The writer of this has never admired the works of Rider Haggard; they are too untrue—untrue to Nature and the probabilities of life, and certainly untrue to facts, which are grossly exaggerated. But even in winter a strayed swallow is seen in our country. On the barest plain a tree is met occasionally, and in Haggard’s work I once came across something with which I can cordially agree. It is long ago since I read it, but it so surprised me that I have always remembered it. Yet it is so long since I read it that I am not quite sure in which of his works I saw it; but if I am not mistaken the thing is in Jess. The passage I refer to is where he says that Pretoria is the prettiest town in South Africa; and if Haggard thought so in the days when he knew Pretoria, when the streets were swamps, covered with grass, and it was a danger to venture out of doors after dark for fear of breaking a limb in some concealed hole, when no better building—or hardly better—than the house which Jess inhabited existed in the town, what must we say of it now, when the streets have been rebuilt (more or less), when beautiful buildings—the best and grandest in South Africa—have been raised; merchant princes have erected palaces, beautiful stores rival European houses, and Government has covered a block of ground with a pile of buildings of which even Pretoria can be proud. Even Nature herself has been improved upon, if I may be allowed to say so. Plantations of trees have been planted, where formerly bare plots of ground existed, beautifully laid out ornamental and flower gardens enchant the vision. A block of tares, which grew only a crop of grass formerly, is now laid out in a beautiful park, worthy the name, with a large fish pond in the centre, and even a substantially built bandstand has been added lately. All in all, Pretoria more than deserves the name so often applied to it, ‘Pretty Pretoria’; it really deserves to be called beautiful Pretoria.
No wonder, then, that Steve, who possessed a keenly appreciative eye for the beautiful, was enchanted with the view which met his eye when he entered Pretoria through the poort, from which emerges the road leading into it from Johannesburg, and he felt—like so many others have felt before and since—that once having seen Pretoria, a man may travel the world over, but he would ever feel a longing to be back in Pretoria. Many have felt this longing when in foreign lands, and have come back. Steve found his cousin waiting for him at the halting-place, and was soon introduced into his room at the quiet boarding-house, which had been secured for him at his request.
After a few days spent in resting after travelling for days in a cramped and crowded position, and becoming acquainted with the town in which he had resolved to make his home, Steve took his place in the office where he had secured the much-desired situation.
It did not take Steve long to get well into the mysteries of his work and the good graces of his employer and fellow-clerks. What pleased him most was that he came in daily contact with the Burghers of the district, which gave him the opportunity he had desired, viz., of studying the men whom he looked upon as heroes, in that they had dared so much and suffered so much, and had come out of the ordeal safe and victorious.
He found them distrustful at first, although kind and respectful. The stranger you are to them, the more civilly and kindly you are treated, but always with great reserve. But by studying them, and being always friendly and cordial towards them, he soon gained their confidence, and many was the pound of butter and biltong, varied now and then by a dozen of eggs, a couple of fowls, and at Christmas time even a lamb, that he received from them as tokens of friendship.
He found that the better they knew you, and the more they liked you, the more they joked with you and teased you. They are very fond of teasing, which has led foreigners to take them in earnest, and spread all sorts of reports, repeating for fact what the Boers said when they were only what is vulgarly but expressively called chaffing them. They especially delighted in doing this to ‘green uns,’ but always with the utmost good nature, and only when they liked such a ‘green un.’ They would never do it to one whom they disliked or distrusted. By the good grace and good nature with which Steve received all this banter, he got to be greatly liked, and was soon considered as being quite one of them, and was known to them far and wide. We shall see a great deal more of them in connection with Steve’s adventures and life amongst them, and shall delight to study their character with him with the view of understanding better this much maligned people.
In this way Steve spent several years of quiet life. He applied himself vigorously to his work, so that, as we have said, he soon gained the confidence of his employers, and speedily obtained promotion and increase of salary, which enabled him, while saving considerably, to send many a present to his mother and sisters.
In the boarding-house where he lodged, he found quite a pleasant party, composed of many nationalities, amongst whom he struck up many friendships irrespective of language. He found himself a fellow-lodger of his cousin; his former travelling companion, Harrison; another Englishman, a colonial named Keith, and a young Afrikander named Theron, who formed his particular circle of friends, and they generally managed to be together when any excursion or picnic was undertaken.
Although, as we have said, he did not really agree with his cousin, he felt that in common gratitude towards him for having obtained a situation for him, and as a duty due to cousinly affection, he was bound to include him as one of his friends.
In the boarding-house, the boarders were in the habit of forming themselves into a sort of free and easy debating society, for want of better recreation in the long evenings. That is to say those who did not care to spend their evenings in bar-rooms and billiard saloons, which formed Pretoria’s principal places of amusement at this time. Of course it goes without saying, that Steve kept clear as much as possible of these places, for he was accustomed in his native town to the idea that it was a disgrace for any self-respecting man or youth to be seen going into a bar. What shocked him was for the first time to see a girl serving drink in a bar, surrounded by a coarse and blaspheming crowd of young men. To him women had always seemed as creatures almost divine, too good to be touched without veneration. He thought they should be worshipped at a distance, and that in their presence the most choice and delicate language only should be used. There he saw them treated roughly and disrespectfully, and even handled as if they were only coarse, common, everyday human beings, and worst of all they seemed to be pleased with such treatment, and even to invite it by their actions.