And now, as you grope about, hurriedly collecting the more perishable articles, and flinging them into the safety of the next room—which has a corrugated iron roof—you hear a dull roar; far off at first, but advancing nearer and nearer; till at last a grand volume of sound thunders past, and a broad, tossing river, impetuous as any mountain torrent, is suddenly at your very gates. It is the sluit coming down; filling, and perhaps widely overflowing, its deep channel, which, straight and steep as a railway cutting, has stood dry so long. In all directions these sluits are now careering over the country; and though occasionally their wild rush does some mischief, such as washing away ostriches' nests, drowning stock, or carrying into a dam such an accumulation of soil as to fill it up and render it useless—still, on the whole, the sluit is a most beneficent friend to the farmer. And now, at the first welcome sound of that friend's approach, you hear overhead the loud congratulations of the gentlemen, who, attired in ulsters, are hard at work on the roof, whither they have hastily scrambled to lessen as far as possible the deluge within. "This is worth £200 to us!" you hear in triumphant tones. "We're all right now for six months!" Then—less joyfully—comes a query as to how the great dam in the upper camp, which on a former sad occasion has "gone," will stand this time; but the general opinion is that, with the considerable strengthening it has since received, it will weather the storm; and in the meanwhile souls must be possessed in patience till the morning. And still the rain keeps on, steadily and noisily; and with all the discomfort, and with all the mischief it has wrought indoors, how thankful one is for it! And how one's heart is gladdened by that "sound of abundance of rain," and "voice of many waters!" It means everything to the farmer; the long drought over at last, the dams full, the parched country revived, the poor thin cattle no longer in danger of starvation; healthier ostriches, a better quality of feathers, a near prospect of nests, and in fact the removal of a load of cares and anxieties.
How early we are all astir on the morning after a big rain! and with what eager excitement we look out, in the first gleam of daylight, for that most welcome sight, the newly-filled dam! A wonderful transformation has indeed been worked in the appearance of things since last night. That unsightly dry bed of light-coloured soil, baked by the hot sun to the hardness of pottery, and broken up by a thousand intersecting deep cracks and fissures, which has so long been the ugliest feature among all our unpicturesque surroundings, offends the eye no more; and in its place there now lies in the early morning light a beautiful broad sheet of water, into which the yellow sluit, a miniature Niagara Rapids, is still lavishly pouring its wealth—not for many hours indeed will the impetuous course of this and numerous other sluits, large and small, begin gradually to subside. Everywhere the water is standing in immense pools and ponds; how to feed one unlucky pair of breeding-birds—my special charges—in a low-lying camp on the other side of the sluit is a problem which for the present I do not attempt to solve; indeed, to walk a yard from the door, even in the thickest of boots and shabbiest of garments, requires some courage, for it is anything but an easy matter to keep your feet, and if you fell, you would go into a perfect bath of mud. In some places lie accumulations of hailstones (accounting for the icy coldness of that impromptu shower-bath), and, though partially melted, some of them are still of the size of hazel nuts. The rain is over; and the friendly clouds to which we owe so much are already far off, and lie in white, round, solid-looking masses along the horizon. The sky, as if softened by its tempest of passion, seems of a bluer and more tender tint than it has been for a long time, and all nature appears full of joy and thanksgiving. From all sides you hear the loud chorus of myriads of rejoicing frogs, all croaking congratulations to each other, and all talking at once; they seem to have sprung suddenly into existence since last night, and their noise, discordant as it is, is not unwelcome after the long silence of the drought.
Toto, the instant he catches sight of the water, rushes out of the house, gallops wildly down to the dam, and plunges in, to swim round and round and round, barking with delight. He seems as if he could not have enough of the water; for when, after a long time, he has come out, and is on his way back to us, he suddenly changes his mind, and dashes back for another bathe. Then he seems to lose his head altogether, and vents his wild spirits in a sort of frenzied war-dance along the banks of the dam; seriously upsetting the composure, as well as the dignity, of the crow Bobby, a bird of neat and cleanly habits, who, long debarred from any more satisfactory bath than a washing-basin, has walked down, with the air of an explorer, to this new lake he has just discovered; and is croaking softly and contentedly to himself as he splashes the bright drops again and again over his dusty black plumage. He does not like Toto; indeed, there is a mutual jealousy between these two favoured pets of ours, and they are always rather glad of an excuse for a good row, such as now ensues.
When the commotion has subsided, and Toto is at a safe distance from the dam, a troop of ostriches come down to drink. They are no doubt delighted to find such an abundant supply of water, after the somewhat scanty allowance which has been portioned out to them of late; and they stand greedily scooping up large quantities with their broad bills; then assuming comical attitudes as they stretch out their distended necks to allow the fluid to run down. In the distance, about a dozen other ostriches are spreading their white wings and waltzing along magnificently—a pretty way of expressing their satisfaction at this new and delightful change in their circumstances. But it is sometimes an expensive amusement; and we feel relieved when all have settled down, with unbroken legs, into a more sober mood.
The fowls alone do not participate in the general rejoicing; their house was even less water-tight than our room, and they all seem to have caught cold, and look draggled and miserable. Two poor sitting-hens have been washed out of their nests in the kraal hedge; their eggs are under water, and they wander about clucking despondently. By-and-by they will all be happier, when the waters have subsided a little, and they can pick succulent insects out of the softened ground; but in the meanwhile they show plainly that they do not see the good of living in a half-drowned world.
And here come two of the horses, with "September,"[3] one of our Kaffir herds, who has been out on the veldt to find and catch them. Like most of the other colonists, we have no stables, and when our animals have done their day's work, we let them go, unless an early start has to be made in the morning; then, as they sometimes go long distances, and are not to be caught in a hurry, those that will be wanted are kept in the kraal over-night. During severe droughts the horses are fed at the house; but when there is plenty of vegetation on the veldt, they pick up a living for themselves. They do not get very fat, nor are they handsome to look at; and if an English coachman could see their bony frames and rough, ungroomed coats, he would no doubt be filled with the profoundest contempt. Yet, with all their uncouth appearance, they are far more serviceable than his fat, sleek, overfed animals. They can travel much longer distances; they do not have such frequent colds and other ailments—lameness especially is quite unknown among them—and their services are always at the command of their master, of any of his friends and acquaintances, or even of perfect strangers who may happen to require a mount or a lift. For the colonist is as hospitable with his horses and his vehicles as he is with everything else that he possesses; and the arrival of an invited guest in a hired conveyance, though no unfrequent event at English country homes, is a thing quite unheard-of on Cape farms.
Although in many parts of South Africa horses do not require shoeing at all, they need it in the Karroo, where the ground is particularly stony. When a horse's shoes are worn out, he is worked for some time unshod, until the hoof, which had grown considerably, has worn down, and the animal begins to be a little tender-footed; then fresh shoes are put on. This plan renders it unnecessary for the blacksmith to use his knife, and ensures that the hoof is worn evenly; thus avoiding the lameness which in England is so often caused by the hoof not being pared straight.
And in the meanwhile the two horses have been saddled, and off go T—— and Mr. B—— on a tour of inspection round the farm; first of all making a bee-line for the opposite range of hills, where lies that particular dam in the fate of which we are so deeply interested. I cannot ride with them, much as I should have liked it; for the scenes of devastation indoors claim my attention, and with my dark-skinned hand-maiden and another Kaffir woman, wife of one of the herds, whom I have pressed into the service, I go to work; boldly attacking first the most herculean task of all, i.e., the cleaning of the bedroom out of which we were washed last night. Truly an Augean stable is this first room; and the sight of its horrors by daylight makes me wonder how by any possibility it can ever again be fit for human habitation. The water with which the bed has been deluged was no clear crystal stream—far from it—and pillows, sheets, and counter-pane are of a rich brown hue; so are the toilet table and the once pretty window-curtains of blue-and-white Madras muslin, which now look melancholy indeed as they hang down, straight and limp, from their cornice. In fact, hardly anything in the room can boast of having remained perfectly dry and clean; and the floor is a pool of dirty water several inches deep. It all looks hopeless; but we refuse to be daunted, and set to work with a will; things dry quickly in such a sun as is now shining brightly outside; the mud is "clean" mud, too, and does not stain or spoil so irretrievably as that of most other places. A Falstaffian bundle is made up for the wash, which will keep a Kaffir hard at work for two good days turning the washing-machine; a vigorous scrubbing and "swabbing of decks" goes on indoors; and by the time the gentlemen return to lunch, in the best of spirits, and reporting the dam safe and splendidly full, things have already assumed a brighter aspect. T—— spends the afternoon in repairing the roof, and I walk about the house with a long broom, poking and tapping the ceilings to indicate to him the defective spots; he does the work far better than it was originally done by the builder of the house, and never afterwards do we have so bad a deluge.
It was, however, very nearly equalled in magnitude by a previous one, which, while we were living at Hume Cottage, gave me the first experience of a big rain—and of a brack roof. T—— being away for a few days, I was alone in the house with my one black servant, who of course slept placidly through all the tumult of the elements. I, on the contrary—the bedroom being water-tight—was lying awake, listening and rejoicing as I thought of all the good this splendid rain would do us. Little did I suspect what it was doing in the sitting-room; and I cheerfully and briskly opened the door of the latter next morning, all unprepared for the sight which met my eyes. Poor little room! only a few days before we had taken such pride and pleasure in beautifying it—and now! It looked like nothing but the saloon of a steamer which had gone down and been fished up again. The treacherous roof had let in floods of dirty brown water in all directions; the Turkish rugs were half buried in mud; the new bent-wood chairs looked like neglected old garden seats which for years had braved all weathers; and the table-cloth, on the artistic colours of which we had prided ourselves, gave a very good idea of the probable state of Sir Walter Raleigh's cloak after serving as an impromptu carpet for his queen. But the brunt of the storm had fallen on two sets of hanging bookshelves, well filled with nicely-bound volumes, and gracefully draped with some of our pet pieces of Turkish needlework. The books all looked as if they had been boiled; and the colour which had come out of their swollen and pulpy bindings had run down the saturated embroideries in long streaks, showing where a red book had stood, where a blue or green one, etc. Fortunately, a good cleaning and washing restored most things to a tidy, if not perfectly fresh appearance; but those poor books never recovered.
In a few days—incredibly few—the effects of a good rain are seen in the appearance of the veldt, which rapidly loses its dry, burnt-up look. But, even before the perennial bush has had time to recover its succulence and verdure, all the spaces between its isolated tufts are covered with the softest and most delicate-looking vegetation, which, as if by magic, has sprung suddenly into existence. All these plants, which are of many different kinds, and some of which possess very minute and pretty flowers, are indiscriminately called by the Dutch opslaag ("that which comes up"); and if you happen at the time of their appearance to have a troop of infant ostriches, there is no better food for the little creatures than this tender, bright-green foliage. They are but short-lived little plants; the hot sun soon drying them up.