In the early days of the Diamond Fields, when the evils resulting from an uncontrolled supply of liquor to natives were rampant, the following lines appeared in a Kimberley paper:
The best of all methods, so others maintain,
To free them from ignorance’s yoke,
And enable them civilised freedom to gain,
Is simply to give them Cape Smoke;
When mixed with tobacco, red pepper and lime,
With dagga and vitriol, too,
The draught is delicious, enchanting, sublime,
Why, it even would civilise you: