be content with few luxuries. Their dwellings were in general small and
to modern ideas scantily furnished, as they had not been here long
enough to acquire the means to provide more than was barely necessary
for shelter and the simplest needs. The picturesque and commodious
houses with their ornamented gables and high stoeps, now so much
admired, only made their appearance when more than half a century from
the arrival of Willem Adriaan van der Stel had passed away, and with
them was first seen the massive furniture still occasionally met with.
Lying in the loft or on the beams of most of the cottages was a coffin,
kept in readiness for its eventual purpose, but used in the mean time as
a receptacle for odds and ends.[47]
The farming utensils were extremely crude, the plough especially, with
but one stilt, being as clumsy as it well could be. Black slaves had
been introduced, but were not yet numerous, and Hottentots in
considerable bands still roamed over the pastures beyond the settlement,
some of whom occasionally took service with the colonists in order to
obtain tobacco and strong drink.
The country people were almost exclusively occupied in agricultural or
pastoral pursuits. One of the Huguenot immigrants, Isaac Taillefer by
name, found time from the care of his vineyard to manufacture coarse
felt hats, and some of the women spun yarn and knitted socks and
stockings. What leather was needed was tanned by the farmers themselves,
whose womenfolk also made what soap and candles were required for home
use. Here and there one acted as a blacksmith, a waggonmaker, a
carpenter, or a shoemaker, in addition to looking after his farm, but as
yet there was no scope for mechanical industry on a large scale. The
farmers were in the habit of visiting each others’ houses frequently,
and on such occasions the men were entertained with wine and tobacco and
the women with coffee or tea.[48] At meal times visitors were invited to
partake as a matter of course.
[Sidenote: Life in the Cape Colony.]
It was a simple condition of life, not favourable to great expansion of
the mind, and not free from care, but not necessarily attended with
unhappiness.
Mixed with these worthy colonists was a sprinkling of men of loose
habits, mostly deserters from the garrison in Capetown or from ships, or
who had been discharged from the Company’s service without proper
caution. These men professed to desire to take service with the farmers,
but were in general vagabonds and a pest to the community. Yet no one
cared to give them up to justice, for it was regarded as the duty of the
government, not of the colonists, to apprehend them and punish them for
crime or expel them from the country as vagrants.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
The directors of the East India Company were desirous of increasing the
number of colonists, as they required larger supplies of provisions than
had hitherto been obtainable at the Cape, and they also wished to
strengthen the defensive force here in case of an attack by an enemy.
They were still sending out a few Huguenots almost every year, mixed
with a larger number of Dutch, but the ill-feeling between the two
nationalities in the colony, and more than this the menacing attitude of
the French king towards the Netherlands, with the suspicion that perhaps
the refugees might not prove loyal to a country that gave shelter and
religious dominance indeed, but that in language, customs, and form of
government was foreign and strange,[49] caused them to alter their plans
soon after the new governor was installed in office. On the 16th of June
1700 they appointed a commission to consider the matter, and in
conformity with the report sent in, on the 22nd of the same month they
adopted a resolution to authorise the different chambers to send out
men, women, and children, providing them with free passages, but taking
care that they were either Dutch citizens or subjects of a German state
not carrying on commerce by sea, that they were either of the reformed
or of the Lutheran faith, and that they were agriculturists or
vinedressers; but not to send out any more French.[50]
[Sidenote: Emigration to South Africa.]
Emigration to South Africa, according to the terms of this resolution,
continued until the 15th of July 1707, when it was stopped,[51] and from
that date onward the European population of the colony was increased
only by natural means and by the discharge of servants of the Company.
On the 27th of June 1699 the directors had strictly prohibited the
members of the council of policy and of the high court of justice from
trading in cattle in any way,[52] so that the interests of the colonists
seemed to them to be firmly secured. The chief officials, forbidden to
carry on agriculture or cattle breeding on their own account and to
speculate in oxen and sheep, could not do any damage to the farmers by
competing with them. In the large garden in Table Valley experiments
were being made at the Company’s expense in the cultivation of foreign
and indigenous plants, so that the colonists could learn without cost
what was most proper to cultivate and how to cultivate it. More
favourable terms could hardly be offered to suitable emigrants: free
transport, grant of land in freehold without charge, security against
competition.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
Unfortunately the colonists were ignorant of the last of these
conditions, for the orders of the directors were kept concealed from
them. Every member of the council of policy was sworn to secrecy, and
the contents of no document were made known without the governor’s
order. With our knowledge, now that the old records are open for
examination, it is with a feeling akin to amazement that we observe in
the struggle for justice about to be recorded that the burghers made no
use of a weapon which would at once have demolished their opponent, and
employed only instruments feebler in every way because they were not so
capable of being handled. More than once during the administration of
the Dutch East India Company in South Africa, the burghers complained,
and with reason, that they did not know by what laws they were governed.
Here was a case in point. A wise and salutary law, a law making
provision against gross oppression and wrong, was a dead letter for
years because it was kept concealed in inaccessible archives, and could
therefore be violated with impunity by faithless officials.
II.
ORDINARY EVENTS DURING THE ADMINISTRATION OF GOVERNOR WILLEM ADRIAAN VAN
DER STEL.
[Sidenote: Governor Willem Adriaan van der Stel.]
Willem Adriaan--or Wilhem Adriaen as he wrote his given name--van der
Stel, councillor extraordinary of Netherlands India and governor of the
Cape Colony and its dependency the island of Mauritius, had resided here
for several years after his arrival with his father in October 1679, and
had held different situations in the public service, so that he was well
acquainted with the condition of the country. In the proceedings of the
council of policy he is mentioned on the 16th of December 1680 as
receiving the appointments of secretary of the orphan chamber and of the
matrimonial court, on the 19th of April 1682 as having acted as issuer
of stores and as being then promoted to be a book-keeper, and on the
26th of December 1682 as being issuer of stores and then promoted to be
treasurer.[53] After a sojourn here of several years he returned to
Amsterdam, but the exact date of his removal is unknown. He was
accompanied to South Africa when he became governor by his wife, Maria
de Haase by name, and several children.
Notwithstanding the pains taken by the late governor to promote
tree-planting, there was a scarcity of timber and fuel at the Cape. It
was a difficult matter to supply the ships with firewood. Some skippers
reported that in passing by two islands, named Dina and Marseveen, in
latitude 41° or 42° south, and about four hundred sea miles from the
Cape, they had observed fine forests, which they suggested should be
examined. The master of the galiot _Wezel_ was thereupon instructed to
proceed to the locality indicated, to inspect the forests carefully, and
ascertain what quantity of timber was to be had. The _Wezel_ sailed from
Table Bay on the 31st of March 1699, but returned on the 13th of May
with a report that the search for the islands had been fruitless.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
The governor had instructions from the directors to attend more
carefully to arboriculture than had yet been done, and they complained
that if a sufficient number of trees had been planted in earlier years
there would be no necessity to send timber from Europe for housebuilding
purposes and no want of fuel for the ships. These instructions he
carried out, and during the first winter after his arrival twenty
thousand young oaks were planted in the kloofs at Stellenbosch and
Drakenstein, where the native forests had been exhausted, and over ten
thousand were set out in the Cape peninsula. In the winter of 1701 a
further supply was sent to Stellenbosch from the nursery in Table
Valley, and the landdrost was instructed to have them planted along the
streets.
On the 23rd of November 1699 the governor with a party of attendants set
out on a tour of inspection of the settlement. He visited Stellenbosch,
Drakenstein, and the farms about the Tigerberg, where he found some
persons to whom no ground had yet been allotted. The country was
inhabited by Europeans, though thinly, nearly as far as the present
village of Hermon. Small Hottentot kraals were scattered about, of which
the occupants were found to be very poor and very lazy.
Keeping down the Berg river, the range of mountains on the right was
reported to be tenanted by Bushmen, who were in the habit of descending
from their fastnesses and plundering the burghers and Hottentots below.
The range was on this account known as the Obiqua mountains. The
governor crossed over at a place since termed the Roodezand pass, just
beyond the gorge through which the Little Berg river flows, and entered
the valley now called the Tulbagh basin.
[Sidenote: Description of the Tulbagh Basin.]
Though not greatly elevated, this basin is in the second of the steps by
which the mainland of South Africa rises from the ocean to the central
plain. If a cane with a large round head be laid upon soft ground, the
mark will give an idea of its form. The hollow caused by the head of the
cane will represent the basin, the long narrow groove will indicate the
valley between the Obiqua mountains and a parallel range ten or eleven
kilometres farther inland. The Breede river has its source in the third
terrace, and, rushing down a gorge in the interior range, now called
Michell’s pass, flows south-eastward through the valley. Close to
Michell’s pass the mountain retires, but shortly sweeps round and joins
the Obiqua range, the keystone of the arch thus formed being the Great
Winterhoek, two thousand and eighty-five metres in height, the loftiest
peak visible from Capetown.
It was the basin thus enclosed that the governor and his party entered.
It was found to be drained by the Little Berg river and its numerous
tributary rills, whose waters escape through a gorge in the Obiqua
mountains, and flow north-westward. The watershed between the Breede and
Little Berg rivers is merely a gentle swell in the surface of the
ground. At the foot of Michell’s pass, at the present day, a mill-race
is led out of the Breede and turned into the Little Berg, and thus a few
shovelsful of earth can divert water from the Indian to the Atlantic
Ocean.
The basin excels all other parts of South Africa in the variety and
beauty of its wild flowers, which in early spring almost conceal the
ground. It was too late in the season for the governor’s party to see it
at its best, still the visitors were charmed with its appearance. Very
few Hottentots were found. In the recesses of the mountains were
forests of magnificent trees, and although the timber could not be
removed to the Cape, it would be of great use to residents. Immigrants
were arriving in every fleet from the Netherlands, so the governor
resolved to form a settlement in the valley, where cattle breeding could
be carried on to advantage. Agriculture, except to supply the wants of
residents, could not be pursued with profit, owing to the difficulty of
transport. The governor named the basin the Land of Waveren, in honour
of a family of position in Amsterdam. The range of mountains enclosing
the valley on the inland side and stretching away as far as the eye
could reach, as yet without a name, he called the Witsenberg, after the
justly-esteemed burgomaster Nicolaas Witsen of Amsterdam. The land of
Waveren has long since become the Tulbagh basin, but one may be allowed
to hope that the Witsenberg will always be known by the honoured name it
has borne since 1699.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
Several burghers who had been living at Drakenstein were now permitted
to graze their cattle at Riebeek’s Kasteel, and on the 31st of July 1700
some recent immigrants from Europe were sent to occupy the land of
Waveren. As it was the rainy season, the families of the immigrants
remained at the Cape until rough cottages could be put up for their
accommodation. At the same time a corporal and six soldiers were sent to
form a military post in the valley for the protection of the colonists.
This post was termed the Waveren outstation, and was maintained for many
years. On the 16th of October several additional families were forwarded
to the new district to obtain a living as graziers.
For a time after his arrival the Company’s garden in Table Valley was
kept by the new governor in the same state of cultivation as that in
which his father left it. To its former attractions he added a
museum--chiefly of skeletons and stuffed animals--and a small menagerie
of wild animals of the country, to which purposes one of the enclosed
spaces at the upper end was devoted. Near the centre of the garden he
erected a lodge for the reception of distinguished visitors and for his
own recreation, which building by enlargement and alterations in later
years became the governor’s town residence.
[Sidenote: Illegal Cattle Trade.]
As the garden in Capetown was thus reduced in size, and that at
Rondebosch did not produce as large a quantity of vegetables and fruit
as was required for the hospital, the garrison, and the ships, in the
winter of 1700 Governor Willem Adriaan van der Stel caused a new one to
be laid out a short distance beyond Rustenburg, and spent much money in
its ornamentation. As originally planned, this garden and the
plantations attached to it covered forty morgen of ground; but in course
of time from twenty to thirty morgen more were added to it. A
superintendent was stationed here with assistants and a strong party of
slaves, by whose labour the place soon became exceedingly attractive. In
this garden, which bore the name of Newlands, a small lodge was erected,
which grew half a century later into the favourite country residence of
the governors.
Ever since 1658 trade between the burghers and the Hottentots was
strictly forbidden. The chief object was to prevent any act that might
bring on a collision with the nomadic people or irritate them in any
way. In opposition to the law, however, parties of deserters and other
persons of loose character carried on a cattle trade, and were often
guilty of conduct that cannot be distinguished from robbery. Governor
Simon van der Stel thought to check this by threatening more severe
punishment, and on the 19th of October 1697 he issued a placaat in which
the barter of cattle from Hottentots was prohibited, under penalty of
whipping, branding, banishment, and confiscation of property.
The directors disapproved of this. They wished to encourage the
colonists, and for that purpose they had already, on the 14th of July
1695, issued instructions that their own farming operations should be
gradually discontinued, and that the cultivation of the vine and wheat
together with the rearing of cattle should be left entirely to the
burghers. They were now disposed to allow the colonists to purchase
cattle from the Hottentots and fatten them for sale to such persons as
would contract to supply the hospital, the garrison, and the ships with
beef and mutton. They therefore annulled the placaat, and on the 27th of
June 1699 issued instructions that the cattle trade should be thrown
open, care being taken that the Hottentots suffered no ill-treatment in
connection with it. Servants of the Company having seats in the council
of policy or in the court of justice were excluded from this trade, and
forbidden to supply meat for the public service.[54]
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
This order reached Capetown by the flute _De Boer_ on the 24th of
November, but the governor, who paid little regard to the instructions
of the directors when they clashed with his own interests, did not make
it known at the time. After long delay tenders were called for, and in
February 1700 the burgher Henning Huising entered into a contract to
supply the garrison, hospital, and Company’s fleets with beef and mutton
at 5½d. a kilogramme, he to have the use of the Company’s slaughter
houses, and as a cattle run the whole of the district of Groenekloof
that was not occupied by Hottentots. The contract was signed
provisionally for ten years, but the directors reduced it to five. With
this transaction the Company designed to relinquish sending out
expeditions to purchase cattle, as had been the custom for nearly half
a century; and henceforth it was only when working oxen were needed in
greater numbers than the burghers could supply that military bartering
parties went out. By a placaat of the council of policy presided over by
the commissioner Wouter Valckenier, on the 28th of February 1700 the
trade was thrown open to the burghers, with such restrictions as were
considered necessary to prevent its abuse.
[Sidenote: Training of the Colonists.]
From this date cattle-breeding became a favourite pursuit with yearly
increasing numbers or colonists. There was as much to be made by it as
by agriculture, and it was attended with less expense and less anxiety.
The government gave permission to applicants to use land for grazing
purposes at some defined locality north or north-east of Stellenbosch,
but if the pasture failed or did not prove as good as was anticipated,
the occupiers did not hesitate to seek other and better places. East of
the Hottentots-Holland mountains permission was not given to the
burghers in general to graze oxen and sheep until after the governor’s
recall in 1707, as he kept the pastures there as far as the Ziekenhuis
in one direction and Zoetendal’s Vlei in another for his own use and
that of one of his brothers. In defiance of the instructions or the 27th
of June 1699 and of the avowed policy of the Company at the time, he
himself was rapidly becoming a cattle farmer on a very extensive scale.
Many men and women were thus undergoing a special training for pushing
their way deeper into the continent. They were learning to relish a diet
of little else than animal food, and to use the flesh of game largely in
order to spare their flocks and herds. They were becoming accustomed
also to live in tent waggons for months together, so that the want of
houses soon ceased to be regarded as a matter of much hardship by these
dwellers in the wilds. They were acquiring a fondness for the healthy
life of the open country, with its freedom from care and restraint, and
its simple pleasures. For the town, with its government officials and
law agents and tradesmen and speculators of many kinds always seeking to
take advantage of their simplicity, they acquired such a dislike that
they never visited it when they could avoid doing so. They took with
them no other books than the bible and the psalms in metre, so their
children came to regard education in secular subjects as entirely
unnecessary. In self-reliance, however, they were receiving the most
complete training possible. The tastes and habits which were thus formed
were transmitted to their offspring, and in a few generations there was
a body of frontiersmen adapted, as no other Europeans ever were, for
acting as the pioneers of civilisation in such a country as South
Africa.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]
To encourage the cattle breeders, no rent for ground was charged until
1714, and no other tax than the one for district purposes was laid upon
their stock. A little experience proved that occasional change of
pasture was advantageous in the rearing of oxen and sheep, and the
authorities made no objection to the graziers going yearly for three or
four months to a tract of land far from that on which they lived at
other times. This grew into a custom for each one to select as winter
grazing ground a particular part of the karoo on the third terrace
upward from the sea, his right to which was respected by all the others,
though it was not directly recognised by the government.
With the enlargement of the settlement, fresh troubles arose with the
Bushmen. In March 1701 a band of those people drove off forty head of
cattle from Gerrit Cloete’s farm at Riebeek’s Kasteel. A commando of ten
soldiers and thirty burghers was sent after the depredators, but was
unable to find them. A temporary military post was then established at
Vogelvlei, at the foot of the Obiqua mountains.
This protection soon proved insufficient. In April Gerrit Cloete was
again robbed, and eleven head of cattle were lifted from the Waveren
post. A commando of twelve soldiers and fifty burghers was then
organised to clear the country of Bushmen, but did not succeed in
effecting its object. It was hardly disbanded when one hundred and
thirty-seven head of cattle were lifted within sight of the Vogelvlei
post. Upon this a reinforcement of six mounted soldiers was sent to each
of the two posts already occupied, and twelve men were stationed at
Riebeek’s Kasteel.
[Sidenote: Strife with the Bushmen.]
The Goringhaiqua and Cochoqua Hottentots now tendered their services to
assist the Europeans against the Bushmen, and requested that the captain
Kees, who was then living at Groenekloof, might be recognised as their
leader in the expedition. But it was discovered that Kees, who had
suffered severely from the Bushmen, had already joined a commando of
Gerrit Cloete’s friends, and that the joint force was scouring the
Obiqua mountains. On receipt of this information, the governor sent
instructions to the landdrost of Stellenbosch to have Cloete arrested
and brought to trial for waging war without leave, and to ascertain and
send in the names of those who had joined him in the expedition.
The prosecution fell through, and the governor thought it best after
this to send out only parties of soldiers against the robbers. In
September one of these parties recovered a hundred and twenty head of
cattle belonging partly to burghers and partly to Hottentots; but in the
following month more than two hundred head belonging to the contractor
Henning Huising were lifted at Groenekloof, and a patrol of thirty-five
soldiers was obliged to fall back from Piketberg, where the Bushmen made
a resolute stand.
In November a sergeant and ten men were sent to form a permanent
military post at Groenekloof. In the land of Waveren forty head of
cattle, mostly belonging to Etienne Terreblanche, were seized by
Bushmen, and one of the soldiers who tried to recover them was killed.
Two hundred and seventy-four head belonging to Hottentot kraals at
Riebeek’s Kasteel were driven off, but a party of soldiers followed the
robbers to Twenty-four Rivers, and retook most of the spoil. In trying
to afford protection, no distinction was made by the government between
burghers and Hottentots, the officers at the outposts being instructed
to do their utmost to recover cattle stolen by Bushmen and deliver them
to their proper owners, whoever these might be.
[Sidenote: Historical Sketches.]