VIEWS OF THE BOERS.
The Boers may be considered the real strength of the population of the
Transvaal, or South African Republic.
They number at least eight thousand families, which support themselves
by farm work of some description.
The Boers are generally peasants, though they are usually the wealthiest
land owners in the country.
The character of the Boers has been strongly impressed by their
wanderings and sufferings. Their habits of life, too, have necessarily
been greatly modified through adverse circumstances and by the peculiar
features of their surroundings.
If one of a family is about to ride but a few miles away from his home,
he takes leave of the members of his household with almost as much
ceremony and affection as though going on a journey to a foreign
country. In the same manner, persons, whether they are visitors,
neighbors, or relatives, on entering a household for the first time,
greet each member of the family, and, in turn, receive a hearty clasp of
the hand from each, as a welcome and a token of hospitality and
rejoicing.
This custom evidently originated from the feelings of uncertainty
experienced in the vicissitudes of life forty years ago. Friends meeting
after an absence were in the habit of greeting one another as though
they had been delivered from some great danger. While those who were
about to leave home parted from their friends as though they were never
to meet again.
In the early days of their settlement the Boers had few candles.
Constantly driven from one point to another, their life in the
wilderness, where they hoped and planned to found their homes, proved a
long and weary pilgrimage. A little coarse fat from the animals which
they slaughtered and a bit of rag made their only lamp. Crude as it was,
it answered their needs, for these people acquired a habit of going
early to their rest and rising at the first break of dawn, in order to
utilize every bit of daylight for their labor.
This habit of "early to bed and early to rise" has become characteristic
of the Boers. It is a very rare thing to meet with a family that enjoys
the pleasant evening hour, clustered around the fireside or about the
center table with its cheerful lights, its books, papers, and other
features of comfort and culture.
The daily life of the Boers is of the most primitive character. At the
close of the day, or as soon as the sun has sunk below the horizon, the
cattle and other stock are gathered into the kraals and places of
safety, and the labor of the day is practically over. A short twilight
is enjoyed, then follows the evening meal, a dinner and supper in one.
This is the social meal of the day. At its close, the table is no sooner
cleared than the family assembles for prayers; this has been the custom
for years in the wanderings of these people. The hour of prayer over,
the members of the family retire to their several quarters to enjoy
their well-earned night's rest.
The complaint has often been made that the Boers keep their houses
untidy, unfloored, and poorly lighted. We must not forget, however, that
a house in the country of the Boers is usually the work of the owner's
own hands. Such a house was erected under extreme difficulty in a
country recently frequented by wild beasts and still wilder barbarians.
Whether we find it located beside some beautiful stream, or standing
upon some barren, desolate plain, or nestled under a steep hillside in
some lonely and almost inaccessible kloof among the mountains, we may
feel sure that it was erected without the aid of skilled labor, and that
only the roughest material, found on or near its site, was used in its
construction.
It must be remembered that beams and timbers are not to be found ready
cut and prepared for the builder's hands. Those that the Boers used to
construct their houses had to be brought from very distant points and at
an enormous expense.
The extreme difficulty in obtaining heavy timbers made it necessary to
change the shapes of the houses somewhat from the most approved plan of
dwellings. Necessity is the mother of invention; and the Dutch Boers, in
accordance with the trite saying, "Cut your coat to fit your cloth,"
erected their houses to fit the timbers they were able to procure. They
had to content themselves with small rooms, and deny themselves the
luxury of a broad spreading roof.
Window frames and the glass to fit them were for years almost
unobtainable by such settlers as located themselves north of the Orange
and Vaal rivers. In many of the houses the windows were not only few in
number, but exceedingly small, often seeming like mere shot holes.
The Dutch farmer has been called slow, and he no doubt is slow; for he
belongs to a race not noted for its swiftness of thought or action. For
generations his ancestors have lived in the wilds of Africa, and such
surroundings have not tended to quicken the nature of the average
farmer. Yet with all his moderation the Boer makes an excellent pioneer.
The towns in the Transvaal are as primitive in their way as the houses.
In most instances they are mere villages; others are barely more than
hamlets, which remind one of some of the drier portions of Holland and
Germany.
A town in the Transvaal has generally a square in the center. This is
usually the site for the church. There is generally one main street, on
which one finds the hotel, several taverns, and a store or two.
The town has usually rather a squalid look. Evidently neither time nor
money is ever wasted in mere external ornament. Utility seems to be the
plan of life. The one thought of the practical Boer is not, Is it
beautiful? but, Is it useful?
In the building of Pretoria, the capital of the Transvaal, the Boers
have had some thought of the future. It has a situation in a basinlike
hollow on a plateau some forty-five hundred feet above sea level. While
so fortunate as to have a mild climate, Pretoria is subject to great and
sudden changes of temperature, which are most trying to people of weak
lungs or of a rheumatic constitution. Frequent hailstorms of great
violence are a peculiar feature of the climate. These affect the
temperature to such a degree that a hot day is often followed by a
dismal, chilly night.
Pretoria, as the seat of government, has quite a dignity of its own, and
with the forty-five hundred or more people within its limits has quite
an imposing air of grandeur. It has broad streets, spacious squares, and
many fine architectural features. There are few houses as yet upon its
broad streets. The square has the usual features, the church and the
residences of the chief magistrate, the lawyers, judges, and merchants.
The center of the square is a paradise for wayfaring horses, for it is
their favorite grazing ground.
The inhabitants of Pretoria, warned by experience, and knowing the value
of water, have caused plenty of it to be conveyed into their town. So
plentiful is the supply that it not only irrigates the flourishing
gardens but runs in streams through the streets. Notwithstanding these
streams may be very refreshing to look at, they must be a source of
annoyance to the pedestrian, who would prefer to walk dry-shod through
the streets.
On all sides may be seen hedges of roses. The weeping willow trees,
which are characteristic of all towns in the Transvaal, seem to be, if
possible, still more numerous here.
Provisions are exceedingly dear, except such as are native to the soil.
In consequence, while the Boers have the actual necessaries of life,
they find it impossible to secure the comforts and the refinement that
the average Englishman can obtain at home.
Potchefstroom bears a strong resemblance to Pretoria. The Boers, in
laying out the city, planned it on so large a scale that it is rather a
difficult matter correctly to estimate its extent.
Here we find the great open grass-covered space, the rose hedges, and
rows of weeping willows lining either side of the narrow grass-grown
roads with their well-worn cart ruts.
Many writers have given interesting accounts of the home life of the
Boers. Mr. Burchell, a traveler, tells us that he met with great
hospitality, not only from the wealthy farmers, but from the poorest and
humblest laborers. They carried this hospitality to such an extent as to
manifest a readiness and a willingness to open their doors to every
hungry and belated traveler that appealed for help and shelter.
On one occasion he was the guest of a farmer of the middle class. The
house had a bleak and exposed situation, and there was little about it
to indicate either art or culture. This house, which was built upon a
broad level space bounded by rugged mountains, had one large room, which
occupied the main part of the house. The floor was made of mud, and the
solitary window with its broken panes showed very plainly the scarcity
and the costliness of glass.
The main occupation of the Boers is raising wool, and great quantities
of this product are exported each year from Cape Town. As a matter of
economy the meat of the sheep is consumed for food, and the fat, or
tallow, is made into soap.
At the time of Mr. Burchell's visit to one of the Boers, there was a
large kettle of boiling soap suspended over the deep and spacious open
fireplace, in which a cheerful fire was blazing. This open fireplace
occupied one end of the main building, the bedrooms occupied the other.
A door in the wall at the back led into the kitchen. Near the fireplace
was a small window, kept closely covered by means of a wooden shutter.
This was the only protection from the cold wind; for the window had
neither sash nor glass.
Near the glazed window in the main room of the house was a small table,
and on it stood the little old-fashioned copper urn, which was almost
constantly in use.
On opposite sides of this table were placed ordinary wooden chairs.
These were for the master and mistress. Several chairs and benches and a
good-sized dining table were ranged about the room. Upon a shelf lay a
large Bible and a few other books.
The labor of the farm was performed by a man slave and a few
Hottentots. The work in the kitchen and about the house was
superintended by the mistress, with a black slave and a Hottentot girl
to assist her.
There were three daughters in the family. These were under the
instruction of a tutor, a native of Holland, who had lived for nearly
thirty years in Cape Colony. He had been an inmate of this family for
several months. He could speak quite fluently in English and French, and
seemed well able to instruct his pupils for the positions they would
occupy in life.
It is no uncommon thing to find teachers of this description scattered
over the country. They generally traverse the colony and remain
stationed at each house for a period of from a half to a whole year.
During this time such teachers agree to instruct their pupils in
reading, writing, and arithmetic,--in fact, to finish their education.
The head of the family where Mr. Burchell visited employed his time in
rearing cattle. For the disposing of his stock he depended upon the
butcher's agent. Such a person is sent by his employer in Cape Town to
travel through the grazing districts to select and purchase such cattle
as he may deem best. For these cattle he does not pay money, but gives
notes or drafts signed by his employer, and bearing an official stamp to
indicate their genuineness. Such drafts are considered as good as money,
and can be converted into cash by the grazier, or he can tender them in
payment to his neighbors.
The inland trade connected with Cape Town was in earlier times a matter
of great risk and inconvenience. This was owing to its remote situation
at the extremity of the country and to the miserable condition of the
roads leading to it. The barren condition of the soil and the lack of
good pasturage in the section about the town was a matter of serious
inconvenience to the Dutch farmers.
It was the custom for those residing at a great distance to undertake
the journey but once in the course of a year. The vehicles on such an
occasion resembled very much a traveling menagerie. In addition to the
principal members of the family, the poultry, goats, sheep, dogs,
monkeys, and other animals reminded the stranger, looking at the motley
array, of Noah and the animals that entered the ark. As a matter of
protection, and for the purpose of procuring game for food during the
journey, a musket or two were carried by the farmer and his aids.
The wagon conveying this mixed load was drawn by a train of at least
eight, often ten, or even sixteen, oxen. These, with the enormously long
whip of the driver, and the scantily clothed figure of the little
Hottentot who led the foremost pair, made a most curious and amusing
sight for the stranger visiting the country. The driver's seat was
considered a post of honor; the office of leading the oxen was
considered a most degrading one, fit only for a Hottentot or a slave.
Between Cape Town and the cultivated farming sections lie extensive
sandy plains. These are commonly called the Cape Downs. They are marked
by numberless road and wagon ruts in every direction. The soil of these
downs, which is composed of loose white sand resting on a bed of clay,
is capable of supporting only a few stunted shrubs and coarse rushes.
Here and there are scattered a few solitary huts.
Owing to the general barren nature of the country, travelers find no
inducement to remain more than a day at Cape Town. After a journey that
has perhaps lasted twenty days, during which the barren downs have been
crossed, the farmers frequently unyoke their oxen at Salt River, so as
to be in readiness to enter the town the next morning at break of day.
In this way they frequently dispose of their produce, procure such
articles as they may require, and set out immediately upon the homeward
journey in the course of a single day.
Now that the South African Republic is so well supplied with railways,
no doubt even the primitive and slow-moving Boer will in time avail
himself of the advantages of modern ways, and the old time customs will
cease to exist, just as in our own country traveling by stagecoach is a
thing of the past, except over some of the mountain roads not yet
crossed by railways.