eaten with more relish than might have been expected, considering the preliminaries to the feast.This was one of those difficulties that did not occur to them again. It was a preventable difficulty, to be avoided in future by the exercise of forethought; but there were difficulties and troubles in store against which forethought was of little avail.While they were yet in the enjoyment of the chops which had caused them so much mental and physical pain, they were alarmed by a sudden cry from Junkie. Looking round they saw that urchin on his knees holding on to the side of his home-made crib, and gazing in blank amazement at the hole in the wall which served for a window. And well might he gaze, for he saw the painted face of a black savage looking in at that window!On beholding him Mrs Merton uttered a scream and Mrs Brook an exclamation. Mrs Scholtz and Gertie seemed bereft of power to move or cry.Perhaps the Kafir took this for the British mode of welcoming a stranger. At all events, he left the window and entered by the door. Being quite naked, with the exception of the partial covering afforded by a leopard-skin robe, his appearance was naturally alarming to females who had never before seen a native of South Africa in his war-paint. They remained perfectly still, however, and quite silent, while he went through the cottage appropriating whatever things took his fancy. He was the native whom we have already introduced as having been met by George Dally, though of course the Brook household were not aware of this.A few other savages entered the cottage soon after, and were about to follow the example of their chief and help themselves, but he sternly ordered them to quit, and they submissively obeyed.When he had gone out, without having condescended to notice any of the household, Master Junkie gave vent to a long-suspended howl, and claimed the undivided attention of Mrs Scholtz, whose touching blandishments utterly failed in quieting him. The good nurse was unexpectedly aided, however, by the savage chief, who on repassing the window, looked in and made his black face supernaturally hideous by glaring at the refractory child. Junkie was petrified on the spot, and remained “good” till forgetfulness and sleep overpowered him.Meanwhile Mrs Merton swooned into a chair—or appeared to do so—and Mrs Brook, recovering from her first alarm, went out with Gertie to see what the black marauders were about.They were just in time to see the last tail of their small flock of sheep, and their still smaller herd of cattle, disappear into the jungle, driven by apparently a score of black, lithe, and naked devils, so ugly and unearthly did the Kafirs seem on this their first visit to the unfortunate settlers.It was a peculiarly bitter trial to the Brooks, for the herd and flock just referred to had been acquired, after much bargaining, from a Dutch farmer only a few days before, and Edwin Brook was rather proud of his acquisition, seeing that few if any of the settlers had at that time become possessors of live stock to any great extent. It was, however, a salutary lesson, and the master of Mount Hope—so he had named his location—never again left his wife and family unguarded for a single hour during these first years of the infant colony.
“Don’t you think this a charming life?” asked Mrs Brook of Mrs Merton, who had been her guest for a week.
Mrs Merton was about thirty years of age, and opinionated, if not strong-minded, also rather pretty. She had married young, and her eldest son, a lad of twelve, had brought her from her husband’s farm, some three miles distant from that of Edwin Brook.
“No, Mrs Brook, I don’t like it at all,” was Mrs Merton’s emphatic reply.
“Indeed!” said Mrs Brook, in some surprise.
She said nothing more after this for some time, but continued to ply her needle busily, while Mrs Scholtz, who by some piece of unusual good fortune had got Junkie to sleep, plied her scissors in cutting out and shaping raw material.
The two dames, with the nurse and Gertie, had agreed to unite their powers that day in a resolute effort to overtake the household repairs. They were in a cottage now, of the style familiarly known as “wattle and dab,” which was rather picturesque than permanent, and suggestive of simplicity. They sat on rude chairs, made by Scholtz, round a rough table by the same artist. Mrs Brook was busy with the rends in a blue pilot-cloth jacket, a dilapidated remnant of the “old England” wardrobe. The nurse was forming a sheep skin into a pair of those unmentionables which were known among the Cape-colonists of that period by the name of “crackers.” Mrs Merton was busy with a pair of the same, the knees of which had passed into a state of nonentity, while other parts were approaching the same condition. Gertie was engaged on a pair of socks, whose original formation was overlaid by and nearly lost in subsequent deposits.
“Why do you like this sort of life, Mrs Brook?” asked Mrs Merton suddenly.
“Because it is so new, so busy, so healthy, so thoroughly practical. Such a constant necessity for doing something useful, and a constant supply of something useful to do, and then such a pleasant feeling of rest when at last you do get your head on a pillow.”
“Oh! it’s delightful!” interpolated Gertie in a low voice.
“Well, now, that is strange. Everything depends on how one looks at things.—What doyouthink, Mrs Scholtz?” asked Mrs Merton.
“I’ve got no time to think, ma’am,” replied the nurse, giving the embryo crackers a slice that bespoke the bold fearless touch of a thorough artist. “When Junkie’s not asleep he keeps body and brain fully employed, and when he is asleep I’m glad to let body and brain alone.”
“What is your objection to this life, Mrs Merton?” asked Mrs Brook, with a smile.
“Oh! I’ve no special objection, only I hate it altogether. How is it possible to like living in a wilderness, with no conveniences around one, no society to chat with, no books to read, and, above all, no shops to go to, where one is obliged to drudge at menial work from morning till night, and one’s boys and girls get into rags and tatters, and one’s husband becomes little better than a navvy, to say nothing of snakes and scorpions in one’s bed and boots, and the howling of wild beasts all night? I declare, one might as well live in a menagerie.”
“But you must remember that things are in a transition state just now,” rejoined Mrs Brook. “As we spread and multiply over the land, things will fall more into shape. We shall have tailors and dressmakers to take the heavy part of our work in this way, and the wild beasts will retire before the rifle and the plough of civilised man; no doubt, also, shops will come in due course.”
“And what of the Kafirs?” cried Mrs Merton sternly. “Do you flatter yourself that either the plough or the rifle will stop their thievish propensities? Have we not learned, when too late—for here we are, and here we must bide,—that the black wretches have been at loggerheads with the white men ever since this was a colony, and is it not clear that gentle treatment and harsh have alike failed to improve them?”
“Wise treatment has yet to be tried,” said Mrs Brook.
“Fiddlesticks!” returned Mrs Merton impatiently. “What do you call wise treatment?”
“Gospel treatment,” replied Mrs Brook.
“Oh! come now, you know thatthathas also been tried, and has signally failed. Have we not heard how many hundreds of so-called black converts in this and in other colonies are arrant hypocrites, or at all events give way before the simplest temptations?”
“I have also heard,” returned Mrs Brook, “of many hundreds of so-called white Christians, whose lives prove them to be the enemies of our Saviour, and who do not even condescend to hypocrisy, for they will plainly tell you that they ‘make no pretence to be religious,’ though they call themselves Christians. But that does not prove gospel treatment among the English to have been a failure. You have heard, I daresay, of the Hottentot robber Africaner, who was long the terror and scourge of the district where he lived, but who, under the teaching of our missionary Mr Moffat, or rather, I should say, under the influence of God’s Holy Spirit, has led a righteous, peaceful, Christian life for many years. He is alive still to prove the truth of what I say.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” returned Mrs Merton, with a decisive compression of her lips.
“Well, many people have testified to the truth of this, and some of these people have seen Africaner and have believed.”
“Humph!” returned Mrs Merton.
This being an unanswerable argument, Mrs Brook smiled by way of reply, and turned a sleeve inside out, the better to get at its dilapidations. Changing the subject, she desired Gertie to go and prepare dinner, as it was approaching noon.
“What shall I prepare, mother?” asked Gertie, laying down her work.
“You’d better make a hash of the remains of yesterday’s leg of mutton, dear; it will be more quickly done than the roasting of another leg, and we can’t spare time on cookery to-day. I daresay Mrs Merton will excuse—”
“Mrs Brook,” interrupted Mrs Merton, with that Spartan-like self-denial to which she frequently laid claim, without, however, the slightest shadow of a title, “I can eat anything on a emergency. Have the hash by all means.”
“And I’m afraid, Mrs Merton,” continued Mrs Brook, in an apologetic tone, “that we shall have to dine without bread to-day—we have run short of flour. My husband having heard that the Thomases have recently got a large supply, has gone to their farm to procure some, but their place is twelve miles off, so he can’t be back till night. You won’t mind, I trust?”
Mrs Merton vowed that she didn’t mind, became more and more Spartanic in her expression and sentiments, and plied her needle with increased decision.
Just then Gertie re-entered the cottage with a face expressive of concern.
“Mother, there’s no meat in the larder.”
“No meat, child? You must be mistaken. We ate only a small part of yesterday’s leg.”
“Oh! ma’am,” exclaimed the nurse, dropping the scissors suddenly, and looking somewhat guilty, “I quite forgot, ma’am, to say that master, before he left this morning, and while you was asleep, ma’am, ordered me to give all the meat we had in the house to Scholtz, as he was to be away four or five days, and would require it all, so I gave him the leg that was hanging up in the larder, and master himself took the remains of yesterday’s leg, bidding me be sure to tell George to kill a sheep and have meat ready for dinner.”
“Oh, well, it doesn’t matter,” said Mrs Brook; “we shall just have to wait a little longer.”
Nurse looked strangely remorseful.
“But, ma’am—” she said, and paused.
“Well, nurse!”
“I forgot, ma’am—indeed I did—to tell George to kill a sheep.”
Mrs Brook’s hands and work fell on her lap, and she looked from Mrs Scholtz to her visitor, and from her to the anxious Gertie, without speaking.
“Why, what’s the matter?” asked Mrs Merton.
“My dear,” replied Mrs Brook, with a touch of solemnity, “George Dally, our man, asked me this morning if he might go into the bush to cut rafters for the new kitchen, and I gave him leave, knowing nothing of what arrangements had been made before—and—and—in short, there’s not a man on the place, and—there’s nothing to eat.”
The four females looked at each other in blank silence for a few seconds, as the full significance of their circumstances became quite clear to them.
Mrs Merton was the first to recover.
“Now,” said she, while the Spartanic elements of her nature became intensified, “we must rise to this occasion like true women; we must prove ourselves to be not altogether dependent on man; we must face the difficulty, sink the natural tenderness of our sex, and—and—kill a sheep!”
She laid down the crackers on the table with an air of resolution, and rose to put her fell intent in execution.
But the carrying out of her plan was not so easy as the good lady had, at the first blush of the thing, imagined it would be. In the first place, like other heroes and heroines, she experienced the enervating effects of opposition and vacillating purpose in others.
“You must all help me,” she said, with the air of a commander-in-chief.
“Help you to kill a sheep, ma’am?” said Mrs Scholtz, with a shudder, “I’ll die first! I couldn’t do it, and I wouldn’t, for my weight in gold.”
Notwithstanding the vehemence of her protestation, the nurse stood by and listened while the other conspirators talked in subdued tones, and with horrified looks, of the details of the contemplated murder.
“I never even saw the dreadful deed done,” said Mrs Brook, becoming pale as she thought of it.
“Oh, mamma! much better go without meat; we could dine on cakes,” suggested Gertie.
“But my love, there is not a cake or an ounce of flour in the house.”
“Women!” exclaimed Mrs Merton severely, “we must rise to the occasion. I am hungrynow, and it is not yet noon; what will be our condition if we wait till night for our dinner?”
This was a home-thrust. The conspirators shuddered and agreed to do the deed. Gertie, in virtue of her youth, was exempted from taking any active part, but an unaccountable fascination constrained her to follow and be a witness—in short, an accomplice.
“Do you know where—where—theknifeis kept?” asked Mrs Merton.
Mrs Scholtz knew, and brought it from the kitchen.
It was a keen serviceable knife, with a viciously sharp point. Mrs Merton received it, coughed, and hurried out to the sheep-fold, followed by her accomplices.
To catch a sheep was not difficult, for the animals were all more or less tame and accustomed to gentle treatment by the females, but to hold it was quite another thing. Mrs Merton secured it by the head, Mrs Scholtz laid hold of the tail, and Mrs Brook fastened her fingers in the wool of its back. Each female individually was incapable of holding the animal, though a very small one had been purposely selected, but collectively they were more than a match for it. After a short struggle it was laid on its side, and its feet were somewhat imperfectly secured with a pocket-handkerchief.
“Now, ma’am,” cried Mrs Scholtz, holding tight to the tail and shutting her eyes, “do be quick.”
Mrs Merton, also shutting her eyes, struck feebly with the knife. The others, having likewise shut their eyes, waited a few seconds in a state of indescribable horror, and then opened them to find that the Spartan lady had missed her mark, and planted her weapon in the ground! So feeble, however, had been the stroke that it had barely penetrated an inch of the soil.
“Oh, Mrs Merton!” exclaimed Mrs Brook remonstratively.
Mrs Merton tried again more carefully, and hit the mark, but still without success.
“Itwon’tgo in!” she gasped, as, on opening her eyes a second time, she found only a few drops of blood trickling from a mere scratch in the sheep’s neck; “I—Ican’tdo it!”
At that moment the unfortunate animal suddenly freed its head from the Spartan matron’s grasp. A sharp wriggle freed its tail and feet, and in another moment it burst away from its captors and made for a shallow pond formed by Edwin Brook for a colony of household ducks.
Roused to excessive indignation by the weakness and boastfulness of Mrs Merton, Mrs Scholtz sprang to her feet and gave chase. The others joined. Hunger, shame, determination, disappointment, combined to give them energy of purpose. The sheep rushed into the pond. Mrs Scholtz recklessly followed—up to the knees—caught it by the horns, and dragged it forth.
“Give me the knife!” she shouted.
Mrs Merton hurriedly obeyed, and the nurse, shutting her eyes, plunged it downwards with a wild hysterical shriek.
There was no mistake this time. Letting the animal go, she fled, red-handed, into the innermost recess of the cottage, followed by her horrified friends.
“Oh! whathaveI done?” groaned Mrs Scholtz; burying her face in her hands.
Mrs Brook and the others—all shuddering—sought to soothe her, and in a short time they regained sufficient composure to permit of their returning to the victim, which they found lying dead upon the ground.
Having thus got over the terrible first step, the ladies hardened themselves to the subsequent processes, and these they also found more difficult than they had anticipated. The skinning of a sheep they did not understand. Of the cutting up they were equally ignorant, and a terrible mess they made of the poor carcass in their varied efforts. In despair Mrs Brook suggested to Mrs Scholtz, who was now the chief and acknowledged operator, that they had better cut it up without skinning, and singe off the wool and skin together; but on attempting this Mrs Scholtz found that she could not find the joints, and, being possessed of no saw, could not cut the bones; whereupon Mrs Merton suggested that she should cut out four slices from any part that would admit of being penetrated by a knife, and leave the rest of the operation to be performed by Dally on his return. This proposal was acted on. Four fat slices were cut from the flanks and carried by Gertie to the kitchen, where they were duly cooked, and afterwards eaten with more relish than might have been expected, considering the preliminaries to the feast.
This was one of those difficulties that did not occur to them again. It was a preventable difficulty, to be avoided in future by the exercise of forethought; but there were difficulties and troubles in store against which forethought was of little avail.
While they were yet in the enjoyment of the chops which had caused them so much mental and physical pain, they were alarmed by a sudden cry from Junkie. Looking round they saw that urchin on his knees holding on to the side of his home-made crib, and gazing in blank amazement at the hole in the wall which served for a window. And well might he gaze, for he saw the painted face of a black savage looking in at that window!
On beholding him Mrs Merton uttered a scream and Mrs Brook an exclamation. Mrs Scholtz and Gertie seemed bereft of power to move or cry.
Perhaps the Kafir took this for the British mode of welcoming a stranger. At all events, he left the window and entered by the door. Being quite naked, with the exception of the partial covering afforded by a leopard-skin robe, his appearance was naturally alarming to females who had never before seen a native of South Africa in his war-paint. They remained perfectly still, however, and quite silent, while he went through the cottage appropriating whatever things took his fancy. He was the native whom we have already introduced as having been met by George Dally, though of course the Brook household were not aware of this.
A few other savages entered the cottage soon after, and were about to follow the example of their chief and help themselves, but he sternly ordered them to quit, and they submissively obeyed.
When he had gone out, without having condescended to notice any of the household, Master Junkie gave vent to a long-suspended howl, and claimed the undivided attention of Mrs Scholtz, whose touching blandishments utterly failed in quieting him. The good nurse was unexpectedly aided, however, by the savage chief, who on repassing the window, looked in and made his black face supernaturally hideous by glaring at the refractory child. Junkie was petrified on the spot, and remained “good” till forgetfulness and sleep overpowered him.
Meanwhile Mrs Merton swooned into a chair—or appeared to do so—and Mrs Brook, recovering from her first alarm, went out with Gertie to see what the black marauders were about.
They were just in time to see the last tail of their small flock of sheep, and their still smaller herd of cattle, disappear into the jungle, driven by apparently a score of black, lithe, and naked devils, so ugly and unearthly did the Kafirs seem on this their first visit to the unfortunate settlers.
It was a peculiarly bitter trial to the Brooks, for the herd and flock just referred to had been acquired, after much bargaining, from a Dutch farmer only a few days before, and Edwin Brook was rather proud of his acquisition, seeing that few if any of the settlers had at that time become possessors of live stock to any great extent. It was, however, a salutary lesson, and the master of Mount Hope—so he had named his location—never again left his wife and family unguarded for a single hour during these first years of the infant colony.
Chapter Nine.Off to the Highlands and Black Snakes in the Bush.While the settlers of this section were thus scattering far and wide, in more or less numerous groups, over the fertile plains of Lower Albany, the Scotch party was slowly, laboriously, toiling on over hill and dale, jungle and plain, towards the highlands of the interior.The country through which the long line of waggons passed was as varied as can well be imagined, being one of the wildest and least inhabited tracts of the frontier districts. The features of the landscape changed continually from dark jungle to rich park-like scenery, embellished with graceful clumps of evergreens, and from that again to the sterility of savage mountains or parched and desert plains. Sometimes they plodded wearily over the karroo for twenty miles or more at a stretch without seeing a drop of water. At other times they came to a wretched mud hovel, the farm-house of a boer, near a permanent spring of water. Again, they were entangled among the rugged, roadless gorges and precipices of a mountain range, through which no vehicle of European construction could have passed without absolute demolition, and up parts of which the Cape-waggons were sometimes compelled to go by means of two teams,—that is, from twenty to thirty or more oxen,—being attached to each. At other times they had to descend and re-ascend the precipitous banks of rivers whose beds were sometimes quite dry and paved with mighty boulders.“It’s an unco’ rough country,” observed Sandy Black to Charlie Considine, as they stood watching the efforts of a double team to haul one of their waggons up a slope so rugged and steep that the mere attempt appeared absolute madness in their eyes.Considine assented, but was too much interested in the process to indulge in further remark.“Gin the rope brek,” continued Sandy, “I wadna gie muckle for the waggon. It’ll come rowin’ an’ stottin’ doon the hill like a bairn’s ba’.”“No fear of the rope,” said Hans Marais, as he passed at the moment to render assistance to Ruyter, Jemalee, Booby, and some others, who were shouting at the pitch of their voices, and plying the long waggon-whips, or the short sjamboks, with unmerciful vigour.Hans was right. The powerful “trektow” stood the enormous strain, and the equally powerful waggon groaned and jolted up the stony steep until it had nearly gained the top, when an unfortunate drop of the right front wheel into a deep hollow, combined with an unlucky and simultaneous elevation of the left back wheel by a stone, turned the vehicle completely over on its side. The hoops of the tilt were broken, and much of the lading was deposited in a hollow beside the waggon, but a few of the lighter and smaller articles went hopping, or, according to Sandy Black, “stottin’” down the slope, and were smashed to atoms at the bottom.Ruyter, Booby, and Jemalee turned towards Hans Marais with a shrinking action, as if they expected to feel the sjambok on their shoulders, for their own cruel master was wont on occasions of mischance such as this to visit his men with summary punishment; but Hans was a good specimen of another, and, we believe, much more numerous class of Cape-Dutchmen. After the first short frown of annoyance had passed, he went actively to work, to set the example of unloading the waggon and repairing the damage, administering at the same time, however, a pretty sharp rebuke to the drivers for their carelessness in not taking better note of the form of the ground.That night in talking over the incident with Ruyter, Considine ventured again to comment on the wrongs which the former endured, and the possibility of redress being obtained from the proper authorities.“For I am told,” he said, “that the laws of the colony do not now permit masters to lash and maltreat their slaves as they once did.”Ruyter, though by nature a good-humoured, easy-going fellow, was possessed of an unusually high spirit for one of his race, and could never listen to any reference to the wrongs of the Hottentots without a dark frown of indignation. In general he avoided the subject, but on the night in question either his wonted reticence had fled, or he felt disposed to confide in the kindly youth, from whom on the previous journey from Capetown he had experienced many marks of sympathy and good-will.“There be no way to make tings better,” he replied fiercely. “I knows noting ’bout your laws. Only knows dey don’t work somehow. Allers de same widmeanyhow, kick and cuff and lash w’en I’s wrong—sometimes w’en I’s right—and nebber git tanks for noting.”“But that is because your master is an unusually bad fellow,” replied Considine. “Few Cape farmers are so bad as he. You have yourself had experience of Hans Marais, now, who is kind to every one.”“Ja, he is good master—an’ so’s him’s fadder, an’ all him’s peepil—but what good dat doos to me!” returned the Hottentot gloomily. “It is true your laws do not allow us to be bought and sold like de slaves, but dat very ting makes de masters hate us and hurt us more dan de slaves.”This was to some extent true. At the time we write of, slavery, being still permitted in the British colonies, the Dutch, and other Cape colonists, possessed great numbers of negro slaves, whom it was their interest to treat well, as being valuable “property,” and whom most of them probably did treat well, as a man will treat a useful horse or ox, though of course there were—as there always must be in the circumstances—many instances of cruelty, by passionate and brutal owners. But the Hottentots, or original natives of the South African soil, having been declared unsaleable, and therefore not “property,” were in many cases treated with greater degradation by their masters than the slaves, were made to work like them, but not cared for or fed like them, because not so valuable. At the same time, although not absolute slaves, the Hottentots were practically in a state of servitude, in which the freedom accorded to them by Government had, by one subterfuge or another, been rendered inoperative. Not long before this period the colonists possessed absolute power over the Hottentots, and although recent efforts had been made to legislate in their favour, their wrongs had only been mitigated,—by no means redressed. Masters were, it is true, held accountable by the law for the treatment of their Hottentots, but were rarely called to account; and the Hottentots knew too well, from sad experience, that to make a complaint would be in many cases worse than useless, as it would only rouse the ire of their masters and make them doubly severe.“You say de Hottentots are not slaves, but you treat us all de same as slaves—anyhow, Jan Smit does.”“That is the sin of Jan Smit, not of the British law,” replied Considine.Ruyter’s face grew darker as he rejoined fiercely, “What de use of your laws if dey won’t work? Besides, what right hab de white scoundril to make slave at all—whether you call him slave or no call him slave. Look at Jemalee!”The Hottentot pointed with violent action to the Malay, who, with a calm and sad but dignified mien, stood listening to the small-talk of Booby, while the light of the camp-fire played fitfully on their swarthy features.“Well, what of Jemalee!” asked Considine.“You know dat him’s a slave—arealslave?”“Yes, I know that, poor fellow.”“You never hear how him was brought up here?”“No, never—tell me about it.”Hereupon the Hottentot related the following brief story.Abdul Jemalee, a year or two before, had lived in Capetown, where his owner was a man of some substance. Jemalee had a wife and several children, who were also the property of his owner. Being an expert waggon-driver, the Malay was a valuable piece of human goods. On one occasion Jan Smit happened to be in Capetown, and, hearing of the Malay’s qualities, offered his master a high price for him. The offer was accepted, but in order to avoid a scene, the bargain was kept secret from the piece of property, and he was given to understand that he was going up country on his old master’s business. When poor Jemalee bade his pretty wife and little ones goodbye, he comforted them with the assurance that he should be back in a few months. On arriving at Smit’s place, however, the truth was told, and he found that he had been separated for ever from those he most loved on earth. For some time Abdul Jemalee gave way to sullen despair, and took every sort of abuse and cruel treatment with apparent indifference, but, as time went on, a change came over him. He became more like his former self, and did his work so well, that even the savage Jan Smit seldom had any excuse for finding fault. On his last journey to the Cape, Smit took the Malay with him only part of the way. He left him in charge of a friend, who agreed to look well after him until his return.Even this crushing of Jemalee’s hope that he might meet his wife and children once more did not appear to oppress him much, and when his master returned from Capetown he resumed charge of one of the waggons, and went quietly back to his home in the karroo.“And can you tell what brought about this change?” asked Considine.“Oh ja, I knows,” replied Ruyter, with a decided nod and a deep chuckle; “Jemalee him’s got a powerful glitter in him’s eye now and den—bery powerful an’ strange!”“And what may that have to do with it?” asked Considine.Ruyter’s visage changed from a look of deep cunning to one of childlike simplicity as he replied— “Can’t go for to say what de glitter of him’s eye got to do wid it. Snakes’ eyes glitter sometimes—s’pose ’cause he can’t help it, or he’s wicked p’raps.”Considine smiled, but, seeing that the Hottentot did not choose to be communicative on the point, he forbore further question.“What a funny man Jerry Goldboy is!” said Jessie McTavish, as she sat that same evening sipping a pannikin of tea in her father’s tent.From the opening of the tent the fire was visible.Jerry was busy preparing his supper, while he kept up an incessant run of small-chat with Booby and Jemalee. The latter replied to him chiefly with grave smiles, the former with shouts of appreciative laughter.“Heisfunny,” asserted Mrs McTavish, “and uncommonly noisy. I doubt if there is much good in him.”“More than you think, Mopsy,” said Kenneth (by this irreverent name did the Highlander call his better-half); “Jerry Goldboy is a small package, but he’s made of good stuff, depend upon it. No doubt he’s a little nervous, but I’ve observed that his nerves are tried more by the suddenness with which he may be surprised than by the actual danger he may chance to encounter. On our first night out, when he roused the camp and smashed the stock of his blunderbuss, no doubt I as well as others thought he showed the white feather, but there was no lack of courage in him when he went last week straight under the tree where the tiger was growling, and shot it so dead that when it fell it was not far from his feet.”“I heard some of the men, papa,” observed Jessie, “say that it was Dutch courage that made him do that. What did they mean by Dutch courage?”Jessie, being little more than eight, was ignorant of much of the world’s slang.“Cape-smoke, my dear,” answered her father, with a laugh.“Cape-smoke?” exclaimed Jessie, “what is that?”“Brandy, child, peach-brandy, much loved by some of the boers, I’m told, and still more so by the Hottentots; but there was no more Cape-smoke in Jerry that day than in you. It was true English pluck. No doubt he could hardly fail to make a dead shot at so close a range, with such an awful weapon, loaded, as it usually is, with handfuls of slugs, buckshot, and gravel; but it was none the less plucky for all that. The old flint-lock might have missed fire, or he mightn’t have killed the brute outright, and in either case he knew well enough it would have been all up with Jerry Goldboy.”“Who’s that taking my name in vain?” said Jerry himself, passing the tent at the moment, in company with Sandy Black.“We were only praising you, Jerry,” cried Jessie, with a laugh, “for the way in which you shot that tiger the other day.”“It wasn’t a teeger, Miss Jessie,” interposed Sandy Black, “it was only a leopard—ane o’ thae wee spottit beasts that they’re sae prood o’ in this country as toca’them teegers.”“Come, Sandy,” cried Jerry Goldboy, “don’t rob me of the honour that is my due. The hanimal was big enough to ’ave torn you limb from limb if ’e’d got ’old of you.”“It may be sae, but he wasna a teeger for a’ that,” retorted Black.—“D’ee know, sir,” he continued, turning to McTavish, “that Mr Pringle’s been askin’ for ’ee?”“No, Sandy, but now that you’ve told me I’ll go to his tent.”So saying the Highlander rose and went out, to attend a council of “heads of families.”Hitherto we have directed the reader’s attention chiefly to one or two individuals of the Scotch party, but there were in that party a number of families who had appointed Mr Pringle their “head” and representative. In this capacity of chief-head, or leader, Mr Pringle was in the habit of convening a meeting of subordinate “heads” when matters of importance had to be discussed.While the elders of the party were thus engaged in conclave at the door of their leader’s tent, and while the rest were busy round their several fires, a man with a body much blacker than thenightwas secretly gliding about the camp like a huge snake, now crouching as he passed quickly, but without noise, in rear of the thick bushes; now creeping on hands and knees among the waggons and oxen, and anon gliding almost flat on his breast up to the very verge of the light thrown by the camp-fires. At one and another of the fires he remained motionless like the blackened trunk of a dead tree, with his glittering eyes fixed on the settlers, as if listening intently to their conversation.Whatever might be the ultimate designs of the Kafir—for such he was—his intentions at the time being were evidently peaceful, for he carried neither weapon nor shield. He touched nothing belonging to the white men, though guns and blankets and other tempting objects were more than once within reach of his hand. Neither did he attempt to steal that which to the Kafir is the most coveted prize of all—a fat ox. Gradually he melted away into the darkness from which he had emerged. No eye in all the emigrant band saw him come or go in his snake-like glidings, yet his presence was known to one of the party—to Ruyter the Hottentot.Soon after the Kafir had taken his departure, Ruyter left his camp-fire and sauntered into the bush as if to meditate before lying down for the night. As soon as he was beyond observation he quickened his pace and walked in a straight line, like one who has a definite end in view.The Hottentot fancied that he had got away unperceived, but in this he was mistaken. Hans Marais, having heard Considine’s account of his talk with Ruyter about Jemalee, had been troubled with suspicions about the former, which led to his paying more than usual attention to him. These suspicions were increased when he observed that the Hottentot went frequently and uneasily into the bushes, and looked altogether like a man expecting something which does not happen or appear. When, therefore, he noticed that after supper, Ruyter’s anxious look disappeared, and that, after looking carefully round at his comrades, he sauntered into the bush with an overdone air of nonchalance, he quietly took up his heavy gun and followed him.The youth had been trained toobservefrom earliest childhood, and, having been born and bred on the karroo, he was as well skilled in tracking the footprints of animals and men as any red savage of the North American wilderness. He took care to keep the Hottentot in sight, however, the night being too dark to see footprints. Lithe and agile as a panther, he found no difficulty in doing so.In a few minutes he reached an open space, in which he observed that the Hottentot had met with a Kafir, and was engaged with him in earnest conversation. Much however of what they said was lost by Hans, as he found it difficult to get within ear-shot unobserved.“And why?” he at length heard the savage demand, “why should I spare them for an hour?”He spoke in the Kafir tongue, in which the Hottentot replied, and with which young Marais was partially acquainted.“Because, Hintza,” said Ruyter, naming the paramount chief of Kafirland, “the time has not yet come. One whose opinion you value bade me tell you so.”“What if I choose to pay no regard to the opinion of any one?” demanded the chief haughtily.Ruyter quietly told the savage that he would then have to take the consequences, and urged, in addition, that it was folly to suppose the Kafirs were in a condition to make war on the white men just then. It was barely a year since they had been totally routed and driven across the Great Fish River with great slaughter. No warrior of common sense would think of renewing hostilities at such a time—their young men slain, their resources exhausted. Hintza had better bide his time. In the meanwhile he could gratify his revenge without much risk to himself or his young braves, by stealing in a quiet systematic way from the white men as their herds and flocks increased. Besides this, Ruyter, assuming a bold look and tone which was unusual in one of his degraded race, told Hintza firmly that he had reasons of his own for not wishing the Scotch emigrants to be attacked at that time, and that if he persisted in his designs he would warn them of their danger, in which case they would certainly prove themselves men enough to beat any number of warriors Hintza could bring against them.Lying flat on the ground, with head raised and motionless, Hans Marais listened to these sentiments with much surprise, for he had up to that time regarded the Hottentot as a meek and long-suffering man, but now, though his long-suffering in the past could not be questioned, his meekness appeared to have totally departed.The Kafir chief would probably have treated the latter part of Ruyter’s speech with scorn, had not his remarks about sly and systematic plunder chimed in with his own sentiments, for Hintza was pre-eminently false-hearted, even among a race with whom successful lying is deemed a virtue, though, when found out, it is considered a sin. He pondered the Hottentot’s advice, and apparently assented to it. After a few moments’ consideration, he turned on his heel, and re-entered the thick jungle.Well was it for Hans Marais that he had concealed himself among tall grass, for Hintza chanced to pass within two yards of the spot where he lay. The kafir chief had resumed the weapons which, for convenience, he had left behind in the bush while prowling round the white man’s camp, and now stalked along in all the panoply of a savage warrior-chief; with ox-hide shield, bundle of short sharp assagais, leopard-skin robe, and feathers. For one instant the Dutchman, supposing it impossible to escape detection, was on the point of springing on the savage, but on second thoughts he resolved to take his chance. Even if Hintza did discover him, he felt sure of being able to leap up in time to ward off his first stab.Fortunately the Kafir was too much engrossed with his thoughts. He passed his white enemy, and disappeared in the jungle.Meanwhile the Hottentot returned to the camp—assuming an easy-going saunter as he approached its fires—and, soon after, Hans Marais re-entered it from an opposite direction. Resolving to keep his own counsel in the meantime, he mentioned the incident to no one, but after carefully inspecting the surrounding bushes, and stirring up the watch-fires, he sat down in front of his leader’s tent with the intention of keeping guard during the first part of the night.
While the settlers of this section were thus scattering far and wide, in more or less numerous groups, over the fertile plains of Lower Albany, the Scotch party was slowly, laboriously, toiling on over hill and dale, jungle and plain, towards the highlands of the interior.
The country through which the long line of waggons passed was as varied as can well be imagined, being one of the wildest and least inhabited tracts of the frontier districts. The features of the landscape changed continually from dark jungle to rich park-like scenery, embellished with graceful clumps of evergreens, and from that again to the sterility of savage mountains or parched and desert plains. Sometimes they plodded wearily over the karroo for twenty miles or more at a stretch without seeing a drop of water. At other times they came to a wretched mud hovel, the farm-house of a boer, near a permanent spring of water. Again, they were entangled among the rugged, roadless gorges and precipices of a mountain range, through which no vehicle of European construction could have passed without absolute demolition, and up parts of which the Cape-waggons were sometimes compelled to go by means of two teams,—that is, from twenty to thirty or more oxen,—being attached to each. At other times they had to descend and re-ascend the precipitous banks of rivers whose beds were sometimes quite dry and paved with mighty boulders.
“It’s an unco’ rough country,” observed Sandy Black to Charlie Considine, as they stood watching the efforts of a double team to haul one of their waggons up a slope so rugged and steep that the mere attempt appeared absolute madness in their eyes.
Considine assented, but was too much interested in the process to indulge in further remark.
“Gin the rope brek,” continued Sandy, “I wadna gie muckle for the waggon. It’ll come rowin’ an’ stottin’ doon the hill like a bairn’s ba’.”
“No fear of the rope,” said Hans Marais, as he passed at the moment to render assistance to Ruyter, Jemalee, Booby, and some others, who were shouting at the pitch of their voices, and plying the long waggon-whips, or the short sjamboks, with unmerciful vigour.
Hans was right. The powerful “trektow” stood the enormous strain, and the equally powerful waggon groaned and jolted up the stony steep until it had nearly gained the top, when an unfortunate drop of the right front wheel into a deep hollow, combined with an unlucky and simultaneous elevation of the left back wheel by a stone, turned the vehicle completely over on its side. The hoops of the tilt were broken, and much of the lading was deposited in a hollow beside the waggon, but a few of the lighter and smaller articles went hopping, or, according to Sandy Black, “stottin’” down the slope, and were smashed to atoms at the bottom.
Ruyter, Booby, and Jemalee turned towards Hans Marais with a shrinking action, as if they expected to feel the sjambok on their shoulders, for their own cruel master was wont on occasions of mischance such as this to visit his men with summary punishment; but Hans was a good specimen of another, and, we believe, much more numerous class of Cape-Dutchmen. After the first short frown of annoyance had passed, he went actively to work, to set the example of unloading the waggon and repairing the damage, administering at the same time, however, a pretty sharp rebuke to the drivers for their carelessness in not taking better note of the form of the ground.
That night in talking over the incident with Ruyter, Considine ventured again to comment on the wrongs which the former endured, and the possibility of redress being obtained from the proper authorities.
“For I am told,” he said, “that the laws of the colony do not now permit masters to lash and maltreat their slaves as they once did.”
Ruyter, though by nature a good-humoured, easy-going fellow, was possessed of an unusually high spirit for one of his race, and could never listen to any reference to the wrongs of the Hottentots without a dark frown of indignation. In general he avoided the subject, but on the night in question either his wonted reticence had fled, or he felt disposed to confide in the kindly youth, from whom on the previous journey from Capetown he had experienced many marks of sympathy and good-will.
“There be no way to make tings better,” he replied fiercely. “I knows noting ’bout your laws. Only knows dey don’t work somehow. Allers de same widmeanyhow, kick and cuff and lash w’en I’s wrong—sometimes w’en I’s right—and nebber git tanks for noting.”
“But that is because your master is an unusually bad fellow,” replied Considine. “Few Cape farmers are so bad as he. You have yourself had experience of Hans Marais, now, who is kind to every one.”
“Ja, he is good master—an’ so’s him’s fadder, an’ all him’s peepil—but what good dat doos to me!” returned the Hottentot gloomily. “It is true your laws do not allow us to be bought and sold like de slaves, but dat very ting makes de masters hate us and hurt us more dan de slaves.”
This was to some extent true. At the time we write of, slavery, being still permitted in the British colonies, the Dutch, and other Cape colonists, possessed great numbers of negro slaves, whom it was their interest to treat well, as being valuable “property,” and whom most of them probably did treat well, as a man will treat a useful horse or ox, though of course there were—as there always must be in the circumstances—many instances of cruelty, by passionate and brutal owners. But the Hottentots, or original natives of the South African soil, having been declared unsaleable, and therefore not “property,” were in many cases treated with greater degradation by their masters than the slaves, were made to work like them, but not cared for or fed like them, because not so valuable. At the same time, although not absolute slaves, the Hottentots were practically in a state of servitude, in which the freedom accorded to them by Government had, by one subterfuge or another, been rendered inoperative. Not long before this period the colonists possessed absolute power over the Hottentots, and although recent efforts had been made to legislate in their favour, their wrongs had only been mitigated,—by no means redressed. Masters were, it is true, held accountable by the law for the treatment of their Hottentots, but were rarely called to account; and the Hottentots knew too well, from sad experience, that to make a complaint would be in many cases worse than useless, as it would only rouse the ire of their masters and make them doubly severe.
“You say de Hottentots are not slaves, but you treat us all de same as slaves—anyhow, Jan Smit does.”
“That is the sin of Jan Smit, not of the British law,” replied Considine.
Ruyter’s face grew darker as he rejoined fiercely, “What de use of your laws if dey won’t work? Besides, what right hab de white scoundril to make slave at all—whether you call him slave or no call him slave. Look at Jemalee!”
The Hottentot pointed with violent action to the Malay, who, with a calm and sad but dignified mien, stood listening to the small-talk of Booby, while the light of the camp-fire played fitfully on their swarthy features.
“Well, what of Jemalee!” asked Considine.
“You know dat him’s a slave—arealslave?”
“Yes, I know that, poor fellow.”
“You never hear how him was brought up here?”
“No, never—tell me about it.”
Hereupon the Hottentot related the following brief story.
Abdul Jemalee, a year or two before, had lived in Capetown, where his owner was a man of some substance. Jemalee had a wife and several children, who were also the property of his owner. Being an expert waggon-driver, the Malay was a valuable piece of human goods. On one occasion Jan Smit happened to be in Capetown, and, hearing of the Malay’s qualities, offered his master a high price for him. The offer was accepted, but in order to avoid a scene, the bargain was kept secret from the piece of property, and he was given to understand that he was going up country on his old master’s business. When poor Jemalee bade his pretty wife and little ones goodbye, he comforted them with the assurance that he should be back in a few months. On arriving at Smit’s place, however, the truth was told, and he found that he had been separated for ever from those he most loved on earth. For some time Abdul Jemalee gave way to sullen despair, and took every sort of abuse and cruel treatment with apparent indifference, but, as time went on, a change came over him. He became more like his former self, and did his work so well, that even the savage Jan Smit seldom had any excuse for finding fault. On his last journey to the Cape, Smit took the Malay with him only part of the way. He left him in charge of a friend, who agreed to look well after him until his return.
Even this crushing of Jemalee’s hope that he might meet his wife and children once more did not appear to oppress him much, and when his master returned from Capetown he resumed charge of one of the waggons, and went quietly back to his home in the karroo.
“And can you tell what brought about this change?” asked Considine.
“Oh ja, I knows,” replied Ruyter, with a decided nod and a deep chuckle; “Jemalee him’s got a powerful glitter in him’s eye now and den—bery powerful an’ strange!”
“And what may that have to do with it?” asked Considine.
Ruyter’s visage changed from a look of deep cunning to one of childlike simplicity as he replied— “Can’t go for to say what de glitter of him’s eye got to do wid it. Snakes’ eyes glitter sometimes—s’pose ’cause he can’t help it, or he’s wicked p’raps.”
Considine smiled, but, seeing that the Hottentot did not choose to be communicative on the point, he forbore further question.
“What a funny man Jerry Goldboy is!” said Jessie McTavish, as she sat that same evening sipping a pannikin of tea in her father’s tent.
From the opening of the tent the fire was visible.
Jerry was busy preparing his supper, while he kept up an incessant run of small-chat with Booby and Jemalee. The latter replied to him chiefly with grave smiles, the former with shouts of appreciative laughter.
“Heisfunny,” asserted Mrs McTavish, “and uncommonly noisy. I doubt if there is much good in him.”
“More than you think, Mopsy,” said Kenneth (by this irreverent name did the Highlander call his better-half); “Jerry Goldboy is a small package, but he’s made of good stuff, depend upon it. No doubt he’s a little nervous, but I’ve observed that his nerves are tried more by the suddenness with which he may be surprised than by the actual danger he may chance to encounter. On our first night out, when he roused the camp and smashed the stock of his blunderbuss, no doubt I as well as others thought he showed the white feather, but there was no lack of courage in him when he went last week straight under the tree where the tiger was growling, and shot it so dead that when it fell it was not far from his feet.”
“I heard some of the men, papa,” observed Jessie, “say that it was Dutch courage that made him do that. What did they mean by Dutch courage?”
Jessie, being little more than eight, was ignorant of much of the world’s slang.
“Cape-smoke, my dear,” answered her father, with a laugh.
“Cape-smoke?” exclaimed Jessie, “what is that?”
“Brandy, child, peach-brandy, much loved by some of the boers, I’m told, and still more so by the Hottentots; but there was no more Cape-smoke in Jerry that day than in you. It was true English pluck. No doubt he could hardly fail to make a dead shot at so close a range, with such an awful weapon, loaded, as it usually is, with handfuls of slugs, buckshot, and gravel; but it was none the less plucky for all that. The old flint-lock might have missed fire, or he mightn’t have killed the brute outright, and in either case he knew well enough it would have been all up with Jerry Goldboy.”
“Who’s that taking my name in vain?” said Jerry himself, passing the tent at the moment, in company with Sandy Black.
“We were only praising you, Jerry,” cried Jessie, with a laugh, “for the way in which you shot that tiger the other day.”
“It wasn’t a teeger, Miss Jessie,” interposed Sandy Black, “it was only a leopard—ane o’ thae wee spottit beasts that they’re sae prood o’ in this country as toca’them teegers.”
“Come, Sandy,” cried Jerry Goldboy, “don’t rob me of the honour that is my due. The hanimal was big enough to ’ave torn you limb from limb if ’e’d got ’old of you.”
“It may be sae, but he wasna a teeger for a’ that,” retorted Black.—“D’ee know, sir,” he continued, turning to McTavish, “that Mr Pringle’s been askin’ for ’ee?”
“No, Sandy, but now that you’ve told me I’ll go to his tent.”
So saying the Highlander rose and went out, to attend a council of “heads of families.”
Hitherto we have directed the reader’s attention chiefly to one or two individuals of the Scotch party, but there were in that party a number of families who had appointed Mr Pringle their “head” and representative. In this capacity of chief-head, or leader, Mr Pringle was in the habit of convening a meeting of subordinate “heads” when matters of importance had to be discussed.
While the elders of the party were thus engaged in conclave at the door of their leader’s tent, and while the rest were busy round their several fires, a man with a body much blacker than thenightwas secretly gliding about the camp like a huge snake, now crouching as he passed quickly, but without noise, in rear of the thick bushes; now creeping on hands and knees among the waggons and oxen, and anon gliding almost flat on his breast up to the very verge of the light thrown by the camp-fires. At one and another of the fires he remained motionless like the blackened trunk of a dead tree, with his glittering eyes fixed on the settlers, as if listening intently to their conversation.
Whatever might be the ultimate designs of the Kafir—for such he was—his intentions at the time being were evidently peaceful, for he carried neither weapon nor shield. He touched nothing belonging to the white men, though guns and blankets and other tempting objects were more than once within reach of his hand. Neither did he attempt to steal that which to the Kafir is the most coveted prize of all—a fat ox. Gradually he melted away into the darkness from which he had emerged. No eye in all the emigrant band saw him come or go in his snake-like glidings, yet his presence was known to one of the party—to Ruyter the Hottentot.
Soon after the Kafir had taken his departure, Ruyter left his camp-fire and sauntered into the bush as if to meditate before lying down for the night. As soon as he was beyond observation he quickened his pace and walked in a straight line, like one who has a definite end in view.
The Hottentot fancied that he had got away unperceived, but in this he was mistaken. Hans Marais, having heard Considine’s account of his talk with Ruyter about Jemalee, had been troubled with suspicions about the former, which led to his paying more than usual attention to him. These suspicions were increased when he observed that the Hottentot went frequently and uneasily into the bushes, and looked altogether like a man expecting something which does not happen or appear. When, therefore, he noticed that after supper, Ruyter’s anxious look disappeared, and that, after looking carefully round at his comrades, he sauntered into the bush with an overdone air of nonchalance, he quietly took up his heavy gun and followed him.
The youth had been trained toobservefrom earliest childhood, and, having been born and bred on the karroo, he was as well skilled in tracking the footprints of animals and men as any red savage of the North American wilderness. He took care to keep the Hottentot in sight, however, the night being too dark to see footprints. Lithe and agile as a panther, he found no difficulty in doing so.
In a few minutes he reached an open space, in which he observed that the Hottentot had met with a Kafir, and was engaged with him in earnest conversation. Much however of what they said was lost by Hans, as he found it difficult to get within ear-shot unobserved.
“And why?” he at length heard the savage demand, “why should I spare them for an hour?”
He spoke in the Kafir tongue, in which the Hottentot replied, and with which young Marais was partially acquainted.
“Because, Hintza,” said Ruyter, naming the paramount chief of Kafirland, “the time has not yet come. One whose opinion you value bade me tell you so.”
“What if I choose to pay no regard to the opinion of any one?” demanded the chief haughtily.
Ruyter quietly told the savage that he would then have to take the consequences, and urged, in addition, that it was folly to suppose the Kafirs were in a condition to make war on the white men just then. It was barely a year since they had been totally routed and driven across the Great Fish River with great slaughter. No warrior of common sense would think of renewing hostilities at such a time—their young men slain, their resources exhausted. Hintza had better bide his time. In the meanwhile he could gratify his revenge without much risk to himself or his young braves, by stealing in a quiet systematic way from the white men as their herds and flocks increased. Besides this, Ruyter, assuming a bold look and tone which was unusual in one of his degraded race, told Hintza firmly that he had reasons of his own for not wishing the Scotch emigrants to be attacked at that time, and that if he persisted in his designs he would warn them of their danger, in which case they would certainly prove themselves men enough to beat any number of warriors Hintza could bring against them.
Lying flat on the ground, with head raised and motionless, Hans Marais listened to these sentiments with much surprise, for he had up to that time regarded the Hottentot as a meek and long-suffering man, but now, though his long-suffering in the past could not be questioned, his meekness appeared to have totally departed.
The Kafir chief would probably have treated the latter part of Ruyter’s speech with scorn, had not his remarks about sly and systematic plunder chimed in with his own sentiments, for Hintza was pre-eminently false-hearted, even among a race with whom successful lying is deemed a virtue, though, when found out, it is considered a sin. He pondered the Hottentot’s advice, and apparently assented to it. After a few moments’ consideration, he turned on his heel, and re-entered the thick jungle.
Well was it for Hans Marais that he had concealed himself among tall grass, for Hintza chanced to pass within two yards of the spot where he lay. The kafir chief had resumed the weapons which, for convenience, he had left behind in the bush while prowling round the white man’s camp, and now stalked along in all the panoply of a savage warrior-chief; with ox-hide shield, bundle of short sharp assagais, leopard-skin robe, and feathers. For one instant the Dutchman, supposing it impossible to escape detection, was on the point of springing on the savage, but on second thoughts he resolved to take his chance. Even if Hintza did discover him, he felt sure of being able to leap up in time to ward off his first stab.
Fortunately the Kafir was too much engrossed with his thoughts. He passed his white enemy, and disappeared in the jungle.
Meanwhile the Hottentot returned to the camp—assuming an easy-going saunter as he approached its fires—and, soon after, Hans Marais re-entered it from an opposite direction. Resolving to keep his own counsel in the meantime, he mentioned the incident to no one, but after carefully inspecting the surrounding bushes, and stirring up the watch-fires, he sat down in front of his leader’s tent with the intention of keeping guard during the first part of the night.
Chapter Ten.The Location on the River of Baboons.The Scotch immigrants at last found themselves in the wild mountain-regions of the interior, after a weary but deeply interesting march of nearly two hundred miles.They had now arrived at the mouth of the Baboons or Baviaans river, one of the affluents of the Great Fish River, and had already seen many of the wild inhabitants of its rugged glen.Their particular location was a beautiful well-watered region among the mountains which had been forfeited by some of the frontier boers at the time of their insurrection against the English Government some years before. They had now crossed the Great Fish River, and, though still within the old boundary of the colony, were upon its utmost eastern verge. The country beyond, as we are told by Pringle, in his graphic account of the expedition, (see Note 1) “for a distance of seventy miles, to the new frontier at the Chumi and Keisi rivers, had been, the preceding year, forcibly depeopled of its native inhabitants, the Kafirs and Ghonaquas, and now lay waste and void, ‘a howling wilderness,’ occupied only by wild beasts, and haunted occasionally by wandering banditti of the Bushman race (Bosjesmen), who were represented as being even more wild and savage than the beasts of prey with whom they shared the dominion of the desert.”Just before their arrival at this point, the old waggons, with the drivers who had accompanied them from Algoa Bay, were exchanged for fresh teams and men, and here Ruyter, Jemalee, and Booby left them, to proceed over a spur of one of the mountain ranges to Jan Smit’s farm on the karroo. But Hans Marais, having taken a fancy to some of the Scotch men, determined to proceed with them until he had seen them fairly established in their new homes. Of course Charlie Considine accompanied Hans.In a wild spot among the mountains they were hospitably received at the solitary abode of a field-cornet named Opperman, who said that he had orders to assist them with an escort of armed boers over the remaining portion of their journey, and to place them in safety on their allotted ground. This remaining portion, he told them, was up the Baviaans River glen, and, although little more than twenty-five miles, would prove to be harder than any part of the journey they had yet encountered.Remembering some of the breakneck gorges of the Zuurberg, Jerry Goldboy said that he didn’t believe it possible for any route to be worse than that over which they had already passed, to which Sandy Black replied with a “humph!” and an opinion that “the field-cornet o’ the distric’ was likely to know what he was speakin’ aboot.” But Jerry never had been, and of course never could be, convinced by reason. “Nothing,” he candidly admitted, “but hard facts had the least weight with him.”“’Ee’ve got hard fac’s noo, Jerry,” said Sandy, about noon of the following day, as he threw down the axe with which he had been hewing the jungle, and pulled off his hat, from the crown of which he took a red cotton handkerchief wherewith to wipe his thickly-beaded brow.Jerry could not deny the truth of this, for he also had been engaged since early morning with a South African axe nearly as large as himself, in assisting to out a passage up the glen.Not only was there no road up this mountain gorge, but in some parts it was scarcely possible to make one, so rugged was the ground, so dense the jungle. But the preliminary difficulties were as nothing compared to those which met them further up; yet it was observable that the Dutch waggoners faced them with the quiet resolution of men accustomed to the overcoming of obstacles.“You’d go up a precipice, Hans, I do believe, if there was no way round it,” said Considine, as he gazed in admiring wonder at his tall friend driving his oxen up an acclivity that threatened destruction to waggon, beasts, and men.“At ony rate he’d try,” remarked Sandy Black, with one of his grave smiles.Hans was too busy to heed these remarks, if he heard them, for the oxen, being restive, claimed his undivided attention, and the wielding of the twenty-foot whip taxed both his arms, muscular though they were.When the long line of emigrants had slowly defiled through thepoort, or narrow gorge, of the mountains from which Baviaans River issues into the more open valley where it joins the Great Fish River, they came suddenly upon a very singular scene, and a still more singular man. In the middle of the poort they found a small farm, where tremendous precipices of naked rock towered all round, so as to leave barely sufficient space on the bank of the river for the houses and cattle-folds, with a well-stocked garden and orchard. There was also a small plot of corn-land on the margin of the stream.“’Tis a little paradise!” exclaimed Kenneth McTavish, as he and Considine joined a knot of men on a knoll, whence they had a good view of the little farm.“It’s an unco’ rocky paradise,” observed Sandy Black, “an’ the angelic appendages o’ wings wadna be unsuitable to its inhabitants, for it seems easier to flee oot o’t ower the precipices than to scramble intil’t ower the rocks an’ rooten trees. I wonder wha it belangs to.”Hans Marais, who came up at the moment, explained that it belonged to a Dutch boer named Prinsolo, who had been a leader some years before in a rebellion, but had been pardoned and allowed to retain his lands. “You’ve sometimes said you thought me a big fellow, Considine,” remarked Hans, “and I can’t gainsay you, but you shall see a much bigger fellow if Prinsolo is at home, for he’s a giant even among Cape Dutchmen. We call him Groot Willem (Big William), for he is burly and broad as well as tall—perhaps he is taking his noon nap,” added Hans, moving forward. “He seldom lets even a single waggon come so near without—ah! I thought so.”As he spoke a peculiarly deep bass yawn was heard inside the principal house of the farm to which the party now drew near. Next moment a heavy thump sounded, as if on the floor, and immediately after there issued from the open door a veritable giant in his shirt-sleeves. Groot Willem was rough, shaggy, and rugged, as a giant ought to be. He was also sluggish in his motions, good-humoured, and beaming, as many of the Dutch giants are. Appropriately enough, on beholding the settlers, he uttered a deep bass halloo, which was echoed solemnly by the mighty cliffs at his back. It was neither a shout of alarm nor surprise, for he had long been aware that this visit was pending, but a hasty summons to his household to turn out and witness the stirring and unwonted sight.It might have been supposed that a giant, whose kindred had been deprived of their lands by the British Government, and some of whom had been executed for high treason, would have regarded the British immigrants with no favourable eye, but Groot Willem appeared to have a large heart in his huge body, for he received the advance-guard of the party with genuine hospitality. Perhaps he was of an unusually forgiving spirit; or it may be that his innate sense of justice led him to recognise the demerit of himself and his kindred; or perchance he was touched by the leniency extended to himself; but, whatever the cause, he shook the newcomers heartily by the hand, said he regarded them as next door-neighbours, started the echoes of the precipices—which he styled Krantzes—and horrified the nearest baboons with shouts of bass laughter at every word from himself or others which bore the remotest semblance to a joke, and insisted on as many of the strangers as could be got into his house, drinking to their better acquaintance in home-made brandy. The same deadly beverage was liberally distributed to the men outside, and Groot Willem wound up his hospitalities by loading the party with vegetables, pomegranates, lemons, and other fruits from his garden as he sent them on their way rejoicing. Soon afterwards he followed them, to aid in forcing a passage up the valley.In return, as a slight acknowledgment of gratitude, Hans supplied the giant with a little powder and lead, and Mr Pringle gave his family a few Dutch tracts and hymn-books.“Wonders’ll niver cease in this land!” said Sandy Black to Jerry Goldboy as they left the farm.“That’s true, Sandy; it’s a houtrageous country.”“To think,” continued the Scot, “that we should foregather wi’ Goliath amang the heeland hills o’ Afriky; an’ him fond o’ his dram tae—Hech, man! look there—at the puggies.”He pointed as he spoke to a part of the precipice where a group of baboons were collected, gazing indignantly and chattering furiously at the intruders on their domain.The ursine baboon is not naturally pugnacious, but neither is he timid or destitute of the means of defence. On the contrary, he is armed with canine teeth nearly an inch long, and when driven to extremities will defend himself against the fiercest wolf-hound. He usually grapples his enemy by the throat with his fore and hind paws—takes a firm bite with his formidable tusks, and tears and tugs till he sometimes pulls away the mouthful. Many a stout baboon has in this manner killed several dogs before being overpowered. It is said that even the leopard is sometimes attacked and worried by baboons, but it is only collectively and in large bands that they can oppose this powerful enemy, and baboons are never the aggressors. It is only in defence of their young that they will assail him.The strong attachment of these creatures to their young is a fine trait in their character. This quality has been shown on many occasions, especially when the creatures have been engaged in orchard-robbing,—for they are excessively fond of fruit and remarkably destitute of conscience. On such occasions, when hunted back to the mountains with dogs, the females, when separated accidentally from their young, have been seen to return to search for them through the very midst of their pursuers, being utterly regardless of their own safety.The group to which Black now directed attention consisted of several females with a number of young ones. They were all huddled in a cleft of the precipice, looking down in apparent surprise at the strangers. On a neighbouring height sat a big old satyr-like male, who had been placed there as a sentinel. Baboons are wise creatures, and invariably place sentinels on points of vantage when the females and their young are feeding on the nutritious bulbs and roots that grow in the valleys. The old gentleman in question had done his duty on the first appearance of the human intruders. He had given a roar of warning; the forty or fifty baboons that were down near the river had scampered off precipitately, dashed through the stream, or leaped over it where narrow, hobbled awkwardly on all-fours over the little bit of level ground, and clambered with marvellous agility up the cliffs, till they had gained the ledge from which they now gazed and chattered, feeling confident in the safety of their position.“Did iver ’ee see the like? They’re almost human!” said Sandy.“Just look at that big grandmother with the blue face and the little baby on ’er back!” exclaimed Jerry.“How d’you know she’s a grandmother?” asked Considine.“W’y, because she’s much fonder of the baby than its own mother could be.”As he spoke, one of the party below them fired, and the echoes sprang in conflict from the surrounding heights, as a bullet whizzed over their heads and hit the rocks, sending a shower of harmless chips and dust among the baboons.With a shriek of consternation they scattered and fled up the heights at racing speed.A burst of laughter from the settlers,—all the more hearty that no damage had been done,—increased the terror inspired by the shot, and seemed to invest the animals with invisible wings.“Tally-ho!” shouted Considine in excitement.“The black ane for ever!” cried Sandy.“I’ll back the grey one with the short tail,” said Kenneth McTavish, coming up at the moment, “although she has two little ones clinging to her.”“Ten to one,” cried Jerry, bending eagerly forward, “on the blue-nosed grandmother wi’ the baby on her back!”It did indeed seem as if Jerry’s favourite was going to reach the top of the crags before any of the other horrified creatures, for she was powerful as well as large, and her burden was particularly small. The infant required no assistance, but clung to its dam with its two little hands like a limpet, so that she could use her limbs freely. But an unusually long and vigorous bound chanced to loosen the little one’s grasp. It fell off with a pitiful shriek, and, with an imploring upward look on its miserable countenance, clasped its little hands in mute despair.Granny or mamma,—we know not which,—with the quick intuition of a great general, took in the whole position like a flash of light. She turned on the ledge she had gained and dropped her tail. Baby seized it and clambered up. Then away she went like a rocket, and before the little one had well regained its former position she had topped the ridge full two yards ahead of the whole troop!“Well done!” cried McTavish.“Huzza!” shouted Jerry.“Brute!” exclaimed Considine, striking up the muzzle of a gun which was pointed at the grandmother and child by a panting young idiot who rushed up at the moment, “would you commit murder?”The gun exploded and sent its ball straight to the new moon, which, early though it was, had begun to display the washed-out horns of its first quarter in the sky.“Confound you!” cried the so-called Brute, who was by no means a coward, throwing down his gun and hitting Considine a heavy blow on the chest.Charlie “returned” on the forehead and sent the Brute head over heels on the turf, but he sprang up instantly, and there would certainly have been a battle-royal if Groot Willem, who opportunely appeared, had not seized Considine by the arm, while Hans Marais grasped the Brute by the neck, and rendered further action impossible. A moment sufficed to cool the youths, for the “Brute” was young, and they both shook hands with a laugh and a mutual apology.Soon after leaving the giant’s farm the travellers reached a point where the main stream was joined by a subsidiary rivulet. Its corresponding valley branched off to the right, about eight miles in length, containing fine pasturage and rich alluvial soil. It extended eastward behind the back of the Kahaberg, where the settlers observed the skirts of the magnificent timber forests which cover the southern fronts of that range, stretching over the summits of the hills at the head of the glen. To this valley, and the wooded hills which bound it, was given the name of Ettrick Forest, while the main valley itself was named Glen Lynden.Not far from this point the apology for a waggon track ended altogether, and thenceforth the settlers found the route difficult and dangerous to a degree far exceeding their previous experiences or their wildest conceptions. Jerry Goldboy had now “facts” enough to overturn all his unbelief. The axe, crowbar, pick, and sledge-hammer were incessantly at work. They had literally tohewtheir path through jungles and gullies, and beds of torrents and rocky acclivities, which formed a series of obstructions that tested the power of the whole party,—Groot Willem and the allies included,—to the uttermost.Of course the difficulties varied with the scenery. Here the vale was narrow and gorge-like, with just sufficient room for the stream to pass, while precipices of naked rock rose abruptly like rampart walls to a height of many hundred feet. These in some places seemed actually to overhang the savage-looking pass, or “poort,” through which the waggons had to struggle in the very bed of the stream. Elsewhere it widened out sufficiently to leave space along the river-bank for fertile meadows, which were picturesquely sprinkled with mimosa trees and evergreen shrubs, and clothed with luxuriant pasturage up to the girths of the horses. Everywhere the mountains rose around, steep and grand, the lower declivities covered with good pasturage, the cliffs above, of freestone and trap, frowning in wild forms like embattled ramparts whose picturesque sides were sprinkled with various species of succulent plants and flowering aloes.For five days did they struggle up this short glen; two of these days being occupied in traversing only three miles of a rugged defile, to which they gave the name of Eildon Cleugh. But “nothing is denied to well-directed labour.” They smashed two waggons, damaged all the others, half-killed their oxen, skinned all their knuckles, black-and-blued all their shins, and nearly broke all their hearts, till at length they passed through the last poort of the glen and gained the summit of an elevated ridge which commanded a magnificent view to the extremity of the vale.“And now, Mynheer,” said the field-cornet in charge of their escort, “there lies your country.”“At last!—thank God,” said the leader of the band, looking round on their beautiful though savage home with feelings of deep gratitude for the happy termination of their long and weary travels.The toil of journeying was now succeeded by the bustle and excitement of settling down.Their new home was a lovely vale of about six or seven miles in length, and varying from one to two in breadth, like a vast basin surrounded on all sides by steep and sterile mountains, which rose in sharp wedge-like ridges, with snow-clad summits that towered to an estimated height of five thousand feet above the level of the sea. The contrast between the warm peaceful valley and the rugged amphitheatre of mountains was very great. The latter, dark and forbidding—yet home-like and gladdening to the eyes of Scotsmen—suggested toil and trouble, while the former, with its meandering river, verdant meadows, groves of sweet-scented mimosa-trees, and herds of antelopes, quaggas, and other animals pasturing in undisturbed quietude, filled the mind with visions of peace and plenty. Perchance God spoke to them in suggestive prophecy, for the contrast was typical of their future chequered career in these almost unknown wilds of South Africa.Left by their escort on the following day—as their English brethren had been left in the Zuurveld of Lower Albany—to take root and grow there or perish, the heads of families assembled, and their leader addressed them.“Here, at last,” said he, “our weary travels by sea and land have come to an end. Exactly six months ago, to a day, we left the shores of bonny Scotland. Since then we have been wanderers, without any other home than the crowded cabin at sea and the narrow tent on shore. Now we have, through God’s great goodness and mercy, reached the ‘Promised Land’ which is to be our future home, our place of rest. We have pitched our tents among the mimosa-trees on the river’s margin, and our kind Dutch friends with the armed escort have left us. We are finally left to our own resources; it behoves us therefore, kindred and comrades, to proceed systematically to examine our domain, and fix our several locations. For this purpose I propose that an armed party should sally forth to explore, while the rest shall remain to take care of the women and children, and guard the camp.”Acting on this advice, an exploration party was at once organised, and set forth on foot, as they had at that time no horses or live stock of any kind—save one dog, which had been purchased by the “Brute” (whose proper name, by the way, was Andrew Rivers) from Groot Willem on the way up.They found the region most desirable in all respects. Open grassy pastures were interspersed everywhere with clumps and groves of mimosa-trees, while the river, a gurgling mountain-brook, meandered musically through the meadows. From grove and thicket sprang the hartebeest and duiker. From their lairs among the reeds and sedges of the river rushed the reitbok and wild hog; while troops of quaggas appeared trotting on the lower declivities of the hills.“A magnificent region truly!” remarked Kenneth McTavish as they returned home at night.“’Eaven upon earth!” said Jerry Goldboy, with quiet enthusiasm.“What splendid scenery!” exclaimed Charlie Considine,—who was addicted to the pencil.“What glorious sport!” cried his former antagonist, Rivers,—who was fond of the rod and gun.“And what aboot the Kawfirs and Bushmen?” asked Sandy Black, who, to use his own language, “could aye objec’.”“Time enough to think of them when they appear,” said Rivers.“I don’t believe they’re half so bad as people say,” cried Goldboy stoutly.“Maybe no,” rejoined Black. “The place is paradise to-day, as you sagaciously remarked, Jerry, but if the Kawfirs come it’ll be pandemonium to-morry. It’s my opinion that we should get oursel’s into a defensible camp as soon as we can, an’ than gae aboot our wark wi’ easy minds. Ye mind what Goliath and Hans Marais said before they left us, aboot keepin’ a sharp look-oot.”As no one replied to this, the Scot changed the subject by asking Considine when he meant to leave.“Not till Hans Marais comes over the hills to fetch me,” was the reply. “He has taken upon himself to give me extended leave of absence. You know, Sandy, that I fill the office of Professor in his father’s house, and of course the Marais sprouts are languishing for want of water while the schoolmaster is abroad, so I could not take it on myself to remain longer away, if Hans had not promised to take the blame on his own shoulders. Besides, rain in Africa is so infrequent, that the sprouts won’t suffer much from a week, more or less, of drought. Your leader wishes me to stay for a few days, and I am anxious to see how you get on. I’ll be able to help a bit, and take part in the night-watches, which I heard Mr Pringle say he intends to institute immediately.”On the day following a site was fixed for the commencement of the infant colony, and the tents, etcetera, were removed to it. The day after being Sunday, it was unanimously agreed to “rest” from labour, and to “keep it holy.”It was an interesting and noteworthy occasion, the assembling of the Scotch emigrants on that Sabbath day to worship God for the first time in Glen Lynden. Their church was under the shade of a venerable acacia-tree, close to the margin of the stream, which murmured round the camp. On one side sat the patriarch of the party with silvery locks, the Bible on his knee, and his family seated round him,—the type of a grave Scottish husbandman. Near to him sat a widow, who had “seen better days,” with four stalwart sons to work for and guard her. Beside these were delicate females of gentle blood, near to whom sat the younger brother of a Scotch laird, who wisely preferred independence in the southern wilds of Africa to dependence “at home.” Besides these there were youths and maidens, of rougher though not less honest mould—some grave, others gay, but all at that time orderly and attentive, while their leader gave forth the beautiful hymn which begins:“O God of Bethel! by whose handThy people still are fed,”and followed it with a selection of prayers from the English Liturgy, and a discourse from a volume of sermons.While they were singing the last Psalm a beautiful antelope, which had wandered down the valley,—all ignorant of the mighty change that had taken place in the prospects of its mountain home,—came suddenly in sight of the party, and stood on the opposite side of the river gazing at them in blank amazement.Andrew Rivers, who sat meekly singing a fine bass, chanced to raise his head at the time. Immediately his eyes opened to their full extent, and the fine bass stopped short, though the mouth did not close. With the irresistible impulse of a true sportsman he half rose, but Sandy Black, who sat near, caught him by the coat-tails and forced him firmly though softly down.“Whist, man; keep a calm sough!”The young man, becoming instantly aware of the impropriety of his action, resigned himself to fate and Sandy, and recovered self-possession in time to close the interrupted line with two or three of the deepest notes in the bass clef.The innocent antelope continued to listen and gaze its fill, and was finally permitted to retire unmolested into its native jungle.Note 1. SeeNarrative of a Residence in South Africa, by Thomas Pringle, late Secretary to the Anti-Slavery Society.
The Scotch immigrants at last found themselves in the wild mountain-regions of the interior, after a weary but deeply interesting march of nearly two hundred miles.
They had now arrived at the mouth of the Baboons or Baviaans river, one of the affluents of the Great Fish River, and had already seen many of the wild inhabitants of its rugged glen.
Their particular location was a beautiful well-watered region among the mountains which had been forfeited by some of the frontier boers at the time of their insurrection against the English Government some years before. They had now crossed the Great Fish River, and, though still within the old boundary of the colony, were upon its utmost eastern verge. The country beyond, as we are told by Pringle, in his graphic account of the expedition, (see Note 1) “for a distance of seventy miles, to the new frontier at the Chumi and Keisi rivers, had been, the preceding year, forcibly depeopled of its native inhabitants, the Kafirs and Ghonaquas, and now lay waste and void, ‘a howling wilderness,’ occupied only by wild beasts, and haunted occasionally by wandering banditti of the Bushman race (Bosjesmen), who were represented as being even more wild and savage than the beasts of prey with whom they shared the dominion of the desert.”
Just before their arrival at this point, the old waggons, with the drivers who had accompanied them from Algoa Bay, were exchanged for fresh teams and men, and here Ruyter, Jemalee, and Booby left them, to proceed over a spur of one of the mountain ranges to Jan Smit’s farm on the karroo. But Hans Marais, having taken a fancy to some of the Scotch men, determined to proceed with them until he had seen them fairly established in their new homes. Of course Charlie Considine accompanied Hans.
In a wild spot among the mountains they were hospitably received at the solitary abode of a field-cornet named Opperman, who said that he had orders to assist them with an escort of armed boers over the remaining portion of their journey, and to place them in safety on their allotted ground. This remaining portion, he told them, was up the Baviaans River glen, and, although little more than twenty-five miles, would prove to be harder than any part of the journey they had yet encountered.
Remembering some of the breakneck gorges of the Zuurberg, Jerry Goldboy said that he didn’t believe it possible for any route to be worse than that over which they had already passed, to which Sandy Black replied with a “humph!” and an opinion that “the field-cornet o’ the distric’ was likely to know what he was speakin’ aboot.” But Jerry never had been, and of course never could be, convinced by reason. “Nothing,” he candidly admitted, “but hard facts had the least weight with him.”
“’Ee’ve got hard fac’s noo, Jerry,” said Sandy, about noon of the following day, as he threw down the axe with which he had been hewing the jungle, and pulled off his hat, from the crown of which he took a red cotton handkerchief wherewith to wipe his thickly-beaded brow.
Jerry could not deny the truth of this, for he also had been engaged since early morning with a South African axe nearly as large as himself, in assisting to out a passage up the glen.
Not only was there no road up this mountain gorge, but in some parts it was scarcely possible to make one, so rugged was the ground, so dense the jungle. But the preliminary difficulties were as nothing compared to those which met them further up; yet it was observable that the Dutch waggoners faced them with the quiet resolution of men accustomed to the overcoming of obstacles.
“You’d go up a precipice, Hans, I do believe, if there was no way round it,” said Considine, as he gazed in admiring wonder at his tall friend driving his oxen up an acclivity that threatened destruction to waggon, beasts, and men.
“At ony rate he’d try,” remarked Sandy Black, with one of his grave smiles.
Hans was too busy to heed these remarks, if he heard them, for the oxen, being restive, claimed his undivided attention, and the wielding of the twenty-foot whip taxed both his arms, muscular though they were.
When the long line of emigrants had slowly defiled through thepoort, or narrow gorge, of the mountains from which Baviaans River issues into the more open valley where it joins the Great Fish River, they came suddenly upon a very singular scene, and a still more singular man. In the middle of the poort they found a small farm, where tremendous precipices of naked rock towered all round, so as to leave barely sufficient space on the bank of the river for the houses and cattle-folds, with a well-stocked garden and orchard. There was also a small plot of corn-land on the margin of the stream.
“’Tis a little paradise!” exclaimed Kenneth McTavish, as he and Considine joined a knot of men on a knoll, whence they had a good view of the little farm.
“It’s an unco’ rocky paradise,” observed Sandy Black, “an’ the angelic appendages o’ wings wadna be unsuitable to its inhabitants, for it seems easier to flee oot o’t ower the precipices than to scramble intil’t ower the rocks an’ rooten trees. I wonder wha it belangs to.”
Hans Marais, who came up at the moment, explained that it belonged to a Dutch boer named Prinsolo, who had been a leader some years before in a rebellion, but had been pardoned and allowed to retain his lands. “You’ve sometimes said you thought me a big fellow, Considine,” remarked Hans, “and I can’t gainsay you, but you shall see a much bigger fellow if Prinsolo is at home, for he’s a giant even among Cape Dutchmen. We call him Groot Willem (Big William), for he is burly and broad as well as tall—perhaps he is taking his noon nap,” added Hans, moving forward. “He seldom lets even a single waggon come so near without—ah! I thought so.”
As he spoke a peculiarly deep bass yawn was heard inside the principal house of the farm to which the party now drew near. Next moment a heavy thump sounded, as if on the floor, and immediately after there issued from the open door a veritable giant in his shirt-sleeves. Groot Willem was rough, shaggy, and rugged, as a giant ought to be. He was also sluggish in his motions, good-humoured, and beaming, as many of the Dutch giants are. Appropriately enough, on beholding the settlers, he uttered a deep bass halloo, which was echoed solemnly by the mighty cliffs at his back. It was neither a shout of alarm nor surprise, for he had long been aware that this visit was pending, but a hasty summons to his household to turn out and witness the stirring and unwonted sight.
It might have been supposed that a giant, whose kindred had been deprived of their lands by the British Government, and some of whom had been executed for high treason, would have regarded the British immigrants with no favourable eye, but Groot Willem appeared to have a large heart in his huge body, for he received the advance-guard of the party with genuine hospitality. Perhaps he was of an unusually forgiving spirit; or it may be that his innate sense of justice led him to recognise the demerit of himself and his kindred; or perchance he was touched by the leniency extended to himself; but, whatever the cause, he shook the newcomers heartily by the hand, said he regarded them as next door-neighbours, started the echoes of the precipices—which he styled Krantzes—and horrified the nearest baboons with shouts of bass laughter at every word from himself or others which bore the remotest semblance to a joke, and insisted on as many of the strangers as could be got into his house, drinking to their better acquaintance in home-made brandy. The same deadly beverage was liberally distributed to the men outside, and Groot Willem wound up his hospitalities by loading the party with vegetables, pomegranates, lemons, and other fruits from his garden as he sent them on their way rejoicing. Soon afterwards he followed them, to aid in forcing a passage up the valley.
In return, as a slight acknowledgment of gratitude, Hans supplied the giant with a little powder and lead, and Mr Pringle gave his family a few Dutch tracts and hymn-books.
“Wonders’ll niver cease in this land!” said Sandy Black to Jerry Goldboy as they left the farm.
“That’s true, Sandy; it’s a houtrageous country.”
“To think,” continued the Scot, “that we should foregather wi’ Goliath amang the heeland hills o’ Afriky; an’ him fond o’ his dram tae—Hech, man! look there—at the puggies.”
He pointed as he spoke to a part of the precipice where a group of baboons were collected, gazing indignantly and chattering furiously at the intruders on their domain.
The ursine baboon is not naturally pugnacious, but neither is he timid or destitute of the means of defence. On the contrary, he is armed with canine teeth nearly an inch long, and when driven to extremities will defend himself against the fiercest wolf-hound. He usually grapples his enemy by the throat with his fore and hind paws—takes a firm bite with his formidable tusks, and tears and tugs till he sometimes pulls away the mouthful. Many a stout baboon has in this manner killed several dogs before being overpowered. It is said that even the leopard is sometimes attacked and worried by baboons, but it is only collectively and in large bands that they can oppose this powerful enemy, and baboons are never the aggressors. It is only in defence of their young that they will assail him.
The strong attachment of these creatures to their young is a fine trait in their character. This quality has been shown on many occasions, especially when the creatures have been engaged in orchard-robbing,—for they are excessively fond of fruit and remarkably destitute of conscience. On such occasions, when hunted back to the mountains with dogs, the females, when separated accidentally from their young, have been seen to return to search for them through the very midst of their pursuers, being utterly regardless of their own safety.
The group to which Black now directed attention consisted of several females with a number of young ones. They were all huddled in a cleft of the precipice, looking down in apparent surprise at the strangers. On a neighbouring height sat a big old satyr-like male, who had been placed there as a sentinel. Baboons are wise creatures, and invariably place sentinels on points of vantage when the females and their young are feeding on the nutritious bulbs and roots that grow in the valleys. The old gentleman in question had done his duty on the first appearance of the human intruders. He had given a roar of warning; the forty or fifty baboons that were down near the river had scampered off precipitately, dashed through the stream, or leaped over it where narrow, hobbled awkwardly on all-fours over the little bit of level ground, and clambered with marvellous agility up the cliffs, till they had gained the ledge from which they now gazed and chattered, feeling confident in the safety of their position.
“Did iver ’ee see the like? They’re almost human!” said Sandy.
“Just look at that big grandmother with the blue face and the little baby on ’er back!” exclaimed Jerry.
“How d’you know she’s a grandmother?” asked Considine.
“W’y, because she’s much fonder of the baby than its own mother could be.”
As he spoke, one of the party below them fired, and the echoes sprang in conflict from the surrounding heights, as a bullet whizzed over their heads and hit the rocks, sending a shower of harmless chips and dust among the baboons.
With a shriek of consternation they scattered and fled up the heights at racing speed.
A burst of laughter from the settlers,—all the more hearty that no damage had been done,—increased the terror inspired by the shot, and seemed to invest the animals with invisible wings.
“Tally-ho!” shouted Considine in excitement.
“The black ane for ever!” cried Sandy.
“I’ll back the grey one with the short tail,” said Kenneth McTavish, coming up at the moment, “although she has two little ones clinging to her.”
“Ten to one,” cried Jerry, bending eagerly forward, “on the blue-nosed grandmother wi’ the baby on her back!”
It did indeed seem as if Jerry’s favourite was going to reach the top of the crags before any of the other horrified creatures, for she was powerful as well as large, and her burden was particularly small. The infant required no assistance, but clung to its dam with its two little hands like a limpet, so that she could use her limbs freely. But an unusually long and vigorous bound chanced to loosen the little one’s grasp. It fell off with a pitiful shriek, and, with an imploring upward look on its miserable countenance, clasped its little hands in mute despair.
Granny or mamma,—we know not which,—with the quick intuition of a great general, took in the whole position like a flash of light. She turned on the ledge she had gained and dropped her tail. Baby seized it and clambered up. Then away she went like a rocket, and before the little one had well regained its former position she had topped the ridge full two yards ahead of the whole troop!
“Well done!” cried McTavish.
“Huzza!” shouted Jerry.
“Brute!” exclaimed Considine, striking up the muzzle of a gun which was pointed at the grandmother and child by a panting young idiot who rushed up at the moment, “would you commit murder?”
The gun exploded and sent its ball straight to the new moon, which, early though it was, had begun to display the washed-out horns of its first quarter in the sky.
“Confound you!” cried the so-called Brute, who was by no means a coward, throwing down his gun and hitting Considine a heavy blow on the chest.
Charlie “returned” on the forehead and sent the Brute head over heels on the turf, but he sprang up instantly, and there would certainly have been a battle-royal if Groot Willem, who opportunely appeared, had not seized Considine by the arm, while Hans Marais grasped the Brute by the neck, and rendered further action impossible. A moment sufficed to cool the youths, for the “Brute” was young, and they both shook hands with a laugh and a mutual apology.
Soon after leaving the giant’s farm the travellers reached a point where the main stream was joined by a subsidiary rivulet. Its corresponding valley branched off to the right, about eight miles in length, containing fine pasturage and rich alluvial soil. It extended eastward behind the back of the Kahaberg, where the settlers observed the skirts of the magnificent timber forests which cover the southern fronts of that range, stretching over the summits of the hills at the head of the glen. To this valley, and the wooded hills which bound it, was given the name of Ettrick Forest, while the main valley itself was named Glen Lynden.
Not far from this point the apology for a waggon track ended altogether, and thenceforth the settlers found the route difficult and dangerous to a degree far exceeding their previous experiences or their wildest conceptions. Jerry Goldboy had now “facts” enough to overturn all his unbelief. The axe, crowbar, pick, and sledge-hammer were incessantly at work. They had literally tohewtheir path through jungles and gullies, and beds of torrents and rocky acclivities, which formed a series of obstructions that tested the power of the whole party,—Groot Willem and the allies included,—to the uttermost.
Of course the difficulties varied with the scenery. Here the vale was narrow and gorge-like, with just sufficient room for the stream to pass, while precipices of naked rock rose abruptly like rampart walls to a height of many hundred feet. These in some places seemed actually to overhang the savage-looking pass, or “poort,” through which the waggons had to struggle in the very bed of the stream. Elsewhere it widened out sufficiently to leave space along the river-bank for fertile meadows, which were picturesquely sprinkled with mimosa trees and evergreen shrubs, and clothed with luxuriant pasturage up to the girths of the horses. Everywhere the mountains rose around, steep and grand, the lower declivities covered with good pasturage, the cliffs above, of freestone and trap, frowning in wild forms like embattled ramparts whose picturesque sides were sprinkled with various species of succulent plants and flowering aloes.
For five days did they struggle up this short glen; two of these days being occupied in traversing only three miles of a rugged defile, to which they gave the name of Eildon Cleugh. But “nothing is denied to well-directed labour.” They smashed two waggons, damaged all the others, half-killed their oxen, skinned all their knuckles, black-and-blued all their shins, and nearly broke all their hearts, till at length they passed through the last poort of the glen and gained the summit of an elevated ridge which commanded a magnificent view to the extremity of the vale.
“And now, Mynheer,” said the field-cornet in charge of their escort, “there lies your country.”
“At last!—thank God,” said the leader of the band, looking round on their beautiful though savage home with feelings of deep gratitude for the happy termination of their long and weary travels.
The toil of journeying was now succeeded by the bustle and excitement of settling down.
Their new home was a lovely vale of about six or seven miles in length, and varying from one to two in breadth, like a vast basin surrounded on all sides by steep and sterile mountains, which rose in sharp wedge-like ridges, with snow-clad summits that towered to an estimated height of five thousand feet above the level of the sea. The contrast between the warm peaceful valley and the rugged amphitheatre of mountains was very great. The latter, dark and forbidding—yet home-like and gladdening to the eyes of Scotsmen—suggested toil and trouble, while the former, with its meandering river, verdant meadows, groves of sweet-scented mimosa-trees, and herds of antelopes, quaggas, and other animals pasturing in undisturbed quietude, filled the mind with visions of peace and plenty. Perchance God spoke to them in suggestive prophecy, for the contrast was typical of their future chequered career in these almost unknown wilds of South Africa.
Left by their escort on the following day—as their English brethren had been left in the Zuurveld of Lower Albany—to take root and grow there or perish, the heads of families assembled, and their leader addressed them.
“Here, at last,” said he, “our weary travels by sea and land have come to an end. Exactly six months ago, to a day, we left the shores of bonny Scotland. Since then we have been wanderers, without any other home than the crowded cabin at sea and the narrow tent on shore. Now we have, through God’s great goodness and mercy, reached the ‘Promised Land’ which is to be our future home, our place of rest. We have pitched our tents among the mimosa-trees on the river’s margin, and our kind Dutch friends with the armed escort have left us. We are finally left to our own resources; it behoves us therefore, kindred and comrades, to proceed systematically to examine our domain, and fix our several locations. For this purpose I propose that an armed party should sally forth to explore, while the rest shall remain to take care of the women and children, and guard the camp.”
Acting on this advice, an exploration party was at once organised, and set forth on foot, as they had at that time no horses or live stock of any kind—save one dog, which had been purchased by the “Brute” (whose proper name, by the way, was Andrew Rivers) from Groot Willem on the way up.
They found the region most desirable in all respects. Open grassy pastures were interspersed everywhere with clumps and groves of mimosa-trees, while the river, a gurgling mountain-brook, meandered musically through the meadows. From grove and thicket sprang the hartebeest and duiker. From their lairs among the reeds and sedges of the river rushed the reitbok and wild hog; while troops of quaggas appeared trotting on the lower declivities of the hills.
“A magnificent region truly!” remarked Kenneth McTavish as they returned home at night.
“’Eaven upon earth!” said Jerry Goldboy, with quiet enthusiasm.
“What splendid scenery!” exclaimed Charlie Considine,—who was addicted to the pencil.
“What glorious sport!” cried his former antagonist, Rivers,—who was fond of the rod and gun.
“And what aboot the Kawfirs and Bushmen?” asked Sandy Black, who, to use his own language, “could aye objec’.”
“Time enough to think of them when they appear,” said Rivers.
“I don’t believe they’re half so bad as people say,” cried Goldboy stoutly.
“Maybe no,” rejoined Black. “The place is paradise to-day, as you sagaciously remarked, Jerry, but if the Kawfirs come it’ll be pandemonium to-morry. It’s my opinion that we should get oursel’s into a defensible camp as soon as we can, an’ than gae aboot our wark wi’ easy minds. Ye mind what Goliath and Hans Marais said before they left us, aboot keepin’ a sharp look-oot.”
As no one replied to this, the Scot changed the subject by asking Considine when he meant to leave.
“Not till Hans Marais comes over the hills to fetch me,” was the reply. “He has taken upon himself to give me extended leave of absence. You know, Sandy, that I fill the office of Professor in his father’s house, and of course the Marais sprouts are languishing for want of water while the schoolmaster is abroad, so I could not take it on myself to remain longer away, if Hans had not promised to take the blame on his own shoulders. Besides, rain in Africa is so infrequent, that the sprouts won’t suffer much from a week, more or less, of drought. Your leader wishes me to stay for a few days, and I am anxious to see how you get on. I’ll be able to help a bit, and take part in the night-watches, which I heard Mr Pringle say he intends to institute immediately.”
On the day following a site was fixed for the commencement of the infant colony, and the tents, etcetera, were removed to it. The day after being Sunday, it was unanimously agreed to “rest” from labour, and to “keep it holy.”
It was an interesting and noteworthy occasion, the assembling of the Scotch emigrants on that Sabbath day to worship God for the first time in Glen Lynden. Their church was under the shade of a venerable acacia-tree, close to the margin of the stream, which murmured round the camp. On one side sat the patriarch of the party with silvery locks, the Bible on his knee, and his family seated round him,—the type of a grave Scottish husbandman. Near to him sat a widow, who had “seen better days,” with four stalwart sons to work for and guard her. Beside these were delicate females of gentle blood, near to whom sat the younger brother of a Scotch laird, who wisely preferred independence in the southern wilds of Africa to dependence “at home.” Besides these there were youths and maidens, of rougher though not less honest mould—some grave, others gay, but all at that time orderly and attentive, while their leader gave forth the beautiful hymn which begins:
“O God of Bethel! by whose handThy people still are fed,”
“O God of Bethel! by whose handThy people still are fed,”
and followed it with a selection of prayers from the English Liturgy, and a discourse from a volume of sermons.
While they were singing the last Psalm a beautiful antelope, which had wandered down the valley,—all ignorant of the mighty change that had taken place in the prospects of its mountain home,—came suddenly in sight of the party, and stood on the opposite side of the river gazing at them in blank amazement.
Andrew Rivers, who sat meekly singing a fine bass, chanced to raise his head at the time. Immediately his eyes opened to their full extent, and the fine bass stopped short, though the mouth did not close. With the irresistible impulse of a true sportsman he half rose, but Sandy Black, who sat near, caught him by the coat-tails and forced him firmly though softly down.
“Whist, man; keep a calm sough!”
The young man, becoming instantly aware of the impropriety of his action, resigned himself to fate and Sandy, and recovered self-possession in time to close the interrupted line with two or three of the deepest notes in the bass clef.
The innocent antelope continued to listen and gaze its fill, and was finally permitted to retire unmolested into its native jungle.
Note 1. SeeNarrative of a Residence in South Africa, by Thomas Pringle, late Secretary to the Anti-Slavery Society.