“Our Boys” had come back to rest awhile;--_The Poetry of South Africa

To sun each heart in a mother’s smile;--

To tell in a sister’s or loved one’s arms

The thoughts that had cheered them ’midst war’s alarms.

And fathers were waiting with hearts that swell,

To learn if their “lads” had borne them _well_,--

And the warrior spirit had waked to life

In the _first strange_ vision of mortal strife.

And little prattlers were waiting there

More eager than any to claim their share,

Looking with wondering hearts and eyes

On trophy shields and assegais,

And clustering round their knees to know

How their “big brothers” had beaten the foe.

Once more the “Assembly” rings aloud,

And the “Boys” muster fast ’midst the gathering crowd.

They have come their last “Dismiss!” to hear,

And bid good-bye to the camp’s rough cheer,

To shake brave _Harvey’s_ warm right hand,

Who had headed them _well_ through Galekaland.

* * * * *

“Boys! I had thought to dissolve your ranks,

And send you home with your country’s thanks.

But again from the mountains the war-cry sounds,

And the tribes on the border are breaking bounds;

The country may need you, hearts and hands,

While taming the pride of the Gaika bands:

Are you willing to answer a _second_ call?”

“_Willing! aye Willing!_ One and All!”

The response rang out, to be drowned among

The echoing cheers of the listening throng;

And if proud we had been of “our Boys” before,

Our triumph and pride gathered head the more,

As they turned from their homes to encamp again,

(With those homes in sight) on the tented plain.

Ready once more, at the trumpet’s clang,

To spring to horse as at _first_ they sprang.

_Rev. H. H. Dugmore._

_IN THE DROUGHT LANDS OF SOUTH AFRICA._

THE RAIN.

It was a land of rills,

Of mountains, kloofs, and hills;

High peaks were westward; eastward the great main--

A rich good land, and free

Men lived in liberty,

Worked and had quiet sleep, and loved the rain.

Thus was it for a time

In this fair sunny clime--

Flocks prospered; prospered, too, the bearded grain,

There only was good cheer,

And farmers felt no fear

When Nature’s lavish bounties fell in rain.

But there came a change,

Clouds were few and strange--

The stored-up waters soon began to wane;

Broken and weak all day,

The streamlets ceased to play,

The sun glared on with no sweet veil of rain.

And lo! the land lay dry--

No moisture in the sky;

The streams dry--sterile the once fertile plain;

And round the empty tank

The ocean feebly sank--

Alas, why cometh not the wished-for rain!

The gentle animals whose fleeces give

The means whereby the people hope to live,

Lie down and die. It seems that ne’er again

Life-giving showers shall fall.

In churches now they call,

“O God, in mercy, send us down the rain!”

All Nature cries aloud--

Oh, come, life-giving cloud!

The flowers, the grass, all herbage green is slain,

The corpse-like earth is black,

Skeletons form a track

O’er regions mourning for the want of rain.

Now has the joyful sight

Filled us with pure delight--

Of fatness dropping from the clouds again;

From mountains to the sea,

One Hymn of Jubilee

Should thank the Master who has sent the rain.

_Alex. Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_THE LANDING OF THE BRITISH SETTLERS OF 1820._

(_Written on occasion of the celebration of the Settlers’ Jubilee in

Grahamstown, in 1870._)

Winds of the North blew cold with icy breath,

And parting seemed a sorrow like to death,

When fifty years ago our little band

Of British settlers left their native land.

They said farewell for ever! ah, farewell

The friends, the joys, the land, they loved so well.

We never more shall stand

On that dear English land,

Nor view our native skies;

Gone each familiar face

Of whose sweet loving grace

Dear memories rise.

Spring shall come back again,

Smiling on hill and plain,

We shall be gone;

Our old homes will be gay

With sunshine and the may,

From our hearts flown.

Farewell, dear land of birth!

Farewell our native earth--

Hill, plain, and river;

Farewell, each dearest friend,

May God all blessings send--

Farewell for ever!

Away they go, ’midst mist and sudden gale,

O’er stormy seas, through Biscay’s Bay they sail.

The sun is covered by dark lowering cloud,

And heaven seems hidden in a dusky shroud.

Hark! the huge vessel felt the thund’ring stroke,

While whelming waves in sudden deluge broke;

The seas around for horrid vengeance rave,

And every yawning gulf now seems a grave.

Again--the storm is o’er, with steady breeze

They glide in safety upon summer seas,

Whose azure surface as a mirror tries

To catch the sunny radiance of the skies.

Here gorgeous tinted sunsets come at even,

To show ten thousand gateways into Heaven--

While gentle zephyrs on the ocean play,

And balmy night succeeds the heat of day.

The twinkling beacons show how far they roam;

No longer the pale pole-star points our home;

The starry banners of the North are furled,--

The Southern Cross shines on a Southern world.

Now soon, with ecstasy, they hear the cry,

Land! land in sight! the land we can descry.

And now the longed-for shores before them rise,

With mountain peaks which fringe the azure skies;

Tall beetling crags frown o’er the breaker’s roar,

Whose white-tipped billows kiss a sandy shore;

’Tis Afric! land of mystery and fear,

Of burning climate, and of desert drear,

Where the fierce lion and fiercer savage roam;

Here is your bourne,--here is your future home.

Supplies obtained within a western bay,

Again they sally forth upon their way,

And round that Cape which, hid in misty forms,

Towered o’er the ocean’s verge “the Cape of Storms,”

Whose dangers Diaz did not fear to cope,

And proved it to the world Cape of Good Hope.

The oceans which this Cape for ever lave

While time shall last is that great sailor’s grave;

And Nature’s self proclaims his honours here,

By such a monument o’er such a bier.

Along the coast they sail. With pleasured eyes

They view new shores--new hills, new plains, arise,

The Cape St. Blaise and Longkloof Mountains past,

The hoped-for, longed-for haven comes at last;

Then, ’midst the glories of an April day,

They cast their anchor in Algoa Bay,

Whose outstretched arms receive in their embrace

Those dauntless settlers of a Northern race.

Here first brave Diaz stayed his vent’rous sail,

First here sought refuge from wild western gale,--

On a small isle, when tempests ceased to toss,

Planted Faith’s emblem there, “The Holy Cross.”

Religion’s banner thus was first unfurled,

First reared within this savage Southern world.

Bare sand-hills line a tract of barren coast,--

No town, or village, can the seaport boast;

The vacant beach and bleak hill-side show clear

The work that waits the hardy pioneer:

O’er walls of surf they reach the welcome strand,

And the first British settlers touch the land.

Upon this South-sea strand--

Unto this savage land--

Welcome, ye little band,

Fit to brave danger.

Losses and wars will be

Fires of adversity,

Tests which you cannot flee

Trials and sorrow.

Yours for success to fight;

Yours to defend the right;

Striving with all your might

For life and freedom.

Under benignant skies,

Fruits on the plains shall rise,

As labour’s sacrifice

To the Creator.

Herds, flocks, and trade shall be

Proof of your industry,

Making prosperity

Smile upon labour.

Sons of the great and free,

On! let your motto be,

“God and the right for me,

Forward for ever.”

Why come they here, amidst the desert’s gloom?

To raise a nation from a lifeless tomb;

To bid fair plains the fruits of labour yield;

To tend the flock; to plough the fertile field;

The wealth of commerce by success to gain;

To found a home where peace and plenty reign.

These are your tasks: but oh! with hardships drear,

With toils unnumbered you must labour here;

For blasted crops, and floods, and drought shall come,

And savage yells around your burning home.

On toilsome sand they wander up and down,

Through numb’rous tents which form a canvas town;

With curious eyes all view the motley throng,--

Huge waggons dragging their slow length along,--

The wily Bushman and the Bechu’an,

The Hottentot, the Boer, and Englishman.

Here strange plants bloom beneath this southern sky,

And graceful aloes raise their blossoms high,

While prickly cacti and the feathery reed

Grow rank and common as the worthless weed.

And now they strike their tents. All “Parties” go,

They leave the sandy beach in waggons slow,

And cross the bushy plain, and Zwartkrops’ stream,

Whose jungle-covered heights above them gleam;

O’er hills, o’er plains, they “trek”--and through the kloof,

Where the high rocky crags their paths o’er-roof,--

Where brilliant birds and gorgeous flowers are seen,

Screened by pavilions of perpetual green,--

Euphorbia raise their candelabra high,

And vivid bush o’er-curtains half the sky.

North, south, east, west, the settlers scatter wide,

By stream, by valley, and by mountain side.

They raise rough homesteads, and by labour’s strain

Soon see around them fields of smiling grain.

Alas, their labour’s vain! Too soon they view

The crops unhealthy, and of dusky hue;

Gaunt famine stalks upon the treach’rous soil,

And failures thrice renewed repay their toil.

Behold dark discontent with angry frown

Upon their hills and valleys settles down.

Again--dawn rises out of horrid night,

Relief has come and prospects are more bright;

They, now successful in the arts of peace,

Find, like the Argonauts, a golden fleece.

But trials still more hard have yet to come,

With Kafir yell and sight of blazing home.

The Kafirs long have angry passions nursed,

And now the flames from smouldering embers burst.

“Must we still retreat from the haunts of man

To the desert drear and the wild Bushman,

Where the lion and jackal are forced to flee,

With the wildebeeste and oribe?

Ah, no; in foray and vengesome fight,

We will dare the invader’s utmost might;

And from bushy ambush again shall fly

Our shaft of destruction, the assegai.”

The sky is lurid with a coming storm;

Against the white man common cause they form--

Their bands of hatred gather from afar,

And league together in a cruel war.

Fierce, treacherous, false, in untamed freedom bold,

The kloof or bush was still the Kafir’s hold;

They sought not battle in the open field,

But used the weapons cunning loves to wield:

To lie in wait, to strike a sudden blow

Of ambushed vengeance on a dreaded foe;

With poisonous lies to sue for speedy peace;

To plot more murder in a brief release;

To pause, to strike with double force the blow;--

The flaming homesteads light them to their foe;

And women’s screams for mercy, drowned in blood,

Cry out for vengeance to an angry God.

And foremost mingling in that awful strife,

The settlers fought for wife, for child, for life.

They see around them hideous signals rise,

The _Kafir’s Fiery Cross_ illumes the midnight skies.

They rush from burning homes, or die, as brave men die,

With face unto the foe and hopes in God on high.

And then, ye swarthy warriors, then began

Unequal warfare with the strong white man.

The assegai is measured with the gun;

The gage once taken up, war is not done

Till Hintza’s death, and Gwanga’s gory tide,

And Waterkloof, and many a red hillside,

And burning huts, and savage screams of woe,

Have proved the prowess of your British foe.

Three dreadful wars have Kafir fierceness proved,

And thrice their vengeance sought the white man’s blood;

While thrice their warriors have been taught to know,

How vain their battle against such a foe.

Sir Harry Smith’s and Cathcart’s names rank high

With those renowned in English chivalry,

And many a nameless kloof’s mimosas wave

O’er the brave British soldier’s grave;

And Bowker’s, Southey’s, Currie’s names shall be,

With those of others, kept in memory.[16]

Queenstown and Cradock’s volunteers lay down

Their warlike weapons,--while King Williamstown

Rests on its arms by the Buffalo’s side,

And starts new commerce on East London’s tide.

The settler’s city in success has grown,

And busy commerce smiles on Grahamstown;

And Port Elizabeth, their landing-place,

Still striding onward in progressive race,

Makes commerce speed its sails from Algoa Bay,

And sends new products o’er the watery way;

And far and near the bustling towns arise,

Planted and nursed by settlers’ enterprise.

To God Almighty let us thanks upraise,

To Him all glory; to Him endless praise.

Now fifty years have passed. Here is the field

Of dauntless energy, and this the yield;

Their advent here we celebrate in days

Which well can speak the British settler’s praise,--

Their glory with their memory is blent,

THE EASTERN PROVINCE IS THEIR MONUMENT.

_Alex. Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_IN THE COUNTRY OF MANKORAAN._

(NORTH OF THE VAAL RIVER, DECEMBER, 1882.)

Ah sad are our hearts,

Our souls full of trouble,

Ruin’s harvest has come--

We are left as the stubble.

The white man is here

For our fields and our cattle;

No hope is now left us--

No chance in the battle.

We look on like men

Who are used to disaster,

And see ruin’s night

Falling faster and faster.

Or like animals struck

By the swift assegai,

We are sentenced to death,

We have only to die.

From Limpopo to Vaal

Has the mandate been given,

“From his veld and his home

Must the black man be driven.”

From the homes of our youth,

Which our eyes love to scan,

We are forced from the kraals

Of our chief--Mankoraan.

We starve in the veld

So blooming and verdant;

The invader is lord,

The owner--his servant.

Christianity--lo!

To your justice we fly;

Protect us at once,

Or we perish and die.

_Alex. Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_DRINK._

Behold the Moloch of our Pagan days,

The Bacchic God, whom all his votaries praise;

For “Io Bacchus” is a modern hymn,

Chanted in praise of drink ’midst festive din.

The god is worshipped here in our own days,

Enshrined in radiance ’midst the hotels’ blaze--

Or, where the drink-shop, with its beaming light,

Attracts the moth-like worshippers at night--

The sacrificial victims never fail,

With gait unsteady, and with features pale--

Still they come on; nor sex nor age is spared,

Recruits by thousands easily are snared;

Here comes the husband, with unsteady tread,

And offers up for drink his children’s bread;

His weary wife soon learns to follow in,

And drown her wretchedness in draughts of gin;

The starving children, outcast and forlorn,

From Virtue’s path at once are quickly torn.

Hence, from this nursery of sin and grief,

We get the outcast woman and cunning thief;

And the first lessons of the murderer’s sin

Are taught in brawls amidst the tavern’s din.

Moloch of drink! to thee are offered still

Youth, beauty, fortune, science, art, and skill;

Thousands of votaries drink thy poisoned cup,

And health, strength, life are freely offered up

In thy fell service. Life-blood still is poured

In new libations--neither plague nor sword

Obtains its victims, in the town or field,

In such abundance as thy altars yield.

“The cheerful cup, the drinking cup, goes round!’

Convivial spirits gladly hail the sound.

See here, in wretched misery, crawls along

The shadow of a man once hale and strong,

At one time wealthy--held in high esteem;

He loved, and was beloved--his upright mien

Told of an upright heart, till drink stepped in,

And all the train of curses following sin.

Then farewell heaven and friends, and peaceful life,

And welcome squalor, penury, and strife;

His once-loved partner learns from him to shrink,

Her life a martyrdom, her murderer Drink!

His son and daughter--God in heaven to be

The cause of such great crime and misery!

The girl, an outcast, walks the midnight street;

The boy skulks, trembling, ’fore policeman’s feet.

“In festive houses festive cups go round!”

Widows and orphans shudder at the sound.

A death-knell tolls in every drinking song,

To some most heedless ’midst the drinking throng.

Ah! when the nations suffer, is it well

To wreath with flowers the portal of their hell?

When tens of thousands perish by the cup.

For neighbour’s sake, for God’s sake, give it up!

Its use is lawful, let its disuse be

Heaven’s key for thee and thousands--Charity.

Not blasting fire from heaven so surely kills,

As burning draughts which flow from Bacchic rills.

See nations fall, as oaks by lightning stroke,

Their glories rivened, and their manhood broke.

Britain! “the Kafirs” curse before they die,

The cup--their poison, and thy infamy--

In Afric’s land are riveted new chains,

And freedom flies when drunkenness remains.

_Alex. Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_SOUTH AFRICA REDIVIVA._

Bright land which stretchest down through Southern seas

On which the Sun loves well to look--South Africa--

Thou now hast wakened--and the stirring breeze

Which comes from the northward fills thee with a soul.

Arise, throw off thy shackles and advance--

Among the nations claim thy place, and live!

The time has come to shake off thy dull sleep

Of slavery and apathy: thou wast made to be

A home for millions of the brave and free.

For God has blest thee with a dower of wealth,

Of tree, of herb, of pasture, and of field:

Thy children laugh aloud in jocund health,

And all things men require thy plains can yield;

At faintest knock thy mountain portals ope,

Revealing treasure glimpses fair to see--

Rich diamonds, metals, aye, Imperial gold,

Are in the dower which God hath given thee.

Arise, ye Lotus-eaters of the South, and know

The plenteous blessings which from labour flow.

As men have reaped great Europe--pouring down

From Scandinavia and far Baltic’s wave,

So must our future too be reaped--now sown,

The crops will grow above this era’s grave.

South Afric calls aloud to Europe, filled

With overflowing energy and youth,

Come in your thousands--work as your fathers willed,

With strength, with power, with energy and truth.

Good Hope will turn to Hope at last fulfilled,

And Southern Africa be great--as God has willed.

_Alex. Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_THE BEAUTFUL ISLAND OF DREAMS._

“They come, the shapes of joy and woe,

The airy crowds of long ago,

The dreams and fancies known of yore

That have been and shall be no more;

They change the cloisters of the night

Into a garden of delight.”--_Golden Legend._

When sorrow’s dull clouds o’ershadow the soul,

And the sunshine of life is concealed,

When the waves of misfortune still over us roll,

There is sometimes a refuge and shield,

In a calm little harbour lit up by its sun,

With genial though transient beams,

’Tis hailed as a shelter whene’er it is won--

The Beautiful Island of Dreams.

When pursued by avenging demons of hate,

The wretched oft pause in their path,

And find a retreat and a respite from fate--

A brief lull in the tempest of wrath;

In the fair fairy bowers where in shadowy light,

Illusion reality seems,

Whose oceans are bridged by the visions of night--

The Beautiful Island of Dreams.

And still in this desert as onward we roam,

On a dull and a desolate track,

Fast journeying on to Eternity’s home,

We sometimes in Dreamland look back;

And in slumber behold the dear friends that have gone;

And the past or the future now seems

Rich with memory or hope to that oasis flown--

The Beautiful Island of Dreams.

_Alex Wilmot._

[Illustration]

_CAPE OF GOOD HOPE._

There is a land, unknown to fame,

A land whose heroes have no name

In the grey records of past age;

Unchronicled in hist’ry’s page,

Untamed by art, yet wild and free,

That land lies in the Southern sea--

It laughs to heav’n which smiles on it;

There midway in wild waters set,

With suns serene and balmier breeze

Than ever swept these northern seas,

Its beetling crags rise vast, and war

With oceans, meeting from afar,

To break their billows on its shore,

With fearful never-ending roar.

Bold mariners who sailed of old

Through unknown seas in search of gold,

Saw those dark rocks, those giant forms,

And, fear-quelled, named them “Cape of Storms.”

O land of storms, I pine to hear

That music which made others fear;

I long to see thy storm-fiend scowl,

I long to hear the fierce winds howl,

Hot with fell fires, across thy plains.

Thou glorious land! where Nature reigns

Supreme in awful loveliness,

O shall thy exiled son not bless

Those hills and dales of thine, where first

He roamed a careless child; where burst

Thy tropic splendour on his eye;

Where days were spent, whose mem’ries lie

Deep ’neath all afterthought and care,

Yet rise more buoyant than the air,

And float o’er all his days? O home

Of beauty rare, where I did roam

In childhood’s golden days, my pray’r

For thee soars through this northern air.

Land of “Good Hope!” thy future lies

Bright ’fore my vision as thy skies!

O Africa! long lost in night,

Upon the horizon gleams the light

Of breaking dawn. Thy star of fame

Shall rise and brightly gleam; thy name

Shall blaze on hist’ry’s later page;

Thy birth-time is the last great age;

Thy name has been, slave of the world;

But, when thy banner is unfurled,

Triumphant Liberty shall wave

That standard o’er foul slav’ry’s grave,

And earth--decaying earth--shall see

Her freest, fairest child in thee!

_William Rodger Thomson._

UTRECHT, 1856.

_GOOD HOPE._