THE SUMMER CLOUDS--NEWS OF RAIN--START FOR PELLA--THE VEDIC HYMNS--
DIGGING FOR WATER--ARRIVAL AT PELLA--TERRIBLE HEAT--THE TRIBE--AQUINAS
IN THE WILDERNESS--THE MISSION--THE RIVER GORGE--THE TARANTULA INVASION.
That mountain tract stretching like a back-bone through Namaqualand,
parallel with the coast upon which the Atlantic ceaselessly thunders, is
the region which catches the sparse, south-western winter rains,--but
which in summer is the abode of drought. On the in-lying Bushmanland
plains the winters are quite arid; it is only in summer, when occasional
thunderstorms stray down from the north-east, that the level desert gets
rain.
In a season when the Storm Gods go forth mightily to war on the aether
seas, and the capricious heavens are bountiful, it is a striking
experience to climb, on a torrid afternoon, some peak jutting from the
eastern margin of the mountain tract, and from there to watch the
ordered procession of the thunder-ships as they sweep down from their
far-off port of assembly. Like great battle-craft, black beneath and
equipped with dreadful artillery,--their dazzling decks heaped and laden
with ocean-gleaned merchandise of crudded white,--they charge menacingly
across the illimitable plains as though to overwhelm the granite ranges.
But each stately vessel barely touches some outlying buttress; then the
aery hull swerves and changes its course due south, bearing its most
precious freight to more fortunate regions. It is as though some
immense, invisible fender were being lowered from the sky to guard the
range from the shock of impact.
There came good news from Bushmanland; thunderstorm after thunder-storm
had trailed over the plains, each marking its path with verdure and
filling every rock-depression with water. The drought had broken, so my
long-postponed trip to Pella, that remote outpost of French-Roman
Catholicism, could be undertaken. Pella lies where the iron mountains,
like a leash of black panthers, spring from the northern margin of the
plains,--and then sink to their lair in that great gorge through whose
depths the Orange River swirls and eddies with its drainage of a million
hills.
We were to travel with horses along a route I had special reasons for
wishing to take, but which, had the drought still prevailed, we would
not have dared to traverse. But under the existing circumstances it
would never be necessary to travel more than twenty miles without
finding a spot where a water-pit might be dug.
So Andries brought his spring-wagon in to the Copper Mines and we made
busy preparations for a start. Our wagon-team numbered eight, four
belonging to Andries and four to me. Old Prince pulled as a wheeler; my
two young chestnuts as leaders. Besides the wagon we had another
vehicle,--a strange, springless, nondescript contraption knocked
together by Andries out of the remains of an old horse-wagon which he
had broken up. It had low, strong wheels set very wide apart, with a
rough framework of yellow-wood boards superimposed. There was no seat,
but a box-like rim of woodwork edged the frame. To this vehicle four
half-trained horses were yoked. It was intended to be used in pursuing
springbuck over the plains. Hendrick was to be the driver; his task
would not be an easy one. Andries owned a mob of over sixty horses, the
greater number of which had been taught but the merest rudiments of
service.
We reached the outer periphery of the hills late in the afternoon, and
camped on the margin of the pale-green ocean of feathery "toa."
Far-off, to eastward, we marked the rose-litten turrets of a
thunder-cloud. When the sun went down these were illuminated by
incessant lightnings, symbols of destruction heralding the advent of the
only giver of life-rain.
I had formerly been accustomed to bring books to Bushmanland, but, with
one exception, I did so no longer. The exception was Ludwig's
translation of the Vedic Hymns. The open Volume of the desert, so
insistent to be read, was sufficient; nevertheless those large,
primordial utterances of the Vedas seemed appropriate whenever one was
brought into contact with unspoilt Nature in her vaster aspects.
Although they originated under conditions very dissimilar to the local
ones, the Vedic Hymns are tuned to the desert's pitch. In India, as in
Bushmanland, rain is the paramount necessity. When the rain-gods forget
Bushmanland a few thousand fat-tailed sheep may perish; a hundred
families may have to retire from its margins and live for a season by
digging wild tubers among the granite hills, or by robbing the ants of
their underground store of "toa" seed. But if a similar thing happen in
India, perhaps ten millions of human beings die a horrible death.
In the desert,--away from man and everything that suggested him, the
Hebrew Scriptures seemed to be too overloaded with ethics, too exigent
towards enlisting the services of the deity on the side of tribe against
tribe. But the Vedic Hymnist was a worshipper who imposed no conditions
upon his gods. He had passionately realised the fundamental fact that
his own continued existence, as well as that of all organic life,
depended upon the beneficient fury of the sky, so he offered awed and
unconditioned adoration to Indra, Agni and the "golden-breasted" Storm
Gods through a symbolism of sincere and homely dignity. Submissive, he
accepted death or life, the thunder-bolt or the Soma-flower,--the
drought that slew its millions or the rain that brought a bounteous
harvest.
We started at break of day. Although rain had fallen, we felt it
necessary to plan our course carefully, for water was only to be found
in the sand-covered rock-depressions--and these, albeit more than
ordinarily frequent in that section of the desert over which our route
lay, were nevertheless few and far between. The weather was hot;
therefore the horses, unlike oxen, had to drink at least once a day.
Even where it existed, water could only be obtained by digging to a
depth of from five to eight feet; then it had to be scooped up in
pannikins after having trickled in from the sides and collected at the
bottom of the pit. Thus, even under favourable conditions, it took
about two hours' hard work to provide sufficient water to quench the
thirst of twelve animals.
With cocked ears and anxious looks the horses would crowd to where the
smell of wet sand told them that relief was near; it became necessary to
keep them off with a whip. Once I narrowly escaped being badly hurt
owing to a mule flinging itself into a pit in which I was digging for
water.
We decided not to delay on our forward journey; therefore the various
herds of game seen in the distance were not interfered with. We
intended, after finishing our business at Pella, to seek out some
temporary oasis favourably situated, pitch our camp there and spend a
few days shooting in the vicinity.
On the forenoon of the fourth day,--a day of terrible heat, we sighted
the mission buildings of Pella in the far distance. These stood on a
limestone ridge in a crescent-shaped bend of that stark range of
mountains on the northern side of which the Orange River has carved its
tremendous earth-scar. Here the colour of the mountains changed; they
were no longer jet-black as I had found those a hundred miles to
westward, but a deep chocolate brown. From Pella ran a steep ravine
which cleft the range almost to its base. Down this a crooked track led
to the river, which was said to be about nine miles away.
It seemed as though we should never reach the mission; the trek over
red-hot sand through which angular chunks of limestone were thickly
distributed, seemed interminable in the fierce heat. But at length the
journey ended, and the panting horses were released for their sand-bath,
preliminary to a much-needed drink. The half-dozen low houses of the
mission, built of unburnt brick and livid-grey in colour, lay huddled
around the unfinished walls of what was intended to eventually be a
church. That bare, sun-scourged, glaring ridge which had been selected
as the site for the institution lacked every attribute tempting to man--
save one: and that the all-essential,--water. For thither, to the midst
of a howling desolation, Nature, in one of her moods of whimsical
paradox, had enticed from the depths a spring of living crystal.
Through torrid day and frosty night,--through short, adventitious rainy
season and long, inevitable period of aridity which filled man and brute
with dismay,--"ohne hast, ohne rast" the gentle fountain welled out,
cold and clear. It seemed as though some spirit whose dwelling was deep
in a zone untroubled by the moods of the changeful sky stretched forth a
pitiful hand to touch the scarred forehead of the waste with comfort and
with healing.
The heat in the wagon had been a burthen and almost a misery, yet I was
able to sustain it while we were in motion. But the stillness of the
atmosphere and the glare from the limestone surrounding the mission,
made one desperate. Shade--coolness--where were they to be found? Even
mere darkness would have been a relief. I sought refuge under a
verandah, but got no assuagement. I longed for some corner into which
to creep--for somewhere to hide, if only from the blistering light.
Father Simon, the Director of the Mission, kindly vacated his house and
placed it at my disposal. The building contained but one room.
I entered and closed the door. For a few seconds the darkness brought a
sense of easement, but the closeness, the thick stagnation of the air,
made me gasp. And the heat was nearly as bad as it was outside. How
was that? I put my hand to one of the clod-like bricks of which the
walls were built. It was quite uncomfortably hot to the touch; the
force of the sun had penetrated it.
Something approaching despair seized me; it was then nearly noon--could
I live through another six hours of such torture? I began to speculate
as to what were the initial symptoms of heat-apoplexy. The labouring
blood thundered in my ears; I felt perilously near delirium. It was as
though one were being suffocated in the cellar of a burning house. I
stripped off my clothes and grovelled naked on the clay floor, seeking
relief in cobwebby corners. In the gloom I caught sight of a bucket of
water. I tore a sheet from the bed, soaked it and wrapped it around me.
In all my life I had never felt in such physical extremity. However,
lying on the ground wrapped in the wet sheet brought a measure of
relief. But the miseries of that day will never be forgotten.
At length the sun went down--sank in golden ruin among the fang-like
peaks of the umber-tinted western mountains. Soon the quivering earth
flung off its Nessus-garment and a delicious interval followed. But
shortly after nightfall the chilliness of the air became so
uncomfortable that I overhauled my belongings in the wagon, seeking a
warmer coat. Father Simon, with a smile, produced his thermometer; the
mercury stood at 86 Fahrenheit. I learned that five hours previously it
had reached 119 in the shade.
Next day brought practically no diminution of temperature; but somehow I
seemed to have acquired resisting power. The fear of possible collapse,
even of death, which came upon me the previous day, had gone. Perhaps
the fatigues of the long journey--more especially the heavy digging in
the water-pits--may have lowered my vitality. Presently we had another
severe ordeal to undergo, for we decided to make our way down the gorge
and spend a night on the bank of the river. It seemed as though it
would be like descending to the Gehenna-pit.
But first to bend an examining eye upon that strange community of men
and women,--those adventurers from the Old World to a world immeasurably
older and less changeful. So far as I could gather, the personnel
consisted of three priests, four lay-brothers and five nuns. It was to
those women that my pity went out; they were so pallid, so
debilitated,--so incongruous with their surroundings. As they flitted
silently about, busied with hospitable service towards the guests, their
hands looked like faded leaves. How the conventual habit, albeit the
material had been lightened to accord with local conditions, must have
weighed them down. The low-roofed, livid-grey brick building in which
they lived must have got heated through and through as Father Simon's
dwelling did. One of those nuns had, so I was told, lost her reason and
was shortly to be removed. Their lot must have been one of continuous
martyrdom.
Father Simon was suave in manner; I could judge him to be shrewd and
clear-headed; evidently he was a man of affairs. His pallor was
apparently congenital; it by no means suggested physical weakness.
Salamander-like, he had habituated himself to the torrid climate. Like
an Arab chief he ruled his clan of about two hundred subjects. This was
as mixed a lot of human beings as one would find anywhere--even in South
Africa, that land of varied human blends. Among them were pure-bred
Europeans,--some bearing names held in honour from Cape Town to
Pretoria. Others were frankly black,--and there were all intermediate
shades.
Just then the mat-houses of the tribe were pitched at one of the
outlying water-places; I did not learn how far off, for distance is an
unimportant detail in the desert. But it was some place where a
thunderstorm had recently burst and, therefore, where pasturage existed.
The wealth of the community consisted of fat-tailed sheep, horses,
goats and a few cattle. The Pella lands were held by the Mission on
ownership tenure; consequently the Superintendent was an autocrat. A
community of that kind was as little fitted to govern itself as a
reformatory would have been. The territory over which Father Simon held
sway contained all the water-places which were to be found in that
corner of the desert. The water in some of these was permanent, the
severest drought occasioning no diminution in its flow. It was this
circumstance, more than anything else, which rendered the autocracy
effective.
Acceptance of the forms of the Roman Catholic ritual was the only
condition of membership; faith appeared to be taken on trust. It was
told me that when Bushmanland happened to be blest with a few
consecutive good seasons, scruples on points of dogma became prevalent
and the tribe thinned out. But when the inevitable drought recurred,
the doubters repented, returned to the forgiving bosom of Mother Church
and recommenced, with more or less fervour, the practice of their
religious duties. I was shewn one patriarch who, with his numerous
family, had three times fallen from grace and had as often been received
back as an erring but repentant sheep.
Besides Father Simon and the nuns I met only two members of the
community who interested me. One was an elderly, thickset priest with a
dense, brown beard. I found him sitting, in a dingy hut, at a
packing-case table. He was smoking an extremely black pipe and reading
at an early 17th Century folio of Thomas Aquinas. His person was
generally unclean; his coarse, stumpy hands were sickening to look upon.
The reading was clearly a pretence; from the appearance of the volume I
should say it had not been previously opened for a very long time. I
felt instinctively that Father Simon, too, knew this, for he addressed a
few sentences in French to the reader,--speaking in a low, even, firm
voice. At once the folio was closed and put back on a cobwebby shelf.
The episode interested me; I sympathised with that priest. In spite of
his unsavoury physical condition my heart went out to him. His life
must have been appallingly empty, for he had not, like Father Simon, the
saving grace of responsibility and the opportunity of expressing his
individuality in administrative work. He was nothing but a more or less
superfluous cog in the wheel of a cranky machine driven by a despotic
hand. The Adam within him cried out for an opportunity of attracting
the attention of the only visitor from the outside world he was likely
to see for the next six months. I found that little trifle of deception
very human--very pitiful. I wonder did he, after all, read his Aquinas
at times; perhaps he did. But I fear his development would rather have
been in the direction of the "dumb ox" than towards the angels. Poor,
lonely, unwashed human creature.
The only way to save one's soul alive in the desert is to wrestle with
and overcome difficulties--as Jacob wrestled with the angel, and all the
cobwebs ever spun by all the Schoolmen would not give so much strength
to the human spirit as a gallop of ten miles over the plains, among the
whispering shocks of the "toa." That this was the case was evinced by a
young lay-brother with whom I was able to converse in Dutch. He, of
peasant origin and with quite a lot of fire glowing through his clay,
found scope for his abounding energies in looking after the stock
belonging to the Mission and generally carrying on the outside
administrative work. It was he who shepherded the tribe from one
water-place to another; it was he who took venturesome journeys across
wide stretches of desert for the purpose of reporting as to the
condition of the pasturage surrounding the far-outlying oases.
This man was brown and muscular; his eye was steady and masterful--
because his life was spent in action, not in futile dreaming. If he
should have looked upon one of the daughters of the desert and found her
fair, I would not have given much for his vocation. I sincerely hoped
he might do so. The daughters of the desert are not, as a rule,
comely--but, after all, beauty is relative. I imply nothing
discreditable; this man had taken no irrevocable vow of celibacy.
The Pella Mission was engaged in the hopeless task of endeavouring to
make oil and water mix--or rather, to change the metaphor--to graft an
archaic but vigorous and highly-specialised organism upon a rudimentary
one of thin blood and low vitality. A creed rooted in and nourished by
the most ancient human traditions could not possibly develop among
people who possessed no traditions and had not enough positive original
sin in them to make their asthenic souls worth the saving.
On this desert tract where men are blown to and fro by the fiery breath
of recurrent drought, they should be left to sink in the sand or swim in
the aether,--to develop body and soul of a tenacious fibre, or else to
be eliminated by the adverse conditions under which they exist. Subject
to tuition, kept erect by outside support, they must presently stagnate
and ultimately perish. From my point of view their preservation was not
nearly so important as that of the herd of oryx I was endeavouring to
protect from its legioned enemies in central Bushmanland.
But the case of the Pella tribe was hopeless. Could these people have
gone to war, had the desert they inhabited been ten times as wide and
had its bounds contained tribes that raided one another, and thus made
valour-cum-skill-in-arms the alternative to extinction, they might have
developed positive virtues and vices. They might even have lifted their
eyes to the stars and uttered songs of love and death.
The blistering sun of noon was almost over our heads when we started on
our pilgrimage to the river. A crooked pathway choked with sand, into
which one's feet sank deep at every step, led down the wedge-formed
cleft between the towering mountains. We found the course fatiguing in
the descent; what would it be when we came to retrace our steps? As we
proceeded the gorge bent to the right and the glowing cliffs closed in.
At length the stupendous mountain range on the other side of the river
again sprang into view. Soon we caught a glimpse of the rich-green
forest strip which fringed, on either side, the wide course of the
stream. There at least we would find shade. The heat had become
frightful; it was as though one breathed flame.
We reached the river bank. The great torrent of a few weeks back had
shrunk to a network of rivulets which swirled and eddied among the rocks
and islanded sand-banks with a soothing murmur. The trees just there
had been much thinned out; in places the undergrowth had completely
disappeared,--eaten away by the stock which was sent thither in seasons
of exceptional drought. A recent freshet had carpeted the shaded ground
with soft, white sand. A dip in the tepid water refreshed one; the
gentle, lapping wavelets whispered of coolness to come. But the river,
so gentle that day, could at times arise like a wrathful Titan. In a
high cliff-crevice hung a large tree-trunk flung up and wedged there
during some recent flood.
Who could paint the terrific desolation of that home of chaos,--the
towering peaks, the jutting ledges, the Cyclopean, bulging
protuberances? That amphitheatre was surely the haunt of some
ferocious, inimical Nature-spirit--brother to Death and a hater of Life.
Yet life flourished even here, for the river, like a mother holding her
children with tender clasp, led westward her progeny of trees over
strait and perilous pathways. But the feet of the brood dared not stray
from the hem of her garment.
The sun sank; as the glare was withdrawn each salient detail of the
Titanic arena grew clearer and more definite against the background of
darkening blue. Then shadow gathered all into her fold, and it was upon
a pit whose black sides threatened to fall in and crush us, that the
stars of the zenith looked down.
It was deep in the night, but the heat still raged, for the sides of the
glowing rock-pit in which we lay continued to radiate what energy they
had absorbed while the sun still smote on them. We had emerged from
among the trees and built a large fire of drift-wood on a sandbank,--our
object being to obtain illumination. It was quite necessary to have a
bright light; from many of the logs poisonous centipedes, and an
occasional scorpion, were emerging. But even comparatively close to the
fire we could feel no increase of heat. My gun stood against a stone
some distance away. I picked the weapon up, but involuntarily dropped
it, for the barrel almost scorched my hand. And this at nearly
midnight!
But what were those creatures darting here and there; anon rushing
towards us over the livid surface of the sand? Horror. They were
tarantulas,--red, hairy creatures, larger than mice. Within a few
seconds there were hundreds of them circling around the fire with almost
incredible swiftness. The firelight had attracted them from the
cliff-chasms which yawned around us.
This was too much for flesh and blood to endure, so I beat a retreat to
the river and waded out until I reached a flat rock. This proved to be
uncomfortably hot, but the soles of my boots were thick, and I could
every now and then cool them in the water. However, a few yards away
lay a small island of sand, and on this I took refuge. From my retreat
I could see the fire and its environs. I did not think Africa contained
so many tarantulas as were then visible. They had the fire to
themselves, for every member of the party had fled.
The air still felt as though one were in a closed room. But the murmur
of the river became audible to an increasing degree on the western side,
and soon a hot breath of air struck us. After a fitful succession of
puffs a continuous wind set in,--a steady current, momentarily growing
cooler. This was the sea-breeze stealing up the river gorge from the
far-off Atlantic, rolling the mass of heated air before it and cooling
the piled rocks,--helping them to fling off the yoke of torment put upon
them by the cruel, arrogant sun. Soon the temperature began to fall
rapidly, so I waded back, made a wide detour so as to avoid the
tarantula-infested area, and fetched my kaross from where it lay among
the trees. I then returned to my sand-islet and there sank into blessed
sleep with the tepid water murmuring within a few feet of my weary head.
I awoke soon after 3 a.m. The wind had turned perishingly cold,--so
cold that I decided to retire from my exposed situation and seek for
some spot more or less sheltered from the streaming air-current. So I
once more waded back through the tepid water and sought a refuge among
the trees. The fire was still alight; I had to pass it. Not a single
tarantula was visible; no doubt they had retired to their lairs among
the rocks on account of the fall in the temperature. Yet I do not
suppose the latter was below 80 Fahrenheit; the susceptibility of one's
skin is relative; my discomfort was due to the sudden change. I wished
I had not left my thermometer at the wagon; it would have been
interesting to take a reading at midnight.
Once more I fell asleep, with the tree-trunks groaning around me, as the
boughs swayed in the ever-freshening gale.