The long oak avenues of Newlands House on the opposite bank gave us Canaletto-like perspectives of the low white house and twisted chimneys, the green lawns and deer-park, and the intensest blue hydrangeas. I have seen a drawing of the house as it was in the time of Lord Charles Somerset, with oval verandah, otherwise very much the same. It ultimately became the property of an old Van der Pool, who left it to the famous Hiddingh family, who have for years leased it to the Government. A namesake of his was an amusing character, living in semi-darkness and dirt, hoarding up his unprofitable wealth. An old black woman who was once his cook told a very good story of this old miser. Van der Pool was noted for having in his cellars the best wine at the Cape—no one ever tasted it. He hated spinach, but spinach grew in the garden, and therefore must not be wasted. In the dark dining-room, with an old gazette serving for a tablecloth, sat old man Van der Pool waiting for his dinner. Up came the dinner, 'Saartje' with a big dish of spinach rotten with long keeping. Old man Van der Pool cursed Saartje and spinach in best Dutch, and 'made a plan.' '"Saartje," say ole Bass, very gentle, soft like, "go fetch me from die cellar a best big bottle of ole Pontac." I run fetch ole Pontac; ole Bass, he put die bottle jus so, in front of him. "Now," he say, "Saartje, you trek." I trek out not farder dan die door keyhole. I see ole Bass pour out best old Pontac and put die spinach in front too. "Now," he say, "Hendrick, you see dis fine, werry, werry fine ole Pontac, you eat dis verdommte spinach first, den you drink dis wine, wot's been standin, Hendrickie, Kerl, for werry many years." Ole Bass, he eat, eat fast as I nebber seen him before; den, when all spinach done, ole Bass he pour die wine back in die bottle. He laf, laf, and he say, putting his finger to his nose, "Hi! Hendrick, I fool you dis time, I tink, fool you pretty well."'
OAK AVENUE, NEWLANDS
We left the river for a time and got up a side avenue into the big Newlands Avenue, near Montebello and the brewery. All this estate, once called the Palmboom, or Brewery Estate, belonged to old Dirk Van Rheenen, or Van Rhénen, Anne Barnard's friend, the most hospitable man in all the Peninsula. Dirk got the Government beer contract and built a wonderful mansion, designed with all its white stateliness and Doric pillars by a Frenchman who came out to build the Amsterdam Battery—at least, Marinus says so. But I have another story which is as well told. Anne Barnard is my authority, and she says she considers the Van Rheenen house possessed the air of a European mansion, it being erected by his own slaves from an Italian drawing he happened to meet with. There is a quaint description of how the Barnards' party went a-dining with Mynheer Van Rheenen:
'The family received us all with open countenances of gladness and hospitality, but the openest countenance and the most resolute smile, amounting to a grin, was borne by a calf's head, nearly as large as that of an ox, which was boiled entire and served up with the ears whole and a pair of gallant horns. The teeth were more perfect than dentist ever made, and no white satin was so pure as the skin of the countenance. This melancholy merry smiler and a tureen of bird's-nest soup were the most distinguished plats in the entertainment. The soup was a mass of the most aromatic nastiness I ever tasted, somewhat resembling macaroni perfumed with different scents; it is a Chinese dish, and was formerly so highly valued in India that five-and-twenty guineas was the price of a tureenful of it. The "springer"[4] also made its appearance, boiled in large slices—admirable! It is a fish which would make the fortune of anyone who could carry it by spawn to England. The party was good, the game abundant, but ill-cooked, the beef bad, the mutton by no means superior, the poultry remarkably good, and the venison of the highest flavour, but without fat; this, however, was supplied by its being larded very thickly—all sorts of fruits in great perfection, pines excepted, of which there are not many at the Cape. Mynheer carried us off after dinner to see his bloom of tulips and other flowers; the tulips are very fine, and the carnations beautiful; all were sheltered from the winds by myrtle hedges. Our gentlemen returned delighted with the day they had spent, and very glad to have the prospect of another such.'
Gigantic appetites, hadn't they? And if Anne hadn't tasted it all how could she have commented with so much definiteness? They grew tulips here! Why not? But they won't grow, is the answer. I expect the secret lies in the neat myrtle hedges, which can yet be seen in some old-fashioned gardens in Sea Point and Cape Town. They drank well and unwisely, also, these Peninsula people. Thompson remarks upon this in his book on the Cape: 'The Pokaalie cup, like the blessed beer of Bradwardine, too often drowns both reason and refinement.'
CHAPTER VI
THE BOSHEUVEL, OR HEN AND CHICKENS HILL
We crossed the river at the bottom of the Bishopscourt gardens, and found ourselves looking down the long fir avenue, arched as perfectly as the nave of a Gothic cathedral. Opposite, ran another little avenue along the side of the hill, and to the right, staring at us like black and white toadstools of monstrous size out of the green gloom, the thatched cottages of Bishopscourt.
We chose a little narrow pathway running up the hill from the middle avenue, winding through low protea-bush and silver-trees.