South African Memories / Social, Warlike & Sporting from Diaries Written at the Time

by Lady Sarah Isabella Augusta Wilson

Groot Schuurr was outwardly the same as in the old days, and kept up in the way one knew that the great man would have wished. We went for the same rides he used to take. The view was as glorious as ever, the animals were flourishing and increasing in numbers, the old lions gazed placidly down from their roomy cage on a ledge of Table Mountain, the peacocks screamed and plumed themselves, and the herd of zebras grazed in picturesque glades. Nothing was changed there to outward appearances, and one had to go farther afield to see evidences of the dismay caused by the pillar being abruptly broken off. Cape Town itself, I soon noted, was altered by the war almost beyond recognition. From the dull and uninteresting seaport town I remembered it when we came there in 1895, it seemed, seven years later, one of the busiest cities imaginable, with the most enormous street traffic. The pavements were thronged, the shops were crowded, and numerous were the smart, khaki-clad figures, bronzed and bearded, that were to be seen on all sides. The Mount Nelson Hotel, which had been opened just before the war, was crowded with them—some very youthful, who had early acquired manhood and selfreliance in a foreign land; others grey-headed, with rows of medal ribbons, dimmed in colour from exposure to all weathers, whose names were strangely familiar as recording heroic achievements.

At that time Sir Gordon Sprigg, of the Progressive Party, was in power and Prime Minister; but he was only kept in office by the Bond, who made the Ministers more or less ridiculous in the eyes of the country by causing them to dance like puppets at their bidding. It was in the House of Assembly—where he was a whale amongst minnows—that the void was so acutely felt surrounding the vacant seat so long occupied by Mr. Rhodes, and it was not an encouraging sight, for those of his supporters who tried to carry on his traditions, to gaze on the sparsely filled ranks of the Progressive Party, and then at the crowded seats of the Bond on the other side.

We were told, by people who had met the Boer Generals on their recent visit to the colony, that these latter were not in the least cast down by the result of the war; that they simply meant to bide their time and win in the Council Chamber what they had lost on the battle-field; that the oft-reiterated sentence, "South Africa for the Dutch," was by no means an extinct volcano or a parrot-cry of the past. It was evident that political feeling was, in any case, running very high; it almost stopped social intercourse, it divided families. To be a member of the Loyal Women's League was sufficient to be ostracized in any Dutch village, the Boers pretending that the name outraged their feelings, and that distinctions between loyal and disloyal were invidious. Federation—Mr. Rhodes's great ideal—which has since come rapidly and triumphantly to be an accomplished fact, was then temporarily relegated to the background; the Bond, apparently, had not made up their minds to declare for it, but they were hard at work in their old shrewd way, obtaining influence by getting their own men appointed to vacancies at the post-office and in the railway departments, while the Loyalists appeared to be having almost as bad a time as in the old days before the war. At the present moment, in spite of all the good-will borne to the new Union of South Africa by great and small in all lands where the British flag flies, it is well to remember, without harbouring any grudge, certain incidents of the past. A thorough knowledge of the people which are to be assimilated with British colonists is absolutely necessary, that all may in the end respect, as well as like, each other.

From Cape Town, where my sister transacted a great deal of business connected with the winding-up of the Yeomanry Hospital, we went to Bloemfontein, and were the guests at Government House of my old Mafeking friend, Sir Hamilton Gould Adams, promoted to the important post of Governor of the Orange River Colony. From that town we drove across to Kimberley, taking two days to accomplish this somewhat tedious journey. We stayed one night with a German farmer, who had surrendered to the English when Bloemfontein was occupied by Lord Roberts, and his case was typical of many similar awkward predicaments which occurred frequently during the ups and downs of the war. When Lord Roberts's army swept on from Bloemfontein, the Boers in a measure swept back, and our host was for months persecuted by his own people, finally made a prisoner, and was within an ace of being shot; in fact, it was only the peace that saved his life.

Next day we made our noonday halt at Poplar Grove, the scene of one of Lord Roberts's fights, and farther on we passed Koodoos Rand Drift, where General French had cut off Cronje and forced him back on Paardeberg. All along these roads it was very melancholy to see the ruined farms, some with the impoverished owner in possession, others still standing empty. A Boer farmhouse is not at any time the counterpart of the snug dwelling we know in England, but it was heartbreaking to see these homes as they were at the conclusion of the war, when, in nearly every instance, the roof, window-frames, and doors, were things of the past. When a waggon could be espied standing near the door, and a few lean oxen grazing at hand, it was a sign that the owner had returned home, and, on closer inspection, a whole family of children would probably be discovered sheltered by a tin lean-to fixed to the side of the house, or huddled in a tent pitched close by. They all seemed wonderfully patient, but looked despairing and miserable. At one of these houses we spoke to the daughter of such a family who was able to converse in English. She told us her father had died during the war, that two of her brothers had fought for the English, and had returned with khaki uniforms and nothing else, but that the third had thrown in his lot with the Boers, and had come back the proud possessor of four horses.

At Kimberley we had motors placed at our disposal by Mr. Gardner Williams, manager of the De Beers Company, and were amused to hear how excited the Kaffirs had been at the first automobile to appear in the Diamond City, and how they had thrown themselves down to peer underneath in order to discover the horse. These motors, however, were not of much use on the veldt, and we soon found Kimberley very dull, and decided to make a flying tour through Rhodesia to Beira, taking a steamer at that port for Delagoa Bay, on our road to Johannesburg. Our first halting-place was at Mafeking, where we arrived one bitterly cold, blowy morning at 6 a.m. I do not think I ever realized, during all those months of the siege, what a glaring little spot it was. When I returned there two years later: the dust was flying in clouds, the sun was blinding, and accentuated the absence of any shade.

Six hours spent there were more than sufficient, and it was astounding to think of the many months that it had been our home. It has often been said, I reflected, that it is the people you consort with, not the place you live at, that constitute an agreeable existence; and of the former all I could find to say was, "Where are they gone, the old familiar faces?" Beyond the Mayor of the town, who called to reiterate warm thanks for the Mafeking Fund, and a nigger coachman who used to take me out for Sunday drives, I failed to perceive one face I knew in the town during the siege; but at the convent we received the warmest welcome from the Mother Superior and the nuns. This community appeared to be in quite affluent circumstances: the building was restored, the chapel rebuilt and plentifully decorated with new images; there was a full complement of day-boarders, who were energetically practising on several pianos, and many new Sisters had made their appearance; upstairs, the room where was located the Maxim gun was filled by thirty snowwhite beds. It was quite refreshing to find one circle who had recovered from their hardships, and who, if anything, were rather more prosperous than before the war. We paid a flying visit to the little cemetery, which was beautifully kept, and where many fairly recent graves were in evidence, chiefly due to enteric fever after the siege. There we particularly noted a very fine marble cross, erected to the memory of Captain Ronald Vernon; and as we were admiring this monument we met an old Kimberley acquaintance in the person of Mrs. Currey, who had been our hostess at the time of the Jameson Raid. Her husband had since died, and this lady was travelling round that part of Africa representing the Loyal Women's League, who did such splendid work in marking out and tending the soldiers' graves.

At Mafeking we picked up the Rhodesian train de luxe, and travelled in the greatest comfort to Bulawayo, and on to Salisbury. At that town we met a party, comprising, amongst others, Dr. Jameson and the late Mr. Alfred Beit, who were making a tour of inspection connected with satisfying the many wants of the Rhodesian settlers. These pioneers were beginning to feel the loss of the great man to whom they had turned for everything. His faithful lieutenants were doing their best to replace him, and the rôle of the first-named, apparently, was to make the necessary speeches, that of the latter to write the equally important cheques.