Altogether,I was most lucky,had two beautiful days,and enjoyed the journey immensely.It was most 'ABENTHEUERLICH';the light two-wheeled cart,with four wild little horses,and the marvellous brown driver,who seemed to be always going to perdition,but made the horses do apparently impossible things with absolute certainty;and the pretty tiny boy who came to help his uncle,and was so clever,and so preternaturally quiet,and so very small:then the road through the mountain passes,seven or eight feet wide,with a precipice above and below,up which the little horses scrambled;while big lizards,with green heads and chocolate bodies,looked pertly at us,and a big bright amber-coloured cobra,as handsome as he is deadly,wriggled across into a hole.
Nearly all the people in this village are Dutch.There is one Malay tailor here,but he is obliged to be a Christian at Caledon,though Choslullah told me with a grin,he was a very good Malay when he went to Capetown.He did not seem much shocked at this double religion,staunch Mussulman as he was himself.I suppose the blacks 'up country'are what Dutch slavery made them -mere animals -cunning and sulky.The real Hottentot is extinct,Ibelieve,in the Colony;what one now sees are all 'Bastaards',the Dutch name for their own descendants by Hottentot women.These mongrel Hottentots,who do all the work,are an affliction to behold -debased and SHRIVELLED with drink,and drunk all day long;sullen wretched creatures -so unlike the bright Malays and cheery pleasant blacks and browns of Capetown,who never pass you without a kind word and sunny smile or broad African grin,SELON their colour and shape of face.I look back fondly to the gracious soft-looking Malagasse woman who used to give me a chair under the big tree near Rathfelders,and a cup of 'bosjesthee'(herb tea),and talk so prettily in her soft voice;-it is such a contrast to these poor animals,who glower at one quite unpleasantly.All the hovels I was in at Capetown were very fairly clean,and I went into numbers.They almost all contained a handsome bed,with,at least,eight pillows.If you only look at the door with a friendly glance,you are implored to come in and sit down,and usually offered a 'coppj'(cup)of herb tea,which they are quite grateful to one for drinking.I never saw or heard a hint of 'backsheesh',nor did I ever give it,on principle and I was always recognised and invited to come again with the greatest eagerness.'An indulgence of talk'from an English 'Missis'seemed the height of gratification,and the pride and pleasure of giving hospitality a sufficient reward.But here it is quite different.I suppose the benefits of the emancipation were felt at Capetown sooner than in the country,and the Malay population there furnishes a strong element of sobriety and respectability,which sets an example to the other coloured people.
Harvest is now going on,and the so-called Hottentots are earning 2S.6D.a day,with rations and wine.But all the money goes at the 'canteen'in drink,and the poor wretched men and women look wasted and degraded.The children are pretty,and a few of them are half-breed girls,who do very well,unless a white man admires them;and then they think it quite an honour to have a whitey-brown child,which happens at about fifteen,by which age they look full twenty.
We had very good snipe and wild duck the other day,which Capt.D-brought home from a shooting party.I have got the moth-like wings of a golden snipe for R-'s hat,and those of a beautiful moor-hen.
They got no 'boks',because of the violent south-easter which blew where they were.The game is fast decreasing,but still very abundant.I saw plenty of partridges on the road,but was not early enough to see boks,who only show at dawn;neither have Iseen baboons.I will try to bring home some cages of birds -Cape canaries and 'roode bekjes'(red bills),darling little things.
The sugar-birds,which are the humming-birds of Africa,could not be fed;but Caffre finks,which weave the pendent nests,are hardy and easily fed.
To-day the post for England leaves Caledon,so I must conclude this yarn.I wish R-could have seen the 'klip springer',the mountain deer of South Africa,which Capt.D-brought in to show me.Such a lovely little beast,as big as a small kid,with eyes and ears like a hare,and a nose so small and dainty.It was quite tame and saucy,and belonged to some man EN ROUTE for Capetown.
