Mrs.
J-, Who Is Dutch Herself, Tells Me That One May Board In A Dutch
Farm-House Very Cheaply, And
With great comfort (of course eating
with the family), and that they will drive you about the country
and tend
Your horses for nothing, if you are friendly, and don't
treat them with Engelsche hoog-moedigheid.
Oct. 19th. - The packet came in last night, but just in time to save
the fine of 50l. per diem, and I got your welcome letter this
morning. I have been coughing all this time, but I hope I shall
improve. I came out at the very worst time of year, and the
weather has been (of course) 'unprecedentedly' bad and changeable.
But when it IS fine it is quite celestial; so clear, so dry, so
light. Then comes a cloud over Table Mountain, like the sugar on a
wedding-cake, which tumbles down in splendid waterfalls, and
vanishes unaccountably halfway; and then you run indoors and shut
doors and windows, or it portends a 'south-easter', i.e. a
hurricane, and Capetown disappears in impenetrable clouds of dust.
But this wind coming off the hills and fields of ice, is the Cape
doctor, and keeps away cholera, fever of every sort, and all
malignant or infectious diseases. Most of them are unknown here.
Never was so healthy a place; but the remedy is of the heroic
nature, and very disagreeable. The stones rattle against the
windows, and omnibuses are blown over on the Rondebosch road.
A few days ago, I drove to Mr. V-'s farm. Imagine St. George's
Hill, and the most beautiful bits of it, sloping gently up to Table
Mountain, with its grey precipices, and intersected with Scotch
burns, which water it all the year round, as they come from the
living rock; and sprinkled with oranges, pomegranates, and camelias
in abundance. You drive through a mile or two as described, and
arrive at a square, planted with rows of fine oaks close together;
at the upper end stands the house, all on the ground-floor, but on
a high stoep: rooms eighteen feet high; the old slave quarters on
each side; stables, &c., opposite; the square as big as Belgrave
Square, and the buildings in the old French style.
We then went on to Newlands, a still more beautiful place. Immense
trenching and draining going on - the foreman a Caffre, black as
ink, six feet three inches high, and broad in proportion, with a
staid, dignified air, and Englishmen working under him! At the
streamlets there are the inevitable groups of Malay women washing
clothes, and brown babies sprawling about. Yesterday, I should
have bought a black woman for her beauty, had it been still
possible. She was carrying an immense weight on her head, and was
far gone with child; but such stupendous physical perfection I
never even imagined. Her jet black face was like the Sphynx, with
the same mysterious smile; her shape and walk were goddess-like,
and the lustre of her skin, teeth, and eyes, showed the fulness of
health; - Caffre of course. I walked after her as far as her swift
pace would let me, in envy and admiration of such stately humanity.
The ordinary blacks, or Mozambiques, as they call them, are
hideous. Malay here seems equivalent to Mohammedan. They were
originally Malays, but now they include every shade, from the
blackest nigger to the most blooming English woman. Yes, indeed,
the emigrant-girls have been known to turn 'Malays', and get
thereby husbands who know not billiards and brandy - the two
diseases of Capetown. They risked a plurality of wives, and
professed Islam, but they got fine clothes and industrious
husbands. They wear a very pretty dress, and all have a great air
of independence and self-respect; and the real Malays are very
handsome. I am going to see one of the Mollahs soon, and to look
at their schools and mosque; which, to the distraction of the
Scotch, they call their 'Kerk.'
I asked a Malay if he would drive me in his cart with the six or
eight mules, which he agreed to do for thirty shillings and his
dinner (i.e. a share of my dinner) on the road. When I asked how
long it would take, he said, 'Allah is groot', which meant, I
found, that it depended on the state of the beach - the only road
for half the way.
The sun, moon, and stars are different beings from those we look
upon. Not only are they so large and bright, but you SEE that the
moon and stars are BALLS, and that the sky is endless beyond them.
On the other hand, the clear, dry air dwarfs Table Mountain, as you
seem to see every detail of it to the very top.
Capetown is very picturesque. The old Dutch buildings are very
handsome and peculiar, but are falling to decay and dirt in the
hands of their present possessors. The few Dutch ladies I have
seen are very pleasing. They are gentle and simple, and naturally
well-bred. Some of the Malay women are very handsome, and the
little children are darlings. A little parti-coloured group of
every shade, from ebony to golden hair and blue eyes, were at play
in the street yesterday, and the majority were pretty, especially
the half-castes. Most of the Caffres I have seen look like the
perfection of human physical nature, and seem to have no diseases.
Two days ago I saw a Hottentot girl of seventeen, a housemaid here.
You would be enchanted by her superfluity of flesh; the face was
very queer and ugly, and yet pleasing, from the sweet smile and the
rosy cheeks which please one much, in contrast to all the pale
yellow faces - handsome as some of them are.
I wish I could send the six chameleons which a good-natured parson
brought me in his hat, and a queer lizard in his pocket.
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