Zulu huts are round, the framework being of poles bent half circular, tied with grass rope. The arch poles are supported with bent poles strung crosswise, these being made secure by grass rope. Roof and sides are covered with grass and reeds, secured to the framework with the same kind of rope. The floor is of soil, generally taken from an ant-hill, and becomes as compact as cement. In the center of the hut, what may be termed a sort of earthen vessel is built, sometimes 18 inches across, and this is the cooking place—the stove. Zulus build good huts. No windows are provided, however, and but one low entrance. The cooking utensils are limited to an iron kettle, with three legs. This is placed in the "stove." Cornmeal (called mealy meal) is the chief food, which is boiled in the three-legged kettle, and, when cooked, the family gathers round it, some sitting on the floor and others resting on their haunches. Each member is supplied with a wooden spoon, and with these they eat mealy meal as long as there is any to be eaten. A ladle to stir the mush, cut out of a calabash, is generally seen in a Zulu home. The bed is a cotton blanket, spread on the earthen floor, and a bowed piece of wood, resting on two upright pieces at each end, about four inches high, serves as a pillow. A soap box may occasionally be found in a hut, but no chairs. The interior is generally black with smoke from the "stove," a strong, sooty odor being noticeable.

The Zulu tribe does not "colonize"—or, rather, assemble in villages, as each family live by themselves. Huts are numerous, of course, but one rarely, if ever, finds a settlement—a town. They live in "kraals." A kraal is a group of huts, numbering from two to ten, surrounded by a fence, generally composed of thorn brush. The collection of huts generally indicates the number of wives that that Zulu has. One hut is always larger than the others, this being occupied by the first wife. Where cattle are kept together in a small area inclosed by a fence, it becomes a cattle kraal. Sometimes one kraal serves as a shelter for both natives and cattle.

Polygamy is common. The method of obtaining a wife is by purchase from the father. Cattle is the medium of barter, from 10 to 80 cows being the number asked for each girl. A wife who can be bought for 10 cows is just the ordinary girl. The daughter of a petty chief would bring 20 cows, and a girl of royal descent could not be purchased for less than 70 to 100 cows.

When a Zulu wishes to marry he comes to an understanding with the girl's father concerning the number of cattle that must be paid for the bride, and he must not forget to include among them another nice beast, which is slaughtered and eaten at the wedding feast. The marriage always takes place at the home of the bridegroom. The bride, with her attendants, arrives the evening before the wedding day. The extra ox is killed early in the morning.

The bride wears a veil of beads over her face for several hours while the ceremony is taking place. Certain persons are appointed to celebrate the marriage. Dancing is indulged in during this period. The father of the bride steps forward among the merrymakers and bespeaks the merits of his daughter. An old woman runs backward and forward among the guests, holding in her hand a small stick, pointing upward, and cackling like a hen. Dancing is going on all the time, one "group" of dancers holding the "stage" until exhausted, when another group will fill the vacated space and inject renewed life into the ceremony.

The bridegroom must show his valor during the pow-wow. He steps into the arena with two sticks in his hand—stout walking-sticks. A series of thrusts, feints, dodges, ducking, then a terrible thrust; more fencing, another awful jab; snorting, sweating, uttering deep grunts of satisfaction; stamping his feet heavily on the ground to make a noise, imitating thunder, which denotes powerfulness—he is fighting an imaginary foe, and when the bride's father and wedding party signify by applause that he has been victorious—that he has killed his adversary in mortal combat—he retires, carrying in his bosom the assurance that he is a Zulu warrior "to the manner born."

From 300 to 400 Zulus attend a wedding, which lasts sometimes several days. Native beer, made from corn, is brought in large quantities in hollow calabashes by the guests. Faction fights, often brought about through uninvited onlookers, but generally from drinking too much beer, frequently prove an exciting feature of a Zulu wedding.

Under no circumstances can a wife leave her husband. A bargain is a bargain with the Zulu. On the other hand, if the bride's merits have been misrepresented, her husband will take her to her father's kraal and demand the return of the cattle he paid for her. Though the girl gets the cattle in name, the father really has the cows.

When a husband dies, his wives are not left alone in the world. It is a Zulu custom that a brother of the deceased look after the widows. It may seem an imposition on a brother to be saddled with two large families—his own and his dead brother's—yet, bearing in mind that the widows, collectively, are mothers of half a dozen to fifteen daughters, it means that the guardian would fall heir to a nice herd of cows when the girls reach womanhood. Zulu families, however, are not large, averaging about five children.

A Zulu's standing with his people is based on the number of wives he has. One with six to nine helpmates is considered in good circumstances. In a general sense, the wives get along agreeably when they number from two to six. The first wife is mistress of those who come after her. Under the king's ruling, putting to death a favorite wife by the others occurred from time to time; but in such instances the wives numbered eight to twelve. Murders of this character have become of rare occurrence, however, since Zululand has been governed by the white man.

Wives and children are of little or no expense to a husband. He does not work after he has become the possessor of several wives, and the corn is planted, hoed, husked and ground into mealy meal by the wives. None of them wear shoes, nor hats, nor coats. Cotton blankets, which cost from 25 to 35 cents, are their chief covering. No money is required for baby carriages, as, when they are not snugly dished in a blanket on the mother's back, with the ends tied in front across her chest, they are seen creeping about the kraalyard. A visit to the country districts will find native women hoeing or working at something else with their babes tied to their back. Their husbands are in their huts, smoking pipes or sleeping. Zulu women look as strong as the men. Save for their babes, all burdens are borne on their heads. This mode of bearing weight is often carried to the ridiculous. A spool of thread, a tomato, a tincup or similar light article may be seen balanced on a woman's head. But she will carry in the same way, with as apparent ease, though, a 100-pound bag of cornmeal, a five gallon tin of water, a big three-legged iron kettle, and other weights that would tax the strength of a strong man. The Zulu woman's superior physique is accounted for, to a large degree, by the bearing of burdens on her head from early childhood.

A Zulu woman "dressed up" is a striking figure. An ocher-colored cone of hair rises from her head sometimes as high as 10 inches. One unfamiliar with the native's hair, as seen resting flat on the head, would never imagine the kinky mop, when straightened, would measure from 12 to 18 inches, but it will. The natural color of the hair, of course, is black, and its unnatural color is brought about by the application of a thin, red-mud solution. Grass stalks, placed inside, form a frame, which keeps the cone from settling. At the bottom, a band, generally a strip of hide, keeps the "ornament" firm. A long hat pin, whittled thin from a large bone of a beast, also plays a part in keeping the "stove-pipe" properly poised. Her face is broad and rather masculine, the expression stoical. No head covering is worn, and weights are borne on women's heads, cone or no cone. Her broad, strong shoulders are generally bare, and she always stands straight. Strings are fastened around her neck—sometimes these are hairs from an elephant's tail—to which are attached square pieces of cloth, with colored beads fastened on them, resembling dominos. Generally wire bangles are worn on one arm, these in some instances being so numerous that they cover the arm from wrist to elbow. Often the skin of a calf or a sheep or that of a wild beast is wrapped around her chest, passing under her arms, and fastened at the back. This "waist" extends in front to about the knees, and sometimes it is ornamented with beads, pebbles or small seashells. A short skirt of rough cloth extends to just below the knees, so that her legs from that point are bare, as precious few native women wear shoes. They have none. Only married women, or women engaged to be married, appear in the cone-shaped hair fashion.

Polygamy is conducive to thrift as well as to laziness. Nowadays few cattle are left to sons by fathers, as tick fever has almost bared the country of this means of food and barter. So, in order to get a wife, a Zulu must earn money with which to buy cows. The umfaan will save half of his wages of $2.50 or $3 a month that he receives as houseboy. When he has saved enough to buy a cow—they can be had for $15—it is put to graze close to his father's kraal, and he will save enough money to buy another cow or two. In the meantime calves are grazing, and by the time he has reached 21 years of age he generally has enough cows to buy one wife. Numbers of young men go to the Kimberley and Transvaal mines, where the wages run from $15 to $30 a month, with board. Unlike the American negro, the Zulu saves his money. But he will not work more than six months in the year at most. It is said a great deal of the Zulu's cash savings is hid in the ground. They are suspicious of the stability of banks, so keep the money where they can see it when they wish to.

The native of South Africa is as independent of the white man's aid to-day as he was a thousand years ago. His wants being so few, and his food easily obtained, he is not compelled to work for the white man. He is not ambitious for riches.

When a Zulu's hut is built on government ground the tax per year is $3.50, which includes all the land he feels disposed to work. He does not plant all his corn in one field, but has two or three patches growing not far from the kraal. If his hut is built on private land, the landowner charges the native from $5 to $10 a year rent. Land for cultivation, however, is included in the rent of the private landowner. Some of the public men of South Africa entertain the belief that if a heavier government tax were imposed on the native it would force him to work more—smoke him out, as it were. Just think of the snug income some Europeans who have from 100 to 300 huts on their undeveloped land are receiving from natives, as they collect from $5 to $10 for each hut. The native still pays the $3.50 government tax also. While Zulus as a race are honest, few Europeans will do business with them on a credit basis; they must pay cash for what they buy.

Honesty among Zulu house servants is an admirable trait. One might place a bushel of $20 gold pieces in the center of a room, be away from home for months, and on return find the money where it had been left. This applies more to what is termed a "raw kafir." When they have been among white people for a year or two their traits of honesty often slacken. The black man, as a rule, will pick up all the white man's vices, but few of his virtues.

A violation of the Zulu code of honesty was formerly punishable by death, and in some cases is still adhered to. The theft of a horse, cow, sheep, goat, pig or dog brought the death penalty. The moral code is inflexible. If a girl leaves a kraal to go into service in the towns and returns not as good as she was when she left the hut, she is likely to disappear mysteriously. A native guilty of committing a crime with a Zulu woman may be put to death.

Few deformed or crippled members of this tribe are seen. Under the kings' ruling an imperfect child at birth was not permitted to live.

Respect for old age is another excellent trait of the Zulu tribe. Were a mother or father to be living with a son and his wives, the father is "boss" of the kraal; and were the father to die the mother is the head of the kraal. The elder of two persons is respected by the younger. The oldest son has absolute rule over the other children; but, if the father be a chief, the youngest son succeeds him. Indian-like, Zulus walk in single file, and the younger always walks behind the elder. The woman always walks behind the man and carries his belongings. A Zulu woman is never seen alone—always with a child, woman, or girl.

Zulus have their own name for Europeans. A man who wore spectacles would be "four-eyed" in their language; a person with a scar on his face or hands, would be "scar" in the native language; one having a deep voice or light voice—that would be his name with the native. Long hair, short hair, mustache, a smooth face—any mark or peculiarity—Zulus would know him by words pertaining to these.

Natives are not allowed to own or carry firearms or any weapons used by Europeans. The same restriction applies to native police. A knobkerry, a pair of handcuffs and a sjambok (a strip of rhinoceros hide like a short whip) are the only weapons a native policeman is supplied with. The policy is a wise one, for, if the blacks knew how to use firearms, it would mean a constant menace to the whites. Zulus often carry their assegais with them in their country, and are allowed to carry sticks at all times, as a dog will attack a black, and the same dog would not even growl at a white man; besides, deadly snakes are numerous.

The Zulu system of "telegraphing" news from one part of the country to another is an interesting accomplishment. Results of battles and approaching danger are shouted from hilltop to hilltop for hundreds of miles with surprising speed and accuracy. In crises Zulus seem to rise out of the ground.

Sugar, salt, kerosene, cotton blankets, tobacco, snuff, lanterns, Jew's-harps, concertinas, mouth organs, beads, cheap spangles, bright calicoes, whistles, and numerous other things of a tawdry character are what Zulus spend their money on. Six cents is the cheapest purchase he can make, as the three-penny piece is the smallest coin in circulation. They will haggle and haggle with a trader sometimes for half an hour over a six-cent purchase, if the trader will listen to them.

"Bonsella" is a word one will often hear if he has dealings with the Zulu. "Bonsella" means he wants something that does not belong to him. With a six-cent purchase he will insist on a "bonsella." A thin slice of a small bar of soap, a few grains of sugar, a little pinch of salt, a piece of string will do, if he cannot do better; and should he fail in getting something from the trader he will ask for a drink of water.

With similar weapons, and each equally skilled in their use, and even numbers, one is pretty safe in making the statement that no man can fight better nor for a longer period than the Zulu. Their military uniform used to be cow-tails secured to a ring around the neck. The tails were so thick they presented the appearance of a complete robe or skin. The Zulu can store enough food away at one meal to last him for 24 to 36 hours without becoming fatigued. He can run from 50 to 70 miles without stopping. Coupled with these staying qualities, it was the custom with some of the Zulu kings to kill all soldiers who returned defeated in battle. That left but two courses open to him—death or victory.

The Zulu has but a poor and varied quality of religion. Some select the sun as their guiding light, others a white bird, again hawks will appeal to him as being worthy to look up to. Unlike the Mohammedan, his knees are not calloused from kneeling to gods of any sort.

Missionaries claim to have 200,000 followers of the Christian religion, which is nearly one-quarter of the Zulu population—one million. People who live in black countries place little credit to the native for having adopted the European faith. In fact, there is a prejudice against the mission native. If a man in South Africa were in need of two "boys," and two mission "boys" and two kraal "boys" had appeared for work at the same time, he would at once select the kraal "boys." When a native begins to wear shoes and a European hat, his usefulness as an employee generally proves of doubtful quantity. When he embraces the Christian religion he is limited to but one wife. That does not absolve him, however, from coming forward with the cows for his bride.

Zululand, and South Africa generally, is well looked after by European mounted police. The duty of the mounted police is to see that firearms do not find their way to the native; that whisky is not smuggled over the border; to learn if discontent exists that might turn into a revolution. The native police, unmounted, arrests natives for minor offenses, and tries to find out from his brother violations of the law that the white man could not know other than through his minion.

"Ba, ba" (father), is a native salute to a European. A bow always accompanies the words. It is customary to return the native's recognition, although some Europeans will not go to the trifling trouble to do so, which is discourteous, to say the least.

Should one be benighted, a European does not think twice as to whether he will go to a native's hut and sleep on the floor with the family. In so doing he will be offered every hospitality.

Deadly, poisonous snakes are so numerous in this section that settlers carry with them a snakebite outfit. This consists of a strong cord, a syringe containing a poison antidote, and a small lance attached. In Zululand and Natal a rattle-snake is considered almost harmless. The puff adder, that coils itself in a pathway and is very sluggish, bites one by a backward spring. His fangs grow that way. He cannot bite after one has passed him. Death shortly ensues from the bite of this reptile if not attended to at once.

A person will die in 20 to 30 minutes after being bitten by a mamba. There are two kinds of this deadly snake—the green and black—but no difference in the quality of poison they inject into their victim. Death from a mamba's bite is said to be an awful one. Sometimes the bitten person's head will burst and appear as a pumpkin would look when thrown with force on a stone. This will account for the settlers carrying the snakebite outfit. The cord is used to wrap around the member bitten above where the fangs entered, to keep the poison from getting further into the system; the lance is used to cut out a piece of flesh where bitten, and the syringe is used to inject the antidote accurately at the raw part of the member where the fangs stopped. This precautionary measure must be gone through within a couple of minutes or one will fall a victim to the mamba's fangs. The snakes grow in length from three to four feet.

"Wood and iron" houses—corrugated iron mostly—is the style of European homes seen in Zululand. This also will apply quite generally to the country districts of South Africa. A half dozen of these, one story high—a postoffice, three general stores, a court house and a hotel—are the buildings about which the commercial life of Melmoth centers. A church building is generally numbered among these groups, and always a graveyard out of proportion. Many of the hotels of Zululand are built somewhat on the kraal plan. The dining and sitting rooms—sometimes one room answers both purposes—are in a one-story "wood and iron" building. Many of the bedrooms—small houses resting on posts a foot to eighteen inches from the ground—are located a short distance from the main building, which they sometimes half-encircle. Each house, by partitioning, contains several small bedrooms. The beds with which these rooms are furnished are generally half-size iron ones, and the light provided is often a candle.

"Keep to the native trail until you come to that clump of wattle trees," directed the driver of the post cart when ten miles from Melmoth on my return to Ginginhlovu. A printer who had got tired of the smell of printers' ink moved to Zululand to make his living in the dual capacity of farmer and trader. So, with a grip in my hand, I started over the Zulu trail to the clump of trees in the distance. I had not gone far when I heard a shout, but could not tell whence it came. It may be the natives telegraphing the start of an uprising, I mused. "Halloa!" was again heard, and, looking in another direction, a wide-brimmed hat was looming over the arch of a grassy hill. It was the printer. The post cart driver had "set me down," as a Britisher would say, at the wrong trail.

"The natives wouldn't sell me any chickens when I first came here, so I wouldn't sell them any goods unless they paid for them with chickens," was one of the difficulties the printer-trader recounted in his effort to hew his way in Zululand.

"Sarah," addressing his wife, "come with us this afternoon while we visit the natives' huts, as you can speak the language better than I," obligingly suggested the sturdy trader, who had beaten freight trains over the United States, sailed before the mast, and had tramped the desert of West Australia to the gold mines at Coolgardie.

Through the trader's wife we chatted with the Zulu women hoeing corn, with their pickaninnies on their backs. Later we squeezed through the small entrances into hut after hut. The lady of the Zulu home explained how the natives winnowed the mealy meal by blowing the dust or bran from it with their breath when passing from the hands, to lodge in a wooden bowl under; how they stirred the meal; explained their scanty washing outfit, how the wives got along together, and other interesting features of Zulu life. After spending several interesting days at the printer-trader's home, it was time to say good-by; and I left with a keen feeling of indebtedness for the unstinted hospitality and kindness shown me.

"I've kept my word—I've got the eggs!" remarked Graham when we had pulled up at his place for luncheon on the return trip.

With pages left unwritten of the Zulu, the strongest, most intelligent and best built tribe of the Bantu race, we will leave the sailor's place for Eshowe, take the post cart to Ginginhlovu, and return by rail to Durban.

CHAPTER IV

My first introduction to South Africa railway travel took place on my initial trip to Johannesburg. The compartment type of corridor carriage, as passenger coaches are termed, with an aisle at the side, similar to that of Great Britain, is in use. Meter gauge—3 feet 6 inches—is the standard of that country, 14 inches narrower than what is known as "standard gauge"—4 feet 8 inches—in the United States and in some of the European countries. The narrow spaces of the compartment (6 by 6½ feet) inclined one to wish for a two person seat. Two out of a filled compartment have direct access to a window—the two passengers whose seats are the outside end ones. Most travelers have seats reserved, in some instances a week in advance, their names being written on a card on the outside of the car at the compartment assigned.

Compartments in the railway coaches are heated with what is called foot-warmers—that is, sometimes the compartment will be provided with this device. The foot-warmer is an iron pipe, two feet long, eight inches wide, three inches thick, and filled with hot water. The foot-warmer is all right when there are but two persons in a compartment, or when two foot-warmers are supplied and four persons occupy a compartment, but when six or eight passengers occupy a compartment—well, 16 passengers' feet cannot get on four feet of piping. That is the only means of heating passenger coaches in South Africa.

In some respects accommodation is better on South African trains than in the United States and Europe—every passenger having a place to sleep, for instance. Six persons can sleep in a compartment, but five is generally the maximum number assigned, the extra berth being reserved for hand baggage. Frequently, when travel is light, one has a compartment to himself. The back of the compartment against which one leans while riding is portable, and when pulled out straight is fastened at each end. Above that shelf, or berth, is another. The same applies to the opposite side of the compartment, which, with seats on each side, termed the lower berths, make six in all—three on each side. These berths, or sleeping shelves, are two feet wide and upholstered. Travelers generally carry with them a cushion and blanket, or rug, as it is termed, which is used for sleeping purposes. The bedding furnished by the railway cost 60 cents. If one is traveling two nights in succession the bedding is rolled up by a steward in the morning and put on the top shelf of the compartment, where it remains during the day, and is taken down the second night for use. Sixty cents for two nights—30 cents a night. Meals on the train are very reasonable. Breakfast and luncheon costs 50 cents and dinner 60 cents. So, paying but 60 cents for a bed, as it were, and not more than 60 cents for a meal, one finds a great reduction in traveling expenses in South Africa compared to what is charged for the same service in the United States. Railroad fare is higher, however, than in America, the second class rate being three and four cents a mile, and first-class six cents a mile. A hundred pounds of baggage is allowed a passenger. The schedule is slow compared with that in England and on some roads in America, twenty-five miles an hour being as fast as trains run. Long delays take place at stations, for when a passenger train stops it often seems as if it had been abandoned.

From Durban to Pietermaritzburg, a distance of 70 miles, an elevation of 3,000 feet is ascended. Some cultivated land is seen from the train, but grassy, timberless hills, with smoke and flames from prairie fires showing here and there off the railway, is what a stranger notices continuously.

Pietermaritzburg, the capital of Natal, was first settled by the Dutch. The town hall, postoffice, and government buildings are imposing structures. In addition, one finds a small museum, botanical garden and good city parks, an electric railway system and a good railway station. One is surprised when visiting small cities located so far out of the world, as it seems, to find them so up to date. Locally, the place is called, for short, Maritzburg.

The Voortrekkers' Church is a historical monument to, and a solemn reminder of, the terrible sufferings of the Voortrekkers during the dark days between the massacres by the hordes of Dingaan, the Zulu king, of over 600 men, women and children, in February, 1838, and the eventful overthrowing of Zulu power, at Blood River, in December of the same year. The massacre of Piet Retief, leader of a colony of Boer emigrants, and some of his band by the native despot at the head kraal, and the slaughter of his followers at Weenen, which immediately followed, is closely identified with the erection of the church. Retief and some of his followers had been led to believe that Dingaan wished to make friends of them. While in the king's kraal, they were seized and massacred. Andries Pretorius, with 450 men, some months later, started on an expedition to avenge the massacre. Religious services were held every day during the march of the expedition, and a vow was made by Pretorius' party that, if they came out victorious in battle with the bloodthirsty and perfidious Zulu king, a church to the honor of God would be erected. Pretorius and his burghers met the Zulu forces at a river then unnamed. Fifteen thousand natives were arrayed against 450 Boers. After several hours' fighting the Zulus fled, leaving behind 5,000 dead and wounded. The river was said to be red with the blood that flowed from wounded natives, and that stream has since been known as Blood River. Dingaan's Day, December 16, one of the national holidays in South Africa, is observed in honor of the bravery of Pretorius and his followers and the avenging of the foul massacre of Piet Retief and his band of emigrants. The church promised by Pretorius was built in 1841, three years later.

Maritzburg natives are mostly Basutos, the only tribe in South Africa that white troops have never conquered. Most of Basutoland is situated in the Drakensburg Mountains, some parts of which contain rich land. They have a king, and are said to be wealthy. Europeans cannot travel in Basutoland without permission from the ruler or some high native officer. A large amount of firearms and munitions of war is said to have been smuggled into their country. The Basuto is feared by all in South Africa, and that will explain why Basutoland is for Basutos only.

Now we travel northward to Ladysmith, passing Spion Kop south of the Siege City. Ragged turrets and spires are still to be seen, bearing gaping evidence of the days of suffering, hunger and fear that the brave besieged underwent in the Boer war. Historical Majuba Hill next comes in view, with Mount Prospect opposite. A tunnel has been bored through the land lying between Majuba and Mount Prospect, known as Laing's Nek. We travel over rough territory for a while, then find ourselves on the high veld, having left the Drakensburg mountain range behind. Continuing to Charlestown, on the south bank of the Vaal River, and crossing the river to Voxburg, we passed out of Natal and were in the Transvaal.

"When do we scoff?" asked a passenger, at one stage of the journey. The term being a strange one, "I don't know" was what a stranger would reply. "Luncheon is ready" announced a train steward just then as he passed the compartment. "Let's go and scoff. I'm hungry," said the South African. "Scoff," in South Africa, has the same meaning here as "grub" in the United States.

The River Vaal is the boundary line between the Transvaal Province, Natal Province and the Orange Free State. The meaning of "Transvaal" is, across the Vaal—trans-Vaal.

On we go over the grassy veld, or prairie, seeing very little cultivated ground, but cattle are grazing here and there. They are a brand peculiar to South Africa; their horns grow from two to three feet, their legs in keeping with the long horns, but their bodies are narrow and of light weight. The most productive feature of the veld were ant-hills, ranging in size from a water bucket to a hogshead. Thousands of these, as far as the eye could reach, mar the green landscape as freckles or small-pox mark an unblemished skin.

The railroad from Durban to Johannesburg is the crookedest one might ride over. To save building a small bridge, the track turns for miles before it gets back to a straight line. When the railway was built the contractors were paid by the mile. Were the road constructed on ordinary scientific lines, the distance between the two cities could be reduced fifty miles. Yet, neat, well-built, attractive stations, surrounded with flower beds, were passed all the way.

Over the freckled veld we rolled, with Johannesburg in the distance. The sky was clear, as most always, on the highlands of the Transvaal. We had traveled to over 6,000 feet above sea level. Objects in the distance became less distinct—a haze seemed to gather. It was the smoke from the gold mines on the great Gold Reef—

"Johannesburg!"—"Johannesburg!" a train guard announced.

A well built business city is the impression made by this great gold center of the world. A long street, with all the business of the city centered in it, one would expect to find on reaching Johannesburg. That is the style of some of our western mining towns. Instead, here are buildings, five to eight stories in height, of stone, brick, and steel, some of them a city block square in dimension, with arcades leading from one street to another; large plate glass windows where goods are attractively displayed; elevators and steam heat appliances—all centralized in a space five squares in extent. This is the retail section of Johannesburg. The great banking and mining companies' buildings—splendid structures, all of modern architecture—are situated half a dozen squares from this center. The financial district is a busy place.

"Come, buyers! Come, buyers! Come, buyers!" the auctioneer cries when he has an assignment to sell something in the marketplace. Every one is used to the call, and soon a group gathers around. "How much—how much—how much?" the auctioneer starts with his glib sale talk. The articles to be sold may be crates of oranges, bunches of bananas, a crate of chickens, geese, hares, wild fowl, pumpkins, tomatoes, turnips, cornmeal, oats, hay, a pig, cattle, buck (deer), wildebeeste (gnu)—anything edible for man and beast. Dozens of auctioneers are selling goods in the Johannesburg market at the same time.

"That fellow is one of the lost tribe of Israel we read about in the Bible," spoke a Britisher who had been a produce dealer on the Johannesburg market for twenty years. "When the Rand was opened to the world," he continued, "the lost tribe cropped up in the Transvaal and that fellow is one of them." The buyer was engaged in a controversy with the old dealer, the point at issue hinging on one chicken, the Israelite contending he had bought thirteen hens, and the dealer maintaining there were only twelve to be sold. Arguments are taking place all the time between buyer, seller and auctioneer.

Fifteen wildebeeste (gnu), with bent horns, and whiskers six inches long growing straight from their noses; blesbuck, bushbuck, springbuck by the dozens, lay on the ground in the market. Meat from these animals is sold as venison. Seeing these beasts of the plains stretched out in plain view, about which most people read but do not see, creates a far-off feeling—a feeling that, were the eyes shut to the brick and mortar walls close by, one would be in a wild, unblazed section of the world.

Hundreds of ox teams in the market ground worm their way through piles of bags, hay and transports, led by the natives with bare feet and bare head. A South African ox team numbers nine yoke—18 oxen. The transport, or wagon, is 18 feet long and strongly built. Seven feet of the rear is generally covered with canvas, and under the "tent" is the home of the Boer, and often his wife, as weeks must elapse from the time a start has been made for market until their return, as the farms, in a great many instances, are located long distances from large towns. Time saving is not a factor in a great many sections of the sub-continent. The oxen plod slowly along an unkept road, always preceded by a kafir, who guides the caravan by rhinoceros-hide strips attached to the horns of the leading team. After traveling about three hours, a stop ("outspan") is made for the cattle to feed, as grass grows bountifully on the veld. So, allowing time for "outspanning" and "inspanning," 10 to 15 miles a day is generally the distance covered by a transport. "Salted" cattle are the only ones in demand for working purposes. "Salted," when used in speaking of oxen, signifies that cattle can run the gauntlet of many diseases that so often bare the veld of grazing stock. These are cattle that have been sick but survived the attack. "Unsalted" stock are in little demand, as they often get sick after starting from the farmer's home and die by the roadside.

One automobile to 15 persons is a high percentage in a city with about 100,000 white population, yet that indicates the wealth of the gold city on the high veld. There are over 800 automobiles and the same number of motorcycles in Johannesburg, and among these are the largest, most expensive and swiftest manufactured.

The term "The Rand" embraces the mining districts of the Reef, and "Witwatersrand" is used when speaking of the districts located close to Johannesburg.

Sixty miles of smokestacks—from Krugersdorp to Springs—will suggest at once the magnitude of the great Gold Reef. Dynamite is blasting the gold-bearing ore for that distance 24 hours a day; black smoke is rolling out of high smokestacks from strong fires, under boilers in which steam is generated to furnish power to hoist the ore from thousands of feet underground to the stamp mills at the top; great dirt heaps—cyanide banks, as they are termed—circle about and wall in thrifty mining towns, that are not seen until a train stops at a railway station; monster stamp mills, whose crushing machinery resembles the roar of a sea beating on a rocky shore, are grinding the quartz into powdered dust—for nearly thirty years the Reef has been exploited, and is still giving up its precious ore. Hundreds of thousands of people are engaged in this gold mining industry; the eyes of the money people of the world are constantly watching the gold yield of the Rand.

In 1884 the output of the Transvaal gold mines was $55,000, and, save for a few years, during which the Boer war was being fought, the output increased until it has reached the enormous sum of $150,000,000 a year. The monthly output is from $12,000,000 to $15,000,000.

The stamps that crush the ore into powdered dust weigh from 1,800 to 2,000 pounds. Under the stamps are zinc-lined inclining tables, 10 feet long and 4 feet wide, covered with quicksilver. Water washes the thin dust over the tables, when the gold adheres to the quicksilver. The dust from five stamps passes over one table. When about an eighth of an inch of gold sediment has accumulated, the stamps cease working, and the residue is scraped off the zinc. The scrapings look like thick black mud. The sediment then goes through a drying process. The dried chunks of gold "mud" are next put in a kettle, or retort, and melted. Borax is tossed into the hot metal, which separates impurities from the gold, the precious metal remaining at the bottom of the kettle, the dross keeping to the top. More gold "mud" is put in the kettle, until there is enough to make a brick, or ingot. The gold metal is poured into a mold. Cooling in a few minutes, the red hot brick is dumped on the floor. The shape of an ingot is similar to a sponge cake, narrower at the bottom than at the top. The weight of an ingot is 1,000 ounces, its value about $20,000.

In early years the dirt that passed over the quicksilver was considered of little value, and was washed away. The dirt is now treated by what is termed the cyanide process. Remaining in large cyanide tanks, any gold contained in the dirt is reduced to a liquid. The liquid next goes to the extracting room, where it passes through inclining tanks, 12 feet long by 6 feet wide, composed of five compartments. The floors of these tanks are covered with 8 inches of zinc shavings. The liquid slowly passes from one compartment to another. Any gold contained in the chemical solution adheres to the zinc shavings. The shavings are then taken from the tank and put in a retort. At the same time sulphuric acid is placed in the retort, which causes the zinc to dissolve. The sediment in this instance is also like black mud. This is next put through a drying process, put in another retort, when the gold can be seen, poured into a mold, and dumped on a floor in ingot form. Some of the mine owners are very obliging to visitors who wish to look about the works. The mines range in depth from 2,000 to 4,000 feet.

Twenty thousand Europeans and 200,000 natives are employed in the Rand mines. Paul Kruger, nearly 30 years ago, fixed the wages of the white miner at $5 a day. Contract miners, however, earn as much as from $200 to $300 a month; but the average wage of the Rand miner is $160 a month. The natives' wage runs from 50 cents to a dollar a day and board. The hours worked are eight, three shifts comprising a day's force.

Compound is the term used for an enclosure in which native employes are kept. As many as 3,000 to 4,000 kafirs work in some of the mines. From the mine they go to the compound, where a bunk is provided, a place to make a fire, and food is furnished. They are not allowed outside the enclosure at night, but on Sundays and holidays most of them are free. Tact has to be exercised when assigning kafirs to their quarters and to working mates, as a hostile feeling exists between certain tribes. If members of unfriendly clans be not kept apart, fights and murders often occur.

Weasel-eyed, idle, easy living Europeans are found in considerable numbers in mining districts. Were the natives allowed their liberty in the evening, it would result in their complete demoralization, for the crafty gentry would succeed in getting bad whisky or vicious rum into the compounds, receiving a big price for the poison, in addition to offering inducements to the "boys" to pilfer nuggets or heavy-bearing gold quartz.

"Scarcity of help, scarcity of help," is the cry of mine owners in South Africa. Sharp competition prevails between mining companies for "boys," and it is a scarcity of this class of labor to which they allude. A European trader may have the confidence of natives in the district in which his store is located, and when help is wanted labor agents call on the merchant. When a trader induces natives to go to the mines, the firm to which they have been sent will pay him $15 for each "boy" as a bonus. If the company failed to pay the bonus, it would thereafter get very few "boys" from that trader's district. In thickly populated centers like Kaffraria a dealer may control as many as 1,000 natives. In such instances companies pay him an income of from $100 to $125 a month, in addition to the $15 a head, in order to keep in his good graces. If a "boy" should engage to work for the shorter term—six months—and rehire at the end of the term, the trader from whose district the kafir originally came would be sent an additional sum of $15. Where labor agents deal with native chiefs for mine "boys," the chief expects a "bonsella" of $2.50 for every "boy" leaving his district to work in the mines. With bonuses, clothes, car fare and other incidentals, it costs the mine company from $25 to $30 to get a "boy" from the kraal to the works. Mine owners claim they pay out a quarter of a million dollars a year in bonuses for native help. It is also claimed that the mining industry could not be conducted at a profit with all white labor.

Twenty-one thousand graves in Braamfontein Cemetery, a great many of these containing two corpses, strongly emphasizes the terrible toll of human life paid to King Gold in the Transvaal mines. This is but one European graveyard, as there are several smaller burying places in the Johannesburg district. Besides those in which only Dutch and English are buried, there are Jewish, Malay and Mohammedan graveyards scattered about the city. Braamfontein Cemetery is filled, and a new one is filling fast. This appalling mortality has taken place during the past 30 years.

Eighty-nine open graves—mound after mound in as regular order as are boards in a floor—is a gruesome setting that forces one to cast a sad glance at the clouds of black smoke pouring out of the hundreds of smokestacks on the great Gold Reef, and at the gray-colored cyanide banks that half encircle the city of Johannesburg. These unbroken rows of freshly dug graves were in the European section of Brixton graveyard, and at the other end of the large burying ground—the native section—eighty freshly dug graves presented a grim foreground.

"Bubonic plague?" the reader may ask. No, phthisis.

Eighty in a thousand of ordinary miners, and 140 in a thousand of workers using underground drilling machines, are affected with phthisis. As gold-bearing rock is being blasted all the time, miners inhale the fine dust during working hours. Respirators, a device covering the nose and mouth, having a sponge at the mouth, and two openings at the side covered with a fine wire screen to admit of air, are worn by some of the workers, but, as it proves cumbersome, a great many miners discard that life-extending invention. Phthisis here signifies the drying up of the lungs. The dust inhaled settles in the cells of the lungs, with the appalling result mentioned.

Seven years is the average lifetime of the Rand miner. On the headstones in Braamfontein Cemetery, carved in granite, most of the ages are found to be in the twenties and thirties. Few stones observed bore ages of 40 years and over.

The average number of burials in Johannesburg is ten a day; Europeans average four and natives six. People not engaged in underground work, and not connected with the mines in any capacity, also become affected with phthisis. As on American prairies, the wind blows on the veld nearly all the time, and generally with considerable force; hence the air is full of dust from the powder-crushed cyanide banks.

Priest, preacher and missionary may be seen at cemetery gates all the time, more particularly in the afternoons.

"Will there be any more funerals today?" was asked of a native who had just filled in a grave.

"Yes, baas. Two wagons coming now," he answered, pointing to the road.

The natives are buried in a burlap sack, drawn tight and sewed, reducing the natural size of the body considerably. Two corpses rest on the bottom of a grave. Six inches of dirt cover these, when two more of the sacked bodies are lowered, making four in one grave.

The city of Johannesburg receive $7 for every kafir buried in Brixton graveyard—$28 for a grave containing the bodies of four natives. The owners of the mines at which the natives had worked must pay this burial charge. Deaths of natives are caused more by accidents in mines than from phthisis, as kafirs will not, as a rule, work more than six months in the year.

At the end of Brixton graveyard, where Europeans are buried, could be seen, from a distance, undertakers in long coats and high hats; hearses, ornamented with white or black cockades, drawn by horses of the same color; clergymen, their heads bowed and reading from books, with groups of veiled people huddled in small areas—putting people underground and the circumstances attending these ceremonies are of very frequent occurrence in Johannesburg.

The grave-diggers have no slack seasons; they are busy the year round, which accounted for so many open graves. As they were sure to be needed, it was better to be ahead of the demand than crowded with orders.

"Don't Expectorate!" is the cautionary sign confronting one at almost every turn in the Gold City. Where the "Don't Spit!" sign appears frequently one knows he has reached a place where lung trouble is prevalent.

Paved streets in some of the South African cities has not been considered so much of a municipal duty as in other parts of the world. The soil being hard, the rain, coming in showers, flows off as it does on paved streets. As the sun shines 365 days in the year on the high veld, the ground is dry in a short time after a shower has passed.

Walking in the streets instead of on the walks is a local custom one quickly notices. In Johannesburg good, wide walks may be practically free of people though the street space is occupied by pedestrians from curb to curb.

"Joburg" is the local term used almost exclusively by South Africans when speaking of Johannesburg. When one hears another say "Johannesburg" it is a pretty sure sign that he is a stranger in "Darkest Africa."

Living expenses are much higher in Johannesburg and other up-country cities than on the coast. House rent runs from $25 to $40 a month; meat was 18 cents to 30 cents a pound; street car fare is very high; in a general sense, expenses are 20 per cent. higher than in the coast cities. Boarding houses charge from $35 to $40 a month; hotel accommodation is expensive, too, the cheapest costing $3 a day; rooms cost $1.25 a day in all the hotels. Six cents is the least sum for any small article. A newspaper costs six cents (threepence), the bootblacks charge 12 cents for a shine, barbers 18 cents for shaving; it seemed as if one was handing out six cents at every few squares to a street-car conductor, so short are the "stages"—in fact, few things can be had for less than six cents.

Dutch, British and Jews comprise the majority of the population, Jews numbering one-third. Germans are also quite numerous. Americans, up to the time of the Boer War, held high positions with mining companies, but they have been thinned out since the country changed hands. Every country of the globe is represented in that cosmopolitan center.

On pay days "Joburg" is a lively place. The saloons seem to get the biggest part of miners' wages. They spend their money like lords. In no place are bars better patronized. A glass of beer costs 12 cents, and stronger drinks 24 cents. The barmaid, a woman engaged tending bars in public drinking places in British territories, is not seen behind the bar of saloons in cities and towns of the Transvaal, men being engaged at that work.

Years ago, when the game of baseball was played, which took place weekly and on holidays, crowds of people used to attend. Games are still played at weekly intervals, but only a few attend—sometimes not more than 100 persons. On the other hand, big crowds attend the English games—cricket and football.

"Closed on account of dust." "Open—Closed on account of dust." Such signs will be found secured to doors of most business houses. The wind blows so generally, and nearly always so strongly, that all doors must be kept closed, whether of business or dwelling. With unpaved streets, and the half-circle of great cyanide banks about the city, Johannesburg, as appearing to some visitors, is not a choice place of residence. The climate of the Rand possesses one virtue—there is no malarial fever. On the other hand, the lips swell, chafe and crack from the effects of both the wind and high altitude, this causing an irritating feeling. Laundries do a good business here. Collars are changed twice a day, as the soil, being red, and the almost constant high winds, with the dry nature of the country, keeps the dust flying about most of the time. One will not have lived in this city long before he will have eaten his allotted "peck of dirt."

In Ludlow Street Jail, New York, prisoners are kept who are not considered criminals—that class of men who cannot pay their debts and who have not been adjudged insolvent. The city pays for their food. In Johannesburg, if a man is sent to jail for a debt, the creditor must pay the city 50 cents a day for the debtor's board. Precious few prisoners of this class are found in the Johannesburg jail.

Newspapers of the Rand are fully up to the requirements of the city, four dailies being published, two morning and two evening. The morning papers issue Sunday editions, one of these including a colored magazine section. It has required constant fighting by the owners to maintain the Sunday editions, as it is an innovation in British territory. Opponents had injunctions issued against these publications, and in other ways the publishers were put to much inconvenience. This edition still appears on the street, however, but, by a court decree, dealers and newsboys are prohibited from soliciting sales. Printers earn good wages on the Rand, running from $30 to $55 weekly, with the working hours seven and eight. One finds here linotype machines, web presses, color presses, stereotyping—all the modern machinery in use in the North. South Africa is the one country where printers can do as well, and sometimes better, than in the United States.

Mechanics and miners are so well organized that they have a building of their own. They pull together on election day, and, as a result, a number of union labor men are sprinkled about the upper and lower Houses of Parliament. Eight hours is the maximum working day in South Africa among skilled mechanics and miners. Wages run from $4.50 to $6 a day.

In years gone by the Dutch suffered so much from the natives during their treks that they have a pretty good idea of how to manage them. No blacks crowd Europeans off the walks in Johannesburg, for the black man is not allowed on them; he must walk in the street. This policy saves trouble for both black and white, for it prevents arguments and fights. He is not allowed to ride on street cars. In railroad compartments colored and half-castes are prohibited from intermingling with Europeans. "Reserved" is posted on the doors of certain compartments, in which one generally would find well-to-do colored passengers.

The native is not allowed to live in towns and cities here. What are termed "locations" are built by the municipality, and in these places the natives are kept to themselves. The Boer plan is much better than the English, as, if the black man be given too much liberty, it generally proves injurious to him. Dutch authorities are very severe on men smuggling liquor to natives. Five hundred dollars is the fine, and in default of payment the smuggler must serve five years in jail.

Indians leaving Natal for the Transvaal generally come to grief. On arrival they are promptly taken into custody, and when 50 to 100 have been collected are put into box cars of a train headed for Portuguese territory, and soon find themselves in the hold of a ship sailing from Lourenzo Marques for India. Indians have spoiled the Province of Natal, so the Dutch are taking care that that race do not get the money that belongs to the white man in the Transvaal. Though Indians are British subjects, it makes no difference to the Dutch. Australia has barred them from that country, too.

An art gallery, a museum, a large public library, a good zoo, sports grounds, parks where music is furnished, theaters, schools, churches, hospitals—all the public accessories that make a city are found in Johannesburg; also most modern city fire-fighting appliances, an electric street car system, electric and gas plants, fully in keeping with those in cities of the same size located in the countries of the North.

"Necessity is the mother of invention," so, as there is practically no timber in South Africa, and brick buildings cost quite a sum of money to erect, homes had to be made of something else. Corrugated iron was the material that answered the purpose of brick, wood and stone. About all the timber required to erect one of these houses is for joists, scantlings, and doors. The sheets of corrugated iron are nailed to the joists and to the scantling at the roof. Sometimes there are plastered interiors, but a great many have no more protection than the sheet of iron. They are very hot in summer and very cold in winter. They pop and crack all the time from expansion and contraction. These houses are seldom more than one story high. "Wood and iron" buildings is what they are called.

"Pipe Hospital" may be seen over the door of a tobacco store. It means that pipes are repaired there.

A broad-brimmed hat, with a thick outside band, the latter often brown, with a white speck here and there, is the head-covering worn in the interior of South Africa. It is the only hat a Dutchman wears. Derby hats are in little demand in that part of the world. One occasionally sees a man wearing that style, but soft hats hold the day.

Snow fell in Johannesburg a few years since, the first in 20 years, and it proved an epoch in the history of the country. Important events that took place before or since are referred to as having occurred before or after the storm. Still, the weather gets cold enough to freeze water, but the sun warms up everything in the daytime. By reason of the high altitude—over 6,000 feet—the weather is never too hot in summer.

To General Louis Botha the people of not only South Africa, but of the world, owe a great debt for saving the Rand mines. The time Botha rendered this service was when Lord Roberts, with his invincible forces, was outside the gates of Johannesburg prepared to enter the city. Most of the gold mines on the Rand had been wired and powerful explosives placed at sections where the greatest damage would take place from an explosion. It was planned that as soon as Lord Roberts entered the city an electric button would be pressed to set off the bombs, which would ruin the mines. Botha, of course, was well aware of what was to occur. A messenger was dispatched by him to Lord Roberts, bearing a request from the Boer commander to delay entering the city for 24 hours. Lord Roberts acceded to the request. During the interval General Botha pleaded with his Boer sympathizers not to blow up the mines. It required his utmost persuasive ability to dissuade the men from carrying out their purpose. He eventually got their promise that the mines would not be molested. Had Botha been narrow-minded or vindictive, instead of a broad-minded man, in dealing with Lord Roberts, the world's output of gold since that time would probably have been from $100,000,000 to $120,000,000 less annually.

Johannesburg is named after a Boer—Johannes—whose farm was located on a portion of the Gold Reef. It was about 1885 when gold was discovered.

The Great Trek by the Dutch from Cape Colony to the Transvaal took place in 1835-38. Being dissatisfied with English administration in Cape Colony, they, like the Mormons in America, kept going into uninhabited parts, stopping only when they believed they had gone beyond reach of everybody, where they could live their own lives in their own way. There were thousands in the Great Trek. In 1852 a government was formed, and M.W. Pretorious became the first President of the South African Republic. In the early seventies there were about 25,000 Boers in the Transvaal. In 1876 the republic practically collapsed, when England assumed responsibility. In 1877 the British flag was raised in Pretoria, but the Dutch did not relish that innovation. During 1881 the Boers attacked the English garrisons, and in January, 1882, the British suffered successive defeats at Majuba Hill, under command of General Colley, the latter being killed at Ingogo Heights. Eight hundred English officers and men were killed in the engagements, and on the Boer side 18 were killed and 33 wounded. A few lean years for the Dutch followed. Later, the gold fields of Barberton sprang into existence, then the Rand, and undreamed of wealth poured into the Transvaal, towns springing up as if by magic. It was during this early heyday period of the Rand that adventurous spirits such as Barnato, Hammond, Beit, Rhodes and others figured prominently in the life of Boerland—some there by reason of the opportunity to vent their inborn desire for adventure, others as agents of Great Britain, but all playing for high stakes round the green table of the great Gold Reef. With the exception of the Jameson Raid, in 1895, the Boers enjoyed peace and prosperity up to the opening of the Anglo-Boer war in 1899, when, three years later, the Transvaal and Orange Free State became British possessions.

On May 31, 1910, the four provinces—Cape of Good Hope, Natal, Orange Free State and Transvaal—became the Union of South Africa, with General Louis Botha, Premier, his Cabinet, save one, being composed of Dutch members. Each province has its legislature, like our State legislature. A governor-general, appointed by the King of England, is the representative of the Imperial Government in South Africa and Rhodesia. With the exception of eight Senators, appointed by the Governor-General, the members of the National and Provincial Parliaments are elected by popular vote. One is safe, commercially speaking, in saying Johannesburg is more than half of Boerland.

Law and order in the Gold City conform to the British standard. Noted crooks and adventurers are found about places where gold and diamonds are mined, yet few big burglaries take place. In stature, the policemen of Johannesburg are second to none. They are of splendid physique. Native policemen are used in that city also.

The ravages of cattle diseases in South Africa is strongly suggested on seeing refrigerator cars being emptied of frozen meat. The poorer portions of beeves and sheep find their way to the compounds, the meat being eaten by the mine "boys." The frozen meat comes from Australia and New Zealand, arriving every week, and is shipped to what is called an agricultural country.

What seems an inexcusable lack of enterprise, combined with mismanagement, is seen at every turn. Cattle hides are shipped to Europe, while boots and shoes worn in South Africa are made in England, Germany, Holland or the United States. Wool is shipped to centers North, and hence all the woolen goods come from Europe. One may ride through sections that should make splendid farming districts, but these are held by landowners in tracts of from 2,000 to 30,000 acres, and only a small area is under cultivation. Lack of water is the reason given. One sees no windmills, however. Rain water is often stored in a crude pond, which is generally muddy from sheep and cattle walking in it. This dirty drinking water alone is enough to kill the stock.

Every animal of field and farm seems to have a mortal enemy. With the cattle, one of three diseases—East Coast or tick fever, rinderpest and red water—is apt to decimate them at any time; two or three diseases wipe out sheep; there is what is termed "horse sickness," horses also dying from eating grass when dew is on the ground, and meningitis menaces mules.

At least four drawbacks figure in raising grain—drought, hailstones, locusts and poor farming—the worst being the presence of the black man, meaning poor farming; though his hut rent keeps the white man's coffee-pot boiling, at the same time it unhands him industrially. When one sees a piece of plowed land it is generally but half plowed, a grassy strip of sod often appearing between furrows at some part of the field. It would be a rare thing to see unplowed strips between furrows in England, on the Continent, or in most of the farming States of America.

CHAPTER V

The Dutch being averse to having the capital near the sea coast, as soon as they gained full control of United South Africa, on May 31, 1910, they decided on Pretoria as the capital, although Capetown was well provided with good legislative buildings. Money was then appropriated to erect government buildings in Pretoria, and a hill east of the city was selected as a site for the Parliament buildings. Following this, a large force of government employes were compelled to leave Capetown for Pretoria, as government business was in future to be transacted in the Transvaal instead of the Cape of Good Hope. At present Pretoria, 45 miles from Johannesburg, is the capital of United South Africa. Before the war the Boers exercised control over only the Transvaal and Orange Free State, but 11 years later they also exercised authority over the Provinces of the Cape of Good Hope and Natal.

One who had imagined he would not find modern utilities and attractiveness of a general nature in a place located 'way up on the veld would be much taken aback upon entering Pretoria. Encircled by a range of hills is this, the best-looking large town in the interior of South Africa. The city being so far away from the busy centers of the world, and over a thousand miles inland from Capetown, one would not expect to find fine, clean streets, a good electric street railway system, good parks, in some of which music is furnished; shade trees, water fountains, and splendid buildings—residential, business, municipal and governmental.

The Dutch Reformed Church, built in the center of the old market square, around which long ox teams used to slowly worm their way and seek shelter behind its stone walls from winds and shade from the sun; where auctioneers, chattering like monkeys, sold produce of burghers, brought from points a hundred miles in some instances, to the highest bidder; where Boer met Boer and sympathized with each other during lean years, discussed native wars, their troubles with England, and the ravages of locusts and rinderpest; where the last President of the Transvaal intermingled with his people, walking among the piles of pumpkins, calabashes, tomatoes, guinea fowl, chickens, hares, and buck; where, on holy days, Psalms were sung by these rough-looking plainsmen—this historical assembling place of burghers, with its old-time and latter-day memories, has been removed, and the market-place converted into a public garden, surrounded at ends and one side by imposing government buildings. On visiting the square where the old church stood, the men of full beards and broad-brimmed soft hats now look instead on beds of flowers in bloom and fountains casting rainbow spray round a circular space.

One feels more comfortable in Pretoria after having spent some time in the Gold City, for he has left the red dust behind, the unattractive cyanide banks, the clouds of black smoke and the sooty buildings. The air is free from smoke, from the dirt banks, and a healthier atmosphere prevails. Pretoria is Dutch; Johannesburg cosmopolitan.

Some 40,000 people were living in this attractive place, and the population is increasing. The government departments were removed from Capetown, one after another, and with the reËstablishment of each Pretoria's population naturally increased as the government employes followed. "Civil servants" is the term used to denote government employes. An increase in salaries was granted to employes when brought from Capetown or Durban, as the salaries paid in the coast cities, on which a frugal person could save money, provided little more than food and clothing in the new capital. As in Johannesburg, house rent is high, and board cannot be had at less than from $35 to $40 a month. The cost of living here, as in Johannesburg, is from 15 to 20 per cent. higher than the coast towns.

Away from mining towns smokestacks are few and far between. Pretoria makes a better showing in this respect, as there are flour mills, an ice plant, an electric power house, and small manufactures that give the place a business appearance.

Walking a few blocks along West Kerk street, on the right hand side, may be seen a one-story stone and cement house, roofed with corrugated iron. This building is surrounded with an iron fence, built on a cement foundation. On each side of the walk leading to the house are two stone lions. In front is a veranda. In that modest house Paul Kruger lived. Walking in the same direction a few squares a park is reached. Entering by a gate, a short distance ahead is seen a large cement foundation with steps leading up, and resting on the foundation is a square granite base. The monument finishes there. Postcards bear a picture of the completed monument to Paul Kruger, but it lacks the bronze figure of the Boer President. "The monument that was to have been erected to the memory of the late President Kruger" is the wording under the picture of the "completed" monument. The bronze figure of Paul Kruger reached Lourenzo Marques, Portuguese East Africa, at the outbreak of the Anglo-Boer War, in 1899. Several lean years followed the Boers' defeat, and the Transvaal was theirs no longer. What stands of "the monument that was to have been" is well looked after. Some day, however, the printing on a postcard of the completed monument will read: "Paul Kruger's Monument."

"Dick" Seddon, of New Zealand, was a great man; Brazil, Argentine, Chile and Australia have produced men they consider great, but their fame is only local. Many in other countries tell one that the United States has produced but two great men—Washington and Lincoln. Looking at things from a world viewpoint, one cannot find a man born south of the equator who measures up to Paul Kruger's fame. So, in fairness to rugged genius, it would seem no overt act would be committed if the completed monument did stand in that park in Pretoria—to the memory of the greatest man born south of the equator.

"Have you been out to Wonderboom?" is a question visitors to Pretoria will be asked. Six or seven miles from the capital is seen from a distance what looks like a very large tree, located a mile from the railroad station. Big trees with dark green leaves are rare on the veld, which accounts for Wonderboom being such an attraction. In a radius of 150 feet seven groups of trees are growing, and from each grows half a dozen trees. The space taken up by some of these groups measures from 20 to 30 feet, and the clumps grow from roots of what appeared to have been large trees at one time. When vegetation of all sorts is white from drought the Wonderboom is as green as if it had been watered at frequent intervals. The trees grow 20 feet high, and cover an area of half an acre. No one seemed to know the name of the wood. "Vonderboom" seemed to be sufficient to cover all questions asked about its specie.

English newspapers published in Pretoria could not be favorably compared to the Johannesburg productions. This may be accounted for by the existence of Dutch publications, which naturally have a larger patronage than English newspapers, the population being in the main Dutch. As a considerable amount of the government printing is now done in Pretoria, this industry has improved. The pay is from $30 to $45 a week, eight hours' work. Mechanics of all kinds receive $5 a day.

All government documents, bills, blanks, etc., are printed in two languages—Dutch and English. As the government owns the railway, telegraph, postoffice and telephone systems, any one can understand what a big item the government's printing bill is. This was agreed to by the British representatives who attended the convention at which the consolidation of the four provinces was ratified. The Dutch adhere strictly to this agreement affecting their language.

The Dutch are not a vindictive race. No tales of brutality are heard of in connection with the Boer War. Men who fought on the British side tell of having been taken prisoner and of being sent back to their command. Sometimes the Boers would take the clothes off a captive, and then direct him to where his fellow soldiers were camped. Paul Kruger would have been justified in shooting the men who instigated and took part in the Jameson Raid, on the grounds of treason, but he spared their lives. They paid big sums of money in fines, though, for their unsuccessful, treasonable offense.

The Dutch have their faults, like other races, but they seem the better able to guide the destiny of their land of plagues.

The Boer War, in a sense, proved a blessing in disguise to the Dutch. Previous to that time proper attention had not been given to educating the young; precious few lawyers, doctors, educators and mining engineers bore Dutch names. Look through the directories of South Africa now and contrast the number of Dutch names that figure among those of the professional class. The war woke up the Boers to a sense of assuming a greater responsibility in the advancement of their country. A great many Dutch young men are students in the leading universities of the world.

Nothing feminine in sound is noticeable about the names of places in Boerland. But one often feels at a loss to account for the general use of the affix "fontein." Save for a narrow strip along the coast the country is dry. The Orange and the Vaal rivers seem to be the only two of consequence in the interior. The country is full of "spruits," "fonteins" and rivers which, when one reaches them, are dry as a bone. The only things that seem to "spruit" in them are cobble-stones and rattle-snakes.

"Assegaiboschfontein," "Jakhalskraalfontein," "Wildebeestespruitbult" are a few names of towns that occur to one as being decidedly masculine.

Boers, physically, are large men. Many of the older men wear full beards, and invariably wear a broad-brimmed hat with cloth band of several plies thick. They smoke calabash pipes, the weed being known as Boer tobacco, which costs 50 cents a pound. They generally carry a sjambok, a strip of rhinoceros hide about three feet long and an inch thick. Meeting one alone, the questions he asks in quick succession—"What's your name?" "Where do you come from?" "What's your business?" "Have you been in South Africa long?" "How long are you going to stay in the country?"—bring to mind this distinguishing trait of a noted Chinese who made a visit to America some years ago. Rum is the Boer's strong drink, but he is seldom seen under the influence of liquor. In a sense, he is of a roaming disposition, for some Boers are on the trek all the time. They seem to be better suited when they have got beyond the outposts of civilization. Were it not for the Boer's inclination to trek, however, it is possible there would be no gold mines on the Rand or diamond fields in Kimberley. His battles with the native tribes and his sufferings and hardships will never be lost sight of as the factors through which the white man was enabled to live in that section of "Darkest Africa."

We take our departure from the Transvaal and make a start for Victoria Falls, in Rhodesia, also British territory. Traveling some 300 miles out of a direct line, through Fourteen Streams, to Vryburg, on to Mafeking, finds us nearly opposite the place started from, but headed in the right direction. A gap of 40 miles from Zeerust to the main line has since been closed, which makes the trip from Johannesburg to Bulawayo much shorter. Two trains a week care for all the business over that stretch of native territory.

From Fourteen Streams, which is only a railway junction, we start northward over the treeless veld on our way to Rhodesia, 700 miles beyond. Vryburg is the next place reached where white people live, and most of the 3,000 inhabitants are engaged in business connected with farming. Nearly a hundred miles further Mafeking was reached, which has been made historical in virtue of the seven-months' siege of Britishers during the Boer War. It is located near the Transvaal border, and is a trading center for the western Transvaal. Railway car shops are located at Mafeking, and these and the trading industries give employment to its 3,000 inhabitants.

An hour's ride further, and we have crossed the Cape Colony-Bechuanaland Protectorate border line. Northward from that point we pass through what seems an uninhabited country, so far as white people are concerned. A railway station is built here and there along the line, where a few Europeans may be seen; but the country is wild and populated with natives. Were one to go to sleep for six or eight hours, upon waking up he would not know that he had moved a mile, so far as any change in the appearance of the landscape would indicate. At a few stations signs of industry were in evidence, bags of corn being piled along the track.

Natives with karosses (skins of wild beasts) and native-made souvenirs surrounded the train when stops were made, spreading their wares on the ground and holding the objects of native handicraft to the gaze of the passengers. The natives' souvenirs were the images of giraffes, elephants, lions, tigers, storks and other animals cut out of wood and painted or dyed black, but many of the imitations were far from good. Splendid karosses are bought cheap along the line. One can have his choice of a lion, tiger, hyena, jackal, wildcat, monkey and baboon, and sometimes a giraffe. Many are as large as a buffalo robe.

"How much!" shouted a splendid specimen of a Bechuana woman, in the native language, as she held her naked pickaninny over her head—laughing heartily at the same time—at a place where the train had stopped and where natives and karosses were numerous. Passengers were bartering and haggling with the natives over the price of karosses, and others were ambitious to sell their souvenirs. The black mother had imbibed the "shopping" spirit, when she jocularly offered her babe for sale. "Half a crown!" (60 cents) shouted a passenger. With that offer the semi-barbarous mother quickly brought her pickaninny to her bosom, threw her arms about the little one and gave it such a hug that the baby's eyes bulged, she laughing so heartily the while as if to split her sides.

Still traveling toward the heart of Africa, we reach Mochudi and the Kalahari Desert, the eastern fringe of which we traverse, a distance of 200 miles. The dust had become so thick in this stretch of the journey that the color of the passengers' clothes could not be detected. All the way along from Mafeking I could not keep from my mind the Americanism, "It's a great country, where nobody lives and dogs bark at strangers."

When the train stopped at Mahalapye we entered what is known as Khama's country. The course of the railroad is nearly on the line taken by David Livingstone, the explorer. When Livingstone and his band passed through that section of Africa, the grandfather of the reigning chief offered every hospitality to the explorer, and espoused the Christian religion. Chief Khama, the grandson, is the most important ruler of Bechuanaland, and has spent some time in Europe; he conforms largely to European customs. Besides being a strict disciplinarian, he forbids the sale of liquor to his people. He receives a pension from the English Government. Serowe, Khama's capital, located 30 miles inland from Palapye Road station, is the largest town in Bechuanaland, having a population of 40,000. His subjects pay the smallest head tax of any of the tribes in South Africa.

We were passing through a country about which the wildebeeste, gemsbuck, eland, tiger, lion, and even the giraffe, still roam. Along the railway may be seen the secretary bird, guinea fowl and also handsome cranes. The secretary bird, so named from feathers growing at the back of the head, which look like quill pens, is what is known as "royal game." "Royal game" are beasts or fowl that must not be killed. The reason the secretary bird is protected is because it is a bitter foe to snakes. Snatching a snake in the middle with his bill, he at once begins to fly upward with the reptile, and when at a certain height will let go his prey. The snake, when he strikes the earth, is killed.

White traders are located through these desolate tracts of country, sometimes a hundred miles from a railway. Little cash changes hands between natives and traders in out-of-the-way districts. For his skins and corn, or whatever the native may have to sell, he receives as pay bright-colored calico, Jew's-harps, concertinas, mouth organs, tinware and such things.

Passing out of Khama's country we enter a territory known as the Tati Concessions. Traversing this tract, we crossed the northern boundary of Bechuanaland a few miles south of Plumtree, when we were in Matabeleland, Rhodesia. In this section Lobengula, the Matabele king, held undisputed sway until Cecil Rhodes decided to annex this part of Africa to England's possessions. What Andries Pretorius did to Dingaan at Blood River—broke forever the power of the Zulus—Cecil Rhodes did with the powerful Lobengula in Matabeleland.

We passed within ten miles of the Matopo Hills, on the top of which is buried Cecil John Rhodes, "the Colossus of South Africa," as he was termed. Whatever shortcomings Rhodes may have possessed, or the means he resorted to to attain his ambition, one of his virtues will always remain unquestioned—bravery. He wished his remains to rest where his greatest feat of daring took place. It was during the rebellion of the Matabeles in 1896-97 that Rhodes, unarmed, with a friend accompanying him, walked up the Matopos through the files of the warring hordes of blacks to where their chiefs were stationed. His cool bravery and personal magnetism so impressed the chiefs that the rebellion ceased.

"Here lie the remains of Cecil John Rhodes" is the brief inscription carved on a granite slab that covers his grave, which was chiseled out of a solid rock on the highest of the Matopo Hills. "World's View" is the name Rhodes gave the place where he is buried. It is located 30 miles southeast of Bulawayo.

Bulawayo, meaning in English "the place of killing," is located in the heart of wildest Africa. We find here splendid streets, as wide as those of Salt Lake City, fringed with trees, with monuments erected at convenient places in the center; a good public library, containing 5,000 volumes; hospitals, parks, a botanical garden, zoÖlogical park, museum and art gallery, schools, churches, business buildings, daily newspapers—all of a high order. Bulawayo, nearly 1,400 miles from Capetown, has a population of 5,000 whites. It is the largest town of Matabeleland, the center of the gold mining industry, and has had railway connection with the Transvaal since 1897. Only four years earlier Lobengula's Kraal occupied the land that Bulawayo is built on. It required the sacrifice of many lives of hardy frontiersman to conquer the Matabeles, and to pave the way for the accession of Matabeleland, Mashonaland, Barotseland and the other sections that comprise Rhodesia.

Industries in Bulawayo are few and small. In this respect, however, it is no different than most African towns. But located in the country away from the metropolis are numerous gold mines, and Bulawayo is headquarters for that industry. The annual output from these mines run from $12,000,000 to $15,000,000.

We find in this place the typical frontiersmen. This feature of the country is reflected from its founder, as Rhodes was not a "toff." Every one goes in his shirtsleeves, and derby hats are not sold in Bulawayo. Soft, wide-brimmed hats, like those worn by the Boers, rule the day. One occasionally sees the butt of a revolver sticking out of a hip pocket or at the side of a belt, and hunting knives, incased in a sheath, are carried by almost every one, particularly on leaving town. A rifle strapped over the shoulder of men coming in from country districts is a common thing to see. Lions and tigers are so numerous in Rhodesia that weapons are carried to protect one's-self from any attack that might be made by the wild beasts. Still, under these "trouble-making" conditions, we find maintained that same respect for law and order that was so noticeable in other parts.

A native word—"indaba"—much in use in Rhodesia, is often used in South Africa. When the chiefs met to talk over matters pertaining to their tribe—a native cabinet meeting—the meeting would be termed an "indaba." When Cecil Rhodes was engaged in dissuading the Matabele chiefs on the Matopo hill to discontinue the rebellion, the meeting of the "great white chief" with the native chiefs was termed an "indaba."

In the grounds of Government House stands what is known as the "Indaba Tree." The residence of the Governor-General is built on the site of Lobengula's home, and it was under this tree that the rulers of the Matabele tribe assembled and dispensed native justice.

Though the altitude of Matabeleland is about 5,000 feet, the weather is warmer in winter than it is in the Transvaal.

Mention has been made of "salted" cattle in South Africa. The only people who can live in most parts of Rhodesia are "salted" men. If the inhabitants are so fortunate as to take on a few pounds of flesh at certain seasons, they lose that much, and generally more, from fever and ague at another season. Among the creditable buildings mentioned of Bulawayo was included "good hospitals." Wherever hospitals are seen frequently, particularly in small settlements, one is using sound judgment if he makes his escape from that place early, as otherwise he will soon be personally familiar with the interior of these institutions. Wherever hospital facilities of a small community are of the first order, one finds a graveyard out of all proportion to the number of people who live in the place. A hen with a brood of chicks was crossing a sidewalk in Bulawayo, and each chick had its head drawn back between its wings. They were so slow getting across the walk that one had to step over them—stepping over chunks of fever, as it were.

Rhodesia is a trap in which many poor men get caught. The riches of the country are much advertised in England, and those who come out and buy land soon find that their limited means are gone, and they are practically stranded. Both Rhodesia and South Africa are countries only for men with capital.

The railway branches in two directions from Bulawayo—one easterly to Salisbury and out to Beira, Portuguese East Africa, the latter place being the port for Rhodesia; and northwesterly to Victoria Falls, and from that point 300 miles northward toward the southern border of the Congo Free State. This branch is what is known as the Cape-to-Cairo route.

We will start for the Falls. Fifty miles from Bulawayo we left the plains and passed through a forest of teak trees. Further on, growing palms indicated a warmer climate.

"Thirteen years ago," said a traveling companion, who was a trader in these parts, "fourteen of us came up to Rhodesia. None was over 25 years of age. I'm the only one left out of the fourteen," he concluded. Asked what had taken off his companions, he answered: "One was killed by a lion, and the others died of fever."

Ho! a smokestack is in view. We have reached Wankie, a coal mining district, and a rich one, too, for the mineral may be seen cropping out of the ground on each side of the track. A big hospital is observed, situated on a hill, which bears the usual significance in Rhodesia.

"Do you see that low, white cloud to the right?" asked a passenger. "That's the spray from Victoria Falls. We have several miles yet to go before we reach the bridge," he added.

We had traveled 1,200 miles from Johannesburg to this place, the journey taking three days. Recklessness, rather than good judgment, marked my course, for railroad fare from and back to Johannesburg tapped my purse for $100. Expenses on the train had increased also, as the cheapest meal from Mafeking north was 60 cents, and the next cheapest 75 cents. But to one whose mind inclines to seeing the acme of nature's handicraft, promptings of this character outweigh financial considerations. Hotel accommodation at Victoria Falls was correspondingly high—$5 a day. One has no choice, as there is but a single hotel there, which is the property of the railroad company. Aside from the hotel, a photographer's studio and a few houses comprise all there is in the way of buildings in Victoria Falls.

Some of the Boers who took part in the Great Trek from Capetown north in 1835-38 did not stop long in what later became the Transvaal, but kept trekking, until they reached the Zambezi River. Most of these voortrekkers, however, were massacred by Matabeles. This occurred from ten to fifteen years earlier than Livingstone's visit. But it fell to David Livingstone to make known to the world the greatest of waterfalls, on which he first set eyes in November, 1855.

For a distance of seven miles above the falls the river is dotted with evergreen islands. Through this archipelago the waters of the Zambezi slowly run, giving no intimation of what is taking place several miles below. On these islands hippopotami feed when inclination prompts, and crocodiles sun themselves and sleep when they choose land to water rest.

Two islands—Livingstone and Cataract—are located at the edge of the precipice, which accounts for Victoria Falls being of three parts, namely: Rainbow, Main and Cataract Falls. The distance from one side of the river to the other here is over a mile—5,808 feet, to be correct. The water, unlike that of Niagara, is of a dark, sallow color, but not muddy, and the falls are straight, instead of horseshoe shape.

Stealthily the water moves over the wide ledge of rock, when its dull, lifeless color in the archipelago now assumes a much brighter shade. Save for two dark panels of unwatered space, made by two green islands just above, there unfolds before the visitor's eye what seems a mile-wide mantle of amber-colored, gauze-like lace. Myriads of water crystals dart from the broad flow's filmy web and, jewel-like, embellish the absorbing water spread for a depth of 380 feet. Also rainbows revel in still further enhancing this crowning masterpiece of art—these, in beautifying, sharing a radiant part—the bars of iris, of lustrous, engrossing hues, burnishing the peerless tri-falls' breast, as the veil-like flow descends in brilliant, multi-colored, wavy folds from its smooth, extended crest to the roaring, misty maw below. Clouds of spray, which may be seen 15 miles away, rise to a height of 2,000 feet from the boiling abyss, and the thunderous roar made by the impact of the waters is heard 12 miles beyond.

A parallel wall rises in front of the precipice over which the water flows. A space varying from 80 to 240 feet separates the two. Into this narrow chasm 5,000,000 gallons of water a minute dash from a height of 380 feet, and one may imagine what pandemonium is taking place all the time in the great vault. For three-quarters of a mile the second, or parallel, wall, runs westward, unbroken. Then there is a break of something like 200 feet in width, that looks as if it had been gnarled out not only by water, but that even some other powerful agency had taken part in making this cleavage. The wall rises again to its full height and maintains a solid, unbroken front for a quarter of a mile further to Cataract Falls, at the west bank of the river. The water from Rainbow Falls, at the east bank, and from Main Falls, in the center of the river, runs westward to the 200-foot gap in the parallel wall, and the water from Cataract Falls runs eastward and, boiling and foaming, intermixes with the other waters and flows through the same opening. One may form an idea of the great depth of water at the narrow outlet when it is borne in mind that this vast quantity, falling over a ledge of rock a mile wide, finds its way out of the huge rock tank through that narrow channel.

After the water storms through the 200-foot wide channel the torrent travels several hundred feet, when it flows under the Zambezi railway bridge, 450 feet above. On it turbulently runs, the water befoamed, through high, perpendicular walls of basaltic rock for over a mile. The rocky banks then decrease, but the course of the river remains rugged and tortuous for a distance of 40 miles.

Vegetation growing about the falls, particularly palm trees, adds much attractiveness to the environment. The absence of improvements—save for the bridge, together with grass-thatched native huts showing dimly through the vegetation on the banks; the evergreen islands; the stillness of the water before making its plunge, contrasted with the wild-appearing, rugged, high, rocky walls below and the foaming and billowy torrent as it dashes madly through the narrow gorge—make Victoria, like other great works of nature, distinctive in formation from other notable waterfalls.

Summing up the comparative grandeur and greatness of Niagara and Victoria Falls, most persons who have seen both would decide, I believe, that Niagara Falls is the more beautiful and Victoria the greater. In this connection one has only to compare the grand crescent of sky-blue water of Niagara with the dull color of Victoria Falls, the water of Niagara, after plunging over an unbroken stretch of rock ledge into a roomy, circular-shaped basin, assuming its true blue color, with the gradual narrowing of the banks to the Gorge; contrast Niagara's broad, sweeping, unconfined character with the water of the Zambezi, hemmed in from view in tank-like walls after passing over the falls, and then prevented from making a good showing, as it were, by a continuation of similar walls for a distance of 40 miles.

The bridge across the Zambezi River is a pretty one, with a single span of 610 feet, and was constructed by an American firm. Cecil Rhodes instructed the builders to erect it where it now stands, "so that it would always be wet by spray from the falls."

Nature's fickleness, a trait disclosed in choosing remote regions for some of her noted wonders, entailing, as it does, long journeys, fatigue and much expense to reach, is conspicuous by her placing Victoria in a country hemmed in on the west by Angola and German West Africa, north by the Belgian Congo, northeast by German East Africa, east by Portuguese East Africa, and south by Bechuanaland and the Transvaal. The shortest time in which a journey could be made from an American port to these falls is about five weeks. Landing at Capetown, four days' travel, on a slow train, mostly over a dry and dusty country, must be undergone to reach that point, when Victoria Falls is viewed in all its sublimity, located in a wild, interesting, but fever-ridden, section of Rhodesia, where only a handful of languid white persons live, and on a continent where the superior race number less than a million and a half.

It is dangerous to cross the Zambezi River in a rowboat, the river being infested with crocodiles, which grow from 12 to 16 feet long. The hippopotamus, though, starts the trouble. He hides just under the water, and nothing can be seen of the beast until a boat is on top of him. Then he rises, overturning the boat. "Hippo" will not harm a person in the water; but crocodiles are generally found close to a hippopotamus, and the former are always hungry. As soon as the unfortunate occupants of a boat have been dumped overboard there is a swirl of water close by, another farther off, yet more disturbed water, when long, dull colored shapes come lashing swiftly up. The poor swimmers disappear, the muddy water reddens for a short time, and then becomes sallow colored again. To the Barotse native the crocodile is a sacred animal, and, as he will not harm the voracious beasts, deaths of both natives and Europeans by crocodiles occur frequently in this part of Rhodesia.

The Zambezi River rises in West Portuguese Africa and empties into the Indian Ocean at Chinde, Portuguese East Africa, about a thousand miles from its source.

Beer and whiskey are drunk a great deal in that part of Rhodesia, and almost every one takes quinine to allay fever. No one would dare take a drink of water were it not boiled.

"Knocking around" is a term much in use in Rhodesia. "Have you seen John Smith knocking around?" "Is there a boat knocking around?" "Are there lions knocking around here?" are common instances in which the term is used.

Tigers are so numerous about Victoria Falls that they rob hen roosts, and even climb through pantry windows and take away what eatables are handy.

Vegetation in these parts is interesting to visitors, as all the bushes and trees are strange to those coming from foreign places. Nearly every tree or shrub produces its seed in the form of a pod, like beans. Thorn prongs, as sharp as needles and two and three inches in length, grow on some trees. The cream-of-tartar tree, however, will interest a visitor more. This one grows very large, and the bark is the color of a hippopotamus' skin. In fact, the bark of all trees has a dark color. The pod of the cream-of-tartar is the shape of a cucumber and 10 to 12 inches long. The shell is very hard, but, when broken open, if ripe, the substance in the pod is white, and separates from the fibers in the form of sugar cubes. The natives eat it. One cream-of-tartar tree seen close to the falls measured 22 feet in diameter.

A very good tribe of natives is found in that part of Rhodesia—the Barotse. At a kraal visited, several of the sightseers asked a native for a drink of native beer. The liquid was brought in a large calabash, and the drinking cup was the bowled-out end of a small calabash. Before the native served the beer he poured out some of the brew in the hollow of his hand and drank it. Then he tilted the vegetable demijohn, when the beer was poured into the cup for the Europeans. The reason of the Barotse sampling the beer first was to allay any suspicion his white visitors might entertain concerning its genuineness.

Natives' musical instruments are a one-string fiddle, a skin drum, and a little wooden frame containing three and four pieces of steel a quarter of an inch in width and four inches in length. This last is called a "piano." The small strips of steel are fastened at one end of the frame. By touching these with the fingers a faint musical sound is produced. For hours at a time a husky native keeps playing the "piano," happy in the thought that he is an accomplished pianist. Lewanika is the head chief of the Barotse tribe.

Native wives are much cheaper in Barotseland than in Zululand, prices ranging from two sheep to ten cows. Should the wife leave her husband—elope, for instance—the girl's father must return the sheep or cows to the deserted husband.

North of the Zambezi River the territory is known as Northwestern Rhodesia, and also Barotseland. Seven miles from Victoria Falls is located Livingstone, the capital of Northwestern Rhodesia. Here, right in the heart of one of the fever regions of Africa, one finds small but substantial provincial buildings, a good, roomy hotel, an up-to-date printing office, and a small but interesting botanical garden.

Malarial, or African, fever is very bad at Livingstone. Horses and cattle cannot live in this part of Rhodesia unless they are well "salted." Everything must be "salted," both man and beast. Transport riders, when taking a load of provisions to traders or to mining camps located far from the railway, are provided with extra oxen. Lions are so numerous it frequently occurs that an ox is found in the morning dead and partly eaten, the work of Leo during the night while the cattle were resting or grazing. It is said the vital part of the cattle where the lion makes his attack is the nose. In a second the beast is thrown, and it is but a matter of a few minutes when the lion will have his prey dead and badly torn.

The tsetse fly is in his own bailiwick in these parts. This fly is one of the worst plagues of Central Africa. In size, this insect is as large as a bumblebee, and when he bites he draws blood, whether it be man or beast. It is said the deadly virus he injects is extracted from the bodies of big wild game. Nagana is the name of the disease caused by the tsetse-fly bite. The scientific name for this fly is rather prosy—Glossina morsitans; also for a first cousin, whose bite likewise caused nagana disease, Glossina allidipes. Mail must be carried to the interior by immune native runners, as a bite from these flies means a very short life for a horse. Deaths from sleeping sickness have occurred in this section of Africa.

Machillas are the means of transportation by which people are carried from place to place. The machilla is a long pole, with the ends of a piece of canvas made fast, over which a cover is stretched. The ends of the pole rest on the shoulders of four natives—eight in all—who run along at a good gait, with their passengers in the hammock-like device, until they reach a relay station—at intervals of about five miles—when a fresh "team" of natives take up the machilla and are off again at a good trot.

The European population of this large tract of land is said to be only 30,000, blacks numbering 150 to one white person—and it is doubtful if that number will ever be greater, for the large graveyards with numerous fresh mounds of dirt are becoming better known through the receipt of mail by friends living in countries of the North sent by cadaverous, shaking relatives dying in the fever glades of Rhodesia.

From Livingstone, 1,650 miles north of Capetown, the projected Cape-to-Cairo line extends 300 miles further, to Broken Hill, where it stops. The route from here is to the southern borderline of the Belgian Congo, thence through that country, crossing the equator, until Uganda is reached. From Uganda it will traverse the Soudan, running thence into southern Egypt. At a point in this country the line will connect with a tongue extending southward from Cairo, the northern terminus. When the center has been linked, the length of the line from Capetown, the southern terminus, to Cairo, will be about 5,000 miles.

Returning to Johannesburg, we passed through Bulawayo, then over the Matabeleland borderline into Bechuanaland, through the Kalahari Desert, next into Cape Colony, and thus into Boerland.

Perhaps the prettiest and most shapely mountains in the world are those in South Africa. Though not so high as those in other countries, their shapeliness attracts, most of them bearded with brush at bases and sides, the tops being round and grassy. With the deep blue sky above—the sun nearly always shining on the high veld, except during a shower of rain—and the same colored horizon all round, together with the rays from a bright sun lavishly diffusing the summits, there is a tone and finish to Boerland mountains which, in other countries, rocks, snow and timber do not bestow. The highest mountain is Mount Aux Sources, rising 10,000 feet, located in the Drakensburg range.

CHAPTER VII

From the Gold City we traveled southward to the Diamond City.

"You haven't been in town long?" a Kimberley policeman addressing me, remarked, as he stepped in front. As a matter of fact, I had only got about a hundred yards from the railway station. I surmised that I had been taken for an "I.D.B." (illicit diamond buyer), having been told a bird can scarcely alight in Kimberley without coming under police surveillance. "We're from the same country, I believe," the officer continued, when I felt easier. "My native town is St. Louis," he added. "Come to my home this afternoon and have dinner with us, after which we'll call on an American living in a house a few doors below," he went on kindly. This courtesy allayed all suspicion that I would be asked to establish my identity before staying longer in the diamond fields. The invitation was accepted, his hospitality being generous. The second American had been on the diamond fields for more than 30 years, but local interest was a secondary consideration to meeting some one just come from the United States. He had been in British territory so long that he had acquired the British accent, but that was the only thing foreign about him, as one would not know where to find a more patriotic son of America. On a second visit to the "Diamond City" every kindness was shown me by these two "exiles."

Kimberley, with a population of about 35,000, one-third of this number being white, is the capital of Griqualand West, a section of Cape Colony. Before diamonds were discovered, the territory embraced in the Kimberley district was understood to be a part of the Orange Free State. When the diamond fields promised rich returns, Cape Colony officials claimed this tract as being part of that province. The matter was finally adjusted by the Free State surrendering its claim to the Cape authorities upon payment by the latter to the Boer republic of several million dollars. The Diamond City has evidently stood still while other places in the sub-continent have kept pace with the progress of the times. Its newspapers are inferior; only one building reaches three stories; there is very little street paving, practically no sidewalks, and public buildings are quite ordinary; the shacks standing not far from the business center, built by colored people out of American oil cans, are a disgrace; church bells even are suspended from a crosspiece resting on the top of two posts, 10 feet high, in the churchyard; the parks do not amount to much, most of the shade trees in these being fine-bearded pine, through which the sun beats down on one. If there was anything of a creditable character here, save for a modern street car system, we did not observe it. To Alexandriafontein, a fenced-in private pleasure resort, an electric line runs, but it costs 25 cents to reach this park.

Were one in need of an object lesson to understand thoroughly what a trust means to a municipality, he would learn that lesson in Kimberley. A number of diamond mines are in operation in the Kimberley district, but there is but one diamond mining company—the De Beers. Diamond mining is the only industry in Kimberley. Mine officials are very kind to visitors who wish to look about the works.

"Ho! that's Kimberley rain," shouted a friend. Looking from a window, the width of the street appeared a solid mass of dust, if the term may be allowed, extending far above the roofs of the houses. "That's the sort of 'rain' we get in Kimberley," he explained. No rain had fallen for six months.

The depth of the diamond mines runs from 1,000 to 2,600 feet. The color of the soil in which the diamonds are found is blue—blue dirt, it is called—which is removed by explosives. Dirt, pebbles and stones are moved in iron trucks with iron covers, and locked. On coming to the surface it is started on gravity railways which extend from two to four miles from the mine. The truck of dirt, weighing about a ton and containing an average of one-third of a karat of diamond, is here dumped on the ground. The "dirt field" contains 1,400 acres of space. Three high barbed wire fences form the inclosure, and police—mounted, on bicycles, and on foot—see that no stranger gets inside the triple barbed-wire fence.

The blue dirt remains in the field from three to six months until, by exposure to the air, it crumbles. A harrow, with teeth 10 inches long, is drawn over the section of field ready for use, when any remaining lumps are broken into fine dirt. The diamond soil is next loaded into trucks and started back to the head of the mine. The dirt is here dumped into a revolving screen, which contains holes for pebbles of certain sizes to drop through. These drop into a revolving round tank, or vat, 14 feet in diameter and about a foot deep, into which water runs. Inside the vat are two large stationary rakes, around which the tank revolves. This is called the washery. The dirt runs out as muddy water, and the rakes serve to move the pebbles to a point in the circular vat where there is an opening. Connecting with this opening is a pipe, down which the stones pass into a steel truck below. When the truck is filled with pebbles, the door is closed and locked.

The truck is now started on a gravity railway to what is called the pulsator, where the nuggets and diamond-bearing stones are separated from those of no value. Here the contents of the truck also are emptied into a revolving screen with graduated holes to allow the pebbles to drop out. The stones of the various sizes now drop into compartments 4 feet long and 18 inches wide—called jigs—which move back and forth. Water runs over the pebbles in the jigs, the light-weight ones washing out and the heavier remaining at the bottom. The pebbles that remain in the jigs are taken out later and put into still another revolving screen. Under the grade sizes of this screen are inclined tables, over which water runs, these having a thickly greased floor, or bottom, on to which the stones drop. The nuggets and diamond-bearing stones stick in the grease, but the non-diamondiferous pebbles pass over. To emphasize how strongly grease acts as a magnet to the precious stones, of the millions and millions of pebbles that are washed over the greased bottoms, which are carefully inspected by experts, rarely is a diamond detected among the culls.

The little lumps on the greased tables—the diamonds covered with grease—might resemble a hand with big warts. The table is cleaned, when the scrapings are treated by a liquid, which renders the diamonds free of grease. They then pass to a sorting room. The sorters are native prisoners, but a white man is over them. Then one negro, very expert in detecting diamonds, examines the stones sorted by the prisoners. From him they pass to a room where two white men again examine them. They are then put into steel cups little larger than a teacup. The cup has a lid to it and a lock. The lid is closed, locked, and the cup labeled. The locked cups next go to the Kimberley office. Every Monday the output of the diamond mines is taken to a train headed for Capetown. That train makes connection with a steamship leaving for Europe on Wednesdays. From England most of the diamonds are sent to Amsterdam, Holland, to be refined.

The reducing character of the diamond mining industry is apt to astonish one. Over 200,000 trucks of dirt are treated daily, and the product from this great quantity of soil is less than a cubic foot. Twenty-three thousand men are engaged in digging, and the diamonds mined by that large force are examined by but four eyes and handled by only four hands in the examining room at the pulsator. The yearly output of the Kimberley diamond mines is from $35,000,000 to $40,000,000.

Credit for bringing to light the first stone found in the Kimberley district, in 1870, is given to an Irishman named O'Reilly. A Dutch boy, whose father's name was Van Niekerk, was playing jackstones. O'Reilly's eye being attracted by a bright stone among those with which the boy was playing, he told the boy's father he thought that particular one was a diamond. O'Reilly's judgment proved to be good, as, when weighed, it was found to be of 22½ karat. The stone was sold for $2,500, O'Reilly and Van Niekerk dividing the money.

On the wagon containing the weekly output of diamonds of the Kimberley mines, and which meets the train that goes to Capetown every Monday afternoon, is seated a white man and a native driver. No attempt has yet been made to rob the wagon while going from the head office of the diamond company to the railway station. This alone may serve to emphasize the grip which law and order has on that community.

A week before a native quits the diamond mines he is kept under strict surveillance. The natives live in compounds, as the kafirs do in the Rand mine compounds, but, unlike the "boys" working in the gold mines, mine "boys" of Kimberley are not allowed outside of the compound except when going to and coming from work, and then only under guard. They are hired for from three months to a year, and are paid from $15 to $30 a month and board. There are seven mines in the Kimberley district, which give employment to 20,000 natives and 3,000 Europeans. Three eight-hour shifts are worked.

Those engaged in the diamond diggings along the banks of the River Vaal carry with them during life a characteristic by which they may be picked out from among men following different pursuits. A fortune—which they all hope for—may escape them if their eyes are raised from the ground for even so brief a time as that required for the wink of an eyelash, as they might thus have missed the fleeting flash of a precious stone just peeping through the soil. For this reason, when engaged in the diamond diggings their eyes are constantly looking downward. After they leave the diggings—when they have spent their savings and become practically starved out—they walk about with bent head, looking at the sidewalk or ground as they did when hand-screening soil and digging alluvial dirt. Some have made fortunes in the diggings, but these are few and far between.

Bloemfontein, next visited, is known as the Convention City. Because of its location, being the most important city in the center of South Africa and well provided with hotels and railway connections, together with its good public buildings, it has become the favored place for national gatherings.

After the Boer War the name of this province was changed to Orange River Colony, against the burghers' wishes. In May, 1910, when the Dutch again assumed power, its former name, and its present one—Orange Free State—again came into use.

Located between hills on two sides, having good streets, shady walks, electric light, good buildings, and a broad, treeless veld to the east, with poverty seemingly absent, an inviting air pervades Bloemfontein. The homes of that city, a great many of them built of red brick, with their vari-colored painted roofs and tidy yards filled with flowers, all nestling under and some built on the side of the kopjes, or hills, put one in mind of that other Dutch capital—Pretoria. Unlike Kimberley, no tin shanties were to be seen here, neither were the streets swarming with half-castes and Hindus.

As in other places in South Africa where there are no mines, smokestacks are few here. The Orange Free State is said to be a good farming section, and from that source, and the general commercial and official business linked with a metropolis and State capital, spring the main assets of the city. Newspapers, a good gauge by which to measure a center, are in advance of the Free State capital.

The marketplace in Bloemfontein is typical of the Dutch, being located in the center of the town, business houses and hotels standing on the four sides. The long ox teams, led by natives with rawhide strips tied to the horns of the leading yoke; the big transport, with its tent at the rear, a Boer sitting in the doorway or opening, smoking his calabash pipe filled with Boer tobacco, and his frau, behind him, knitting; the auctioneers jabbering above a pile of farm produce; the group of farmers, with their wide-brimmed hats and full beards, arguing in the Dutch language, are all in evidence. It was interesting to walk about observing the product of the soil and the people who cultivate it, and the means in use to bring it where it might be profitably sold. With the tent at the rear end of the transport, and "scoff," coffee and cooking utensils, hotel expenses are eliminated, and one may stay as long as one wishes. A great number of Boers pay a couple of days' visit to old acquaintances when they come to this marketplace.

Bi-lingualism, a nightmare to some of the British in South Africa, has its fountainhead in Bloemfontein. Bi-lingualism here means the teaching of the Dutch and English languages in the public schools. When the conditions of consolidation were drafted, dual languages—Dutch and English—to be taught in schools was one of the provisions, and this clause was agreed to by the British representatives at the convention at which the act of federation was ratified. The Minister of Education is from the Orange Free State, and is Dutch through and through. He insists on the dual language clause being carried out to the letter. The Dutch, as spoken in South Africa—it is called the Taal—is not so pure as the Holland Dutch. While one might not agree with the Minister of Education in forcing English scholars to study Dutch, when either French, Spanish or German would be better, his fighting for the perpetuation of his mother tongue must command admiration. Cabinet Ministers of South Africa, by the way, are not cheap salaried men. The Premier receives $70,000 a year, the other members $48,000 a year.

Hotel expenses are from $3 to $5 a day. House rent is rather high, too; but the wages paid mechanics are fair, running from $4 to $5 a day.

In the evening one sees very few black people about the streets. Bloemfontein has a municipal "location"—a place where natives must live—about three miles from town. Except as a servant, the Indian coolie, although a British subject, is not allowed to cross the Free State border. No adverse feeling is entertained for the native, but the line is drawn on Asiatics.

The veld is so bare of any vegetation, save grass, in that part of South Africa that there is not a native tree growing in a radius of a hundred miles from Bloemfontein.

While traveling through farming districts in South Africa one misses the grain elevators seen at every station, and even sidings, when passing through agricultural sections in the United States and Canada.

Southward we headed for Capetown, passing through Modder River and then Naauwpoort. Later we entered a stretch of country known as the Karoo. Rain does not fall in this district for a period of nine or ten months. For hundreds of miles there is not a blade of grass to be seen, yet goats, sheep, and ostriches abound, and grain is a product of that strange stretch of land. Cradock, the metropolis of the Karoo, is an oasis, because good shade trees are numerous. A small bush grows, called karoo, on which goats and sheep feed, and do well, if they do not die from thirst. The climate of the Karoo is very favorable to persons suffering from lung trouble. One of the best churches of Dutch design in South Africa is found in Cradock.

We had now reached the Cape of Good Hope Province. Southeast of Cradock is Kaffraria, at one time a separate colony. Natives are numerous through that section. One of the tribes of Kaffraria is the Fingo, a good native for the mines. Hence, mine labor agents are to be found at every turn seeking help. It is in that district where the traders do so well in furnishing "boys" to the mines. Natives owning land, and wishing to sell it, are not allowed to sell to a white person, but may sell the land to a native.

Unlike Zulus, the natives throughout Kaffraria live in colonies. The huts are principally made of mud and roofed with straw. Different tribes are known to strangers by the blankets they wear. One tribe wears a brown blanket and goes bare-headed, while another wears a dark-colored cotton blanket, with black cloth over their heads. This mode of dress pertains to the native women.

Order is maintained in these settlements by a native appointed by the government. When violations of law occur, the police authorities go direct to this native, as head of the settlement, who is held strictly accountable for any infraction. Cornmeal, or mealy meal, the staff of life to natives of South Africa, costs $7 a bag, and 200 pounds provide "scoff" for four natives for a month.

Africa, as generally known, is the home of the ostrich. In South Africa alone they exceed 700,000, and this southwest corner comprises merely one-twenty-fourth of the area of the "Dark Continent." The territory lying between Kaffraria and Capetown, however, is the section in which the ostrich industry has reached its highest state of development. The feathers are picked at periods of 18 months, the average yield being three pounds, although some ostriches grow six pounds of feathers in a season. These are mostly disposed of by auction at Oudtshoorn, the clearing house for this product of the sub-continent. Buyers representing leading feather merchants of the world attend these sales. The price of feathers varies a great deal, a common quality bringing only $25, while a good grade sells for $100 a pound. The annual exports from this industry amount to $15,000,000. A pair of ostriches sell for $500 to $800. Fifteen eggs is the average composing a sitting, and six weeks' hatching is required to bring forth the young. Hatching devolves mainly on the male bird, he sitting at least four weeks out of the six. The two weeks the female devotes to sitting are objectionable ones to her, being whipped to her task by the male bird from time to time to take even this unequal part in bringing their brood into existence. The law prohibits both shipping from, or taking out of South Africa, eggs of this, the premier bird.

"Will you have some shiverin' jimmy?" asked a compartment companion as he began unwinding a cloth from a bundle. "I'm from Grahamstown," he continued, "where there is nothing but 'pubs' (saloons) and churches. Have some shiverin' jimmy," he concluded. By that time the cloth was off the "parcel." What he called "shiverin' jimmy" proved to be animated headcheese.

The train crept slowly down a steep grade, as we had left the high veld behind. Mount Matroosburg, a thin sheet of snow on its summit, was on our right, and on reaching Hex River Valley we were in the sea zone, and not far from Capetown.

The interest associated with Table Bay, by reason of its early explorers, massacre of early settlers, and the fighting with the Hottentots of those who finally got a footing, comes to mind when in this section. It was about 1653 that Johan van Riebeek, a Hollander, started a settlement. Several attempts to establish a white colony had been made earlier, but attacks by the natives drove those daring men back to their ships. Van Riebeek, however, succeeded. Cape Colony remained Dutch for some years, afterward coming under British control, reverted to the Hollanders again, then to England once more, and has remained an English possession ever since.

To find a city to compare with Capetown, from a point of unusual attractiveness, would be difficult. In front, Table Bay, a charming sheet of blue water, spreads out to a good width, and beyond rises the Drakenstein and Hottentots Holland ranges of mountains, their castle-like peaks lending solemn charm when viewed from a distance; above the city rises Table Mountain, the feature of Capetown, with its two flanking towers—Devil's Peak (3,300 feet) and Lion's Head (2,100 feet)—forming the semi-circular valley in which the city rests so picturesquely. The commanding, frowning and scarred front of this unique mountain proves an object of admiration. Table Mountain is three miles long and three-quarters of a mile wide. The top is as level as a table, and, like other mountains in South Africa, is barren of timber. Rising to a height of nearly 4,000 feet, a view from its broad, flat top is of unusual interest. Antonio de Saldanha, in 1503, is said to have been the first white man to scale its sides.

The Town Hall, Parliament buildings, a splendid public garden, good museum, art gallery, colleges and other commendable public institutions are fully in keeping with the natural attractiveness of the Cape Peninsular. Creditable business buildings and good docks are also prominent.

Durban's wide-awake business men, together with Capetown's high charges to shippers, have taken from Table Bay the maritime prestige she once enjoyed. The majority of ships going to India and Australia do not come into Table Bay for coal, but keep steaming until they have reached Port Natal.

Smokestacks about the shore of the bay are not numerous enough to class the place as a manufacturing center. One often wonders what people do to earn a living in some of the cities of South Africa, in view of blacks doing so much of the work. Wages in Capetown, the lowest paid in South Africa, are not enough for comfortable living. Clerks, bookkeepers and clerical help generally are offered $7 to $10 a week. House rent is very cheap, however.

The blacks and colored of the Cape Province participate in the franchise, and a native of Tembuland was a member of the provincial Parliament. Strict laws in the old Boer provinces prohibit selling liquor to natives. While all natives here cannot vote, all voters have a right to drink liquor. So, if a native has money to buy whisky, he need merely say he is a voter and the saloonkeeper will take his word for it. When a black man can drink all the whisky he can pay for, and has a vote, that means insults and danger to life for the white of both sexes. This is the deplorable stage reached, to a noticeable degree, in Capetown. The white population is decreasing and blacks are becoming more insolent. The native of Capetown is not like the Zulu, nor the Barotse. He is copper colored, lower intellectually, of uninviting features and meanly inclined. Instances are frequent when the black of Capetown will not share the sidewalk—the white man must step off or get into a fight with half a dozen of these drunken natives.

To be allowed to land in Capetown one must have a hundred dollars. Englishmen, Irishmen, Scotchmen, foreigners—no one can land if he has not that sum. The tariff charged on foreign goods is from 50 to 125 per cent. The latter figure applies to tobacco. On a pound of American tobacco, which sells in the United States for 40 cents, there is a tax of $1.20.

Sixteen days is the shortest time in which mail can be transported from Capetown to England. The distance separating these two points is 6,000 miles.

Groote Schuur, the home of the late Cecil Rhodes, of very striking design and richly furnished, is located here in one of the finest estates in the world. Having a splendidly wooded park, with good paths built at convenient sections, it is shaded by the towering clefts of Table Mountain. The entrances to the Rhodes estate were never locked, and one had only to push open a gate to come in touch with nature in a superior form. Passing away in 1902, eight years before the consolidation, but far-seeing enough to know what the future policy of the country would be, Rhodes bequeathed Groote Schuur to the first Premier of a United South Africa. Louis Botha, elected to that high office, thereby came into possession of this attractive home.

"Your Hinterland Is There" is one of the inscriptions carved on the granite base on which the bronze figure of Cecil Rhodes rests in the Public Gardens of Capetown. The front of the figure is facing north, and a hand is pointed in the same direction—to Rhodesia. "So little done and so much to do" were the plaintive words of a man who had added 750,000 square miles to his country's already large possessions.

The wine industry is prominent in this province. Some years ago the grapevines were ravaged by a disease. Grape stocks were imported from the United States, and the native vine engrafted to the American plant, when the industry again thrived.

Snook, a fish three feet in length, numerous about the Cape Peninsula, seemed the principal food of a great number of poor colored people of Capetown.

In a place that has been an English possession so long one would expect to find a general use of the English language, but, on the contrary, natives and a majority of Europeans speak Dutch.

Newspapers and printing in general are ahead of the town. The wages, however, are low compared to other large places in South Africa.

"Hi'm the merry widow!" he shouted. "Hi'm the merry widow!" A Cockney Jew, with a grooved face, was among the merchants who sold goods—underwear, shirts, socks, haircombs, handkerchiefs, etc.—on what is known as the Parade Ground on certain days of the week. He wore on his head a woman's white straw hat with a soft, broad brim, which flopped against the sides of his face while he vigorously cried his wares. Around the crown of the hat was a garland of artificial flowers—daisies, roses, forget-me-nots, etc. He stood on a box, and told his auditors he was almost giving everything away. He talked at the rate of a thousand words a minute, more or less, working so hard that the perspiration on his face resembled a large water-soaked sponge when pressed. While streamlets of sweat ran down the flutes in his cheeks, he frequently interlarded his cheap-bargain harangue with, "Hi'm the merry widow!" "Hi'm the merry widow!"

Nearly 200,000 people live in and about Capetown, and the mixture is the worst in South Africa. Malays came to the Cape Peninsula years ago, and the mongrel off-shoots of these, with Arabs and natives of St. Helena and other places, emphasize the word "colored."

Being situated at almost the junction of two seas, the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans, the climate is the best in South Africa. The weather is never very hot, and frost is unknown.

We shall travel northward over the Karoo again to Bloemfontein, then easterly across the Orange Free State to Ladysmith, board a train going south, and return to Durban.

As stated in the early part of this volume, I had $1,350 when I left New York. On returning to Durban I had $637. With that sum I was about to start for India. The second day after reaching Durban, however, I obtained work on the leading newspaper, which furnished me with employment for six months. My wages averaged $40 a week. Modest comforts were good enough for me, and, living expenses being reasonable, I was enabled to put away a snug sum. Work was there for me if I wished to "drop in" the next year, so I promised to be on hand. This opened an opportunity to visit another continent—Australia—which I had not taken into calculation before leaving New York, as at that time I had not money enough to do so. So, early in January, I was on my way to the Antipodes.

On my return from Australia I took another trip to Johannesburg and back. I went to work the first of August and continued to the middle of December. Then I made a trip to Zululand, and upon my return was again offered work. As I had not enough money for the remainder of the journey, I decided to stay. Taking another trip to East London, Kingwilliamstown, up through Kaffraria, to Cradock, Bloemfontein, Kimberley, Johannesburg, Pretoria, and back to Pietermaritzburg and Durban, in the middle of March, 1912, I went to work for the third time, and finally bid good-by to Durban in July following.