Yankee Girls in Zulu Land

by Louise Vescelius Sheldon

Our first impression of Cape Town, with its sixty thousand inhabitants, black and white, was that it was composed principally of old-fashioned Dutch houses with individual steps, so that the pedestrian had the choice of either dancing up and down the steps or walking in the middle of the road. We found that although the older houses preponderated, there were several streets of handsome residences. The streets were actually dirtier than those of New York.

The principal business streets run parallel with each other from the sea to the mountain, and are crossed at right angles by narrower streets.

On Adderley Street, which is the Broadway of Cape Town, are the elegant Standard Bank Building, the Commercial Exchange and Reading-room, and, at the further end, the large Dutch Reformed Church, which is the church found in every town in Africa. There are many other imposing buildings, beautifully decorated and built with all the modern improvements architecture can offer. Adjoining Adderley Street is Saint George’s Street, with the towering Saint George’s Cathedral rising at the end of the street; here are to be found the Post-office, club-houses, banks, and the leading newspaper office, the Cape Times. Branching off of these streets, the old-fashioned Dutch mansions of the early settlers may be seen.

They are situated in the midst of beautiful grounds overrun with tropical vines and flowers. Near by are the charming modern English villas and cottages. But the most beautiful and admired suburban houses are to be found at Rondebosch, Wynberg, and Constantia, on the east side of Table Mountain, connected by railway with Cape Town; they lie at an elevation from the town and are delightfully cool during the summer months. A drive through the groves of grand old pine and oak trees, with a glimpse of mountain, precipice and sea, beautiful houses on terraced heights, with vineyards beyond, is a delightful event; these features make it a veritable paradise, not imagined by the English traveller; instead of hot, dry, sandy Africa, we have here majestic scenery, dense forests with a wild beauty of their own, and an atmosphere so clear that every object is distinctly revealed. There is a quaint old castle down by the sea, originally erected by the Dutch, who founded the town about 1650. It is square and podgy, like the pictures we have seen of its founders. The Dutch built many forts along the base of the mountain, possibly to keep off the wild beasts that used to prowl about the back windows of His Excellency, the Governor; these forts lie in ruins.

At the upper end of the town are the Public Gardens, a kind of half park, half Botanical Gardens, and a very pleasant, shady, sleepy, restful place it is, in which to spend an hour on a hot afternoon. There is also a capital museum, full of curiosities, and a handsome public library, containing over forty thousand volumes and all the leading English periodicals of the day.

The House of Parliament is a fine building, and the legislators are Dutch, English, Scotch, Irish, everything but American. The Government house is situated in the midst of beautiful grounds facing the Botanical Gardens, and is a long, low building covering much ground. We attended an afternoon reception there. The guests, after being presented to the Governor and his wife, passed through the rooms into the large, park-like grounds, where some of the musicians of a Highland regiment, dressed in the Scotch dress, were playing on the bagpipes. Some people call it music; it may be music in the Highlands.

A second military band was stationed in another part of the grounds. The gathering was a distinguished one; the ladies displayed great taste in their toilets, making the scene appear quite like an English garden party. But the interest of the traveller is not in the pale-faced colonist, but in the dusky, many-hued, coloured inhabitants.

The Malays, although originally coming from the Malay Peninsula in Asia, are natives of Cape Town and have been there for several generations, being the descendants of the former slaves of the Dutch East India Company and its servants. They seem to have retained all their national characteristics and are as distinct from the Hottentot and the Kafirs as is the white man. They are peculiarly a feature of Cape Town, being seldom met elsewhere in the country, except in small numbers at Port Elizabeth; they have adopted Dutch, the language of the old colonists, as their tongue, are generally strict Mohammedans and sober, clever mechanics. They are as noticeable in the town as on the quay. The picturesque, dusky-coloured Malay woman, with her really beautiful features, her rich-coloured, full skirts hanging straight from the waist, and containing from fifteen to eighteen yards of material, and her bright red, yellow and variegated silk handkerchiefs tied around the head and shoulders, looks like a gorgeous balloon sailing down the street in the wind. The balloon, however, is kept to earth by wooden sandals, held to the foot by a wooden peg between the big and second toes, which make a clattering noise as she walks along the street.

She is generally loaded down with gold and silver ornaments; her whole person is scrupulously neat and clean. The Malay women are the washerwomen and upper servants of the household.