Chapter II

Were it not that I now hold in abhorrence all that pertains to the manners and customs of predikants of the Dutch Reformed Church, with a few exceptions I would follow their pattern, and begin this work with a thoughtful dissertation on the wondrous way in which accident directs a man’s steps, even as it did in the days of the Great Trek, when a lion chased my grandfather, causing him to turn into the way that led to the finding of that spring that directed his choosing the spot for his farm, whereon was later found the gold that made his sons rich but unhappy.

In the events that I have set out to tell in truth and plainness will be seen how many errors that I have made have been the following on of accidents that I could not foresee or prevent; and this I commend to those who would blame me for the part I took in the war.

I had been farming with my cousin, Chris Vermaak, in the Newcastle district of Natal over a year after leaving the Transvaal, as I had hoped for ever, when I received an urgent message from my brother Jan to go to Vrededorp and help him smooth certain difficulties, he having been wrongfully, and in mistake, arrested on a charge of horse-stealing.

I was very grieved when I received his letter, not only because I did not wish again to cross the Border, but for the reason that Jan had once before been

B wrongfully charged with the same crime in the Orange Free State, and unjustly convicted. Knowing so well the landdrost at Vrededorp, I feared much that he would allow that almost forgotten circumstance to prejudice him, especially as Jan was my brother, and the landdrost a great believer in the Bible doctrine of visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children or of brother upon brother. But knowing all this, I foolishly consented to go, not even yet having learned the folly of doing a kind act when it causes the doer to run a risk.

“Jan,” said I, when I saw him in the tronk—for they would not allow him bail—“Jan, you have been very foolish to get caught; but did you really steal the horse?”

“Sarel,” answered he, “have you seen it?”

“I have,” said I.

“Then how can you ask me that question? Isn’t he a beauty? How could an Erasmus help jumping it, if he found it alone?”

I rebuked him sternly, but told him that, as his brother, I thought it my duty to do what I could to save him from just punishment. So I went and saw the public prosecutor, young Hendrik Kemp, who had been smallpox tax-collector during my time at Prinsloosdorp, where I often had to show him how to prepare his books for the office inspector, and more often lend him money to make his accounts come out right, which lending was very dangerous if the inspector took it into his head to look at my books on the same visit, as he at last did.

“Hendrik,” said I, after we had talked over the case, and he had shown me the summons, which made it very bad for Jan, “how are the accounts? Can you now keep proper books to please the inspector?”

“Ja, thanks to you, I have had very little trouble lately.”

“And is it true that half your summonses are dismissed on exception, through your mistakes in drawing them?”

“Not half, coos, but nearly half.”

“Then, Hendrik,” said I, “let me draw this one for you, for I fear I shall lose my skill for want of practice.”

He was at first fearful, but when he saw ten five-pound notes -on his table, and remembered how much he was short in his fine account, and how near was the inspector’s visit, he relented, and allowed me to help him.

When the case came on next morning, the attorney I had engaged for the defence took exception to the summons in that it made out that the offence took place on the 29th February, there being no such date in any almanack, English or Dutch, for that year, and outside the jurisdiction of the Court. Hendrik not making any objection, but putting the fault on to the Hollander clerk, the accused was dismissed, though the landdrost spitefully refused to do what Jan’s attorney asked, that he might say that Jan left the Court without a stain on his character.

I am proud to be able to say, as his brother, that Jan did not attempt to leave the dorp until he had given me the £50 I had paid to Hendrik Kemp,—an evidence of the kindly feeling that has ever existed in my branch of the Erasmus family, the brothers never robbing one another, even when the temptation was great and the opportunity very present.

And here I have to tell of that strange and unwelcome accidental shaping of a man’s path to which I referred at the beginning of the chapter.

Just as I had said good-bye to Jan, who should come up to me but Hans Potgieter, landdrost of Prinsloosdorp.

I am glad, coos, that, like the oprecht Burgher you are, you have come back to do your duty to your land. It is troublous times, Sarel, and the rifle and saddle must be ready.”

“Coos,” said I, “I must go back to Natal, for the cattle are sick,’”—which was true of two of them.

“Nay, but you must not. You must come with me to Prinsloosdorp, where I return to-night.”

I confess that I did not like the way Hans spoke, nor the way in which the Burghers standing round looked and smiled. There was something unpleasant behind it all; so I thought to gain time, and told him how we had rinderpest on our farm, and that I was the only man in the district who knew how to inoculate cattle.

Hans laughed as he asked, “Are they your own cattle, Sarel?”

Now if I told the truth and said “Yea,” and that I had got them away from the Transvaal secretly, it would make it appear true, as was said, that I had gone for good. So I lied, and answered “No.”

Then said Hans: “If they are your cousin’s cattle, let him look after his own. Are they Natal cattle?”

“Yes.”

“And many of them sick?”

“Yes, half of them.”

“Then it is a judgment of the good Lord that sickness Should be among the cattle, and if you are a good Burgher you will let them die, so there will be less to draw the cannon and waggons of the Rooineks when the war comes.”

My heart gave a great thump, for I now knew what all the riding between the Transvaal and Natal Boers meant, which was that war was truly coming. Before I could ask more, Hans went on—

“Sarel, you must come and fight for your land. If you don’t come cheerfully you will have to come as a prisoner, for there is a warrant out for you for stealing Government money.”

Immediately a great sickness came over me, not of fear but of the heart, for I was sick and sad that the Government I had served so well should be so ungrateful as to want to punish me for no wrong-doing beyond being short in my cash through ignorance of accounts.

“Hans,” said I, ‘I will go with you as I intended to, but do not think I go because I fear the warrant. I go because I wish to do my duty and bleed for my country.”

So we went on by the next train, Hans keeping close to me when we got out at the stations to drink coffee, as though he feared I should run away, which I could not, even if I would, for I knew that the telegraph would stop me before I could get out of the Transvaal, which is one of the drawbacks to that otherwise useful invention.

On the way up Hans told me it was planned to have war, and drive the Rooineks into the sea at Durban and Cape Town; and he showed me a little pattern of the new flag that was to take the place of the Vierkleur. He told me of the great rewards in farms and cattle that would come to the oprecht Burghers when Paul Kruger was President of all South Africa, and I was glad that war was to come.

It was now the middle of September; and when we reached Prinsloosdorp I found the Burghers already making ready to go on commando, and war in the mouth of every one, especially those who in the old time had been most friendly to the English. I also found that Hans was right about the warrant; but, as he told me when I was safely arrived in the dorp, it was only issued that my services might be secured for the Government, which, as he pointed out, was to be taken as a great compliment rather than a slur, showing that the State did put great value upon my help. So I accepted that very satisfactory explanation, and consented to remain and give the Government of my great knowledge.

A few of the more unchristian Burghers, and particularly the Hollanders, were inclined to say hard things of me, and would ask, in a sneering way, Had I gone to Natal to learn to keep accounts? But others thought none the worse of me for being posted in the ‘Staats Courant’ as a thief; which is one of the good sides of the Boer, for he is ever kindly disposed towards officials who have made mistakes in their accounts, so long as it is only the Government or a Rooinek who has suffered. So, though the field-cornet would not give me the post I was best fitted for,—the serving out of rations and money to vrouws of Burghers going on commando,—he gave me work of another kind that was not without profit, and greatly atoned for my having to leave Natal.

I worked very hard in the office of the field-cornet, and made myself very useful, being the best-educated official in the dorp; so that there was small chance of my being sent on commando, a thing I did not desire, for I could not find it in my heart to go and shoot English after the kindness I had received in Natal. But, to make certain, I got a certificate from the district surgeon that I was suffering from an internal complaint that might prove fatal, not merely if I got into fighting, but even, as the doctor told me privately, if I got near to where danger was. That paper served well for some time, for even Hans Potgieter could not refuse to believe the written word of his own medical officer. But I was near coming to sorrow over these certificates, for one day, when a Burgher whom I much hated for having said hard things of me brought a doctor’s certificate to excuse him from going on commando, I foolishly said such things could be had for the asking, and meant nothing.

“Then why did you get one?” asked the Burgher.

“I did not ask,” said I, “except to go on commando; but the doctor asked me to stay, saying I should be useless in the veld.”

“That proves that the doctor knows what he is saying,” answered he, but I did not reply to the insult.

At the risk of being thought disloyal to the English, I cannot help saying that my anger was raised by seeing how many of them in the dorp tried to get permits to remain instead of being sent away like their fellows; so I bethought me of a way to punish them for their cowardice and want of patriotism to England.

“Hans,” said I one day, when a dozen of these fence-sitters had been begging him to recommend them for permits, ‘these men are cowards, but they will be more use to us than they will to their own side. I have a plan for punishing them. Let me tell them I can get them permits to stay if they pay me £10 each. Then after a short time you can obey the law and tell them they must go, and that I had no right to issue a permit, being only a subordinate.”

Hans at first did not quite see with my eyes, for it was only a short time before that he had got into the papers for taking money to let a Rooinek remove infected cattle contrary to the law. But when he had counted up how much it would be worth in cash, “Sarel,” said he, “why did you run away? Had you been here before we might have made much money, for you are very slim and know all the rascality.”

This flattered me, and I weakly agreed to his plan, which was that I should issue permits to stay for £20 apiece instead of £10. Even then we soon found that we had made a great mistake in fixing the sum so low, for we could easily have got £50, as I know Hans did later on from several Rooineks, though he did not tell me or give me my full share as agreed. Once or twice I felt sorry that Hans had agreed to my plan, but he smoothed me by saying, “Coos, this is a great plan for punishing cowards. If they will not fight for their own people, let them be fined like other wrongdoers. Besides, it will be the last chance we shall have of getting any milk from Rooineks for some time.”

I was glad that when the time came for these Rooineks to be sent away, as they were later, both Hans and I were out of the dorp, for I hear they made a great noise; but as we had given them no receipt for the money they could prove nothing, which made their punishment the more severe.

There were among those who paid to stay, but were sent off, some for whom I felt very sorry, they being good and upright Rooineks, although not Burghers, and I had promised to stand their friend. But my sorrow ceased when I learned that one of these, for whom I felt the most, proved in the end a great scoundrel. He was an apothecary, and stood well with the Burghers because he always gave big doses of physic in large bottles, instead of the small quantities which the other apothecaries sold at such high prices, besides speaking the Taal very well for a Rooinek, and giving long credit.

The Burghers had heard much of the great English explosive called lyddite, and feared it even more than the long knives of the lancers, particularly as many of them had been in Johannesburg at the time of the awful dynamite explosion. Therefore it is no marvel that when they heard how this lyddite turned kopjies into kloofs and valleys, and killed hundreds by shock alone, they were filled with fear, which brought out many old complaints that they thought had been cured, and gave the district surgeon much trouble in writing certificates.

It happened that this apothecary, knowing he would be turned out of the dorp, wickedly went to old Piet Faurie, a Boer standing well in the district. “Piet,” said the apothecary, “you are going on commando, and may be killed by lyddite. I should be sorry, Piet, if you should be killed, for you owe me more than any other Boer in the district. So, if you will give me your word that you will not say where you got it, I will give you a medicine that will make lyddite of no use.”

Now it happened that Piet had been in the great dynamite explosion at Johannesburg, and was stunned speechless for three days, besides being turned green all over; and his one great matter of talk ever since was dynamite, whereby he was listened to as the only man learned in explosives. The apothecary made plain to him that lyddite was just one hundred times wickeder than dynamite, but that if a man’s head could be made soft there would be no shock,—which Piet could quite understand, for he had suffered in his head ever since he was knocked off his waggon by the concussion. So the apothecary gave Piet a large bottle of a dark and sticky medicine that had to be rubbed on to the head night and morning, and even oftener if he was going into fight.

Piet, being foolish, thought it must be good medicine because it had a dreadful smell, being what is called assafœtida. Piet took a very large quantity with him when he went with the commando to Sandspruit, and at first caused great trouble, for the Burghers would not have him in any tent because of the odour, until he told them it was a cure for lyddite, when they all begged some, and rubbed their heads so many times a day that the Kafir servants could only be got to come near them with the sjambok. But the cruel part of the business was that the stuff was no protection at all, as was proved very soon, for the very first Burgher killed by lyddite had not only rubbed his head, but his body, and had been living alone in the veld for a week, as the others would not have him with them.

When the Burghers found how cruelly they had been deceived, they sent back two of their commando to wreck the apothecary’s shop; but he had already sold the business to a Burgher, and been sent over the Border.

In like ways did many unworthy Rooineks take advantage of the faith of trusting Burghers, thereby bringing the name of Englander into evil repute, as in the early days in the Colony and the Transvaal.

The predikant took the subject for his sermon one Sunday, and used words of wisdom when he made plain that while it was only right and godly to spoil an enemy, as did the Israelites the Egyptians, yet it was sinful to ride upon the ignorance of a Burgher; and he read the story of hairy Esau stealing the birthright of his brother and deceiving his father, for which he was justly punished by being made the servant of servants, as the British would be to the Boers whom they had so greatly deceived. The sermon had a very comforting influence, being preached on the Sunday after the battle of Elandslaagte when the people were beginning to doubt all that had been said about the Lord being on the Boer side.

I shamefully confess that my anger was much raised by the same course—the bad lyddite medicine and Elandslaagte; and being now acting field -cornet in charge of the dorp by reason of my internal disease and the laziness of the proper field-cornet, I punished such Rooineks as remained by commandeering £10 worth of goods or money from each of them, and ordering them not to leave their houses after dark to play whist, which was their common and regular habit, even when bad news had come in. I also made some of them close their stores, until the Boer vrouws made a great outcry thereat, the closing not suiting their convenience.

These same vrouws were a continual thorn and weariness to me, all the men being away except about 200 of them who had doctors’ certificates, which they did not deserve.

When the news of the battle of Elandslaagte was posted outside the telegraph office they broke the windows, and frightened the operator so much that he dared not leave the office to go home to supper; and I only got them to promise not to hurt him by making him give a speech from the window, where they could not reach him, explaining that the wires had been tampered with by the British, who had sent false news.

Next day the Government sent from Pretoria a stern rebuke to the operator, forbidding him to frighten the women by posting bad news. Henceforth we only told them of victories, which had a very peaceful effect except upon the Rooineks.

Another great weariness to me was that fifty women of the dorp had been made nurses to attend any sick or wounded that might come in. By a foolish mistake, the district surgeon appointed as head over them a young Hollander woman because she was what is called a “qualified nurse.” This rightly caused great discontent, and the women held a noisy meeting, and appointed, instead, Mrs Van den Berg, who had great experience in curing rheumatism and pains in the legs and back with a medicine she had got from her grandmother, who got it from a Hottentot in Cape Colony. They also made me send away all women who had not good Boer names, whereby perhaps we lost some good nurses; but it was well that the staff was made smaller, as the first case that came in showed.

He was a Boer despatch-rider who had fallen from his horse and hurt his leg. When he was brought to the hotel we used as a hospital, thirty-nine women nurses came in and quarrelled as to who should bandage his leg, making the old Burgher so scared that he became really sick, and his leg was not bandaged at all, Mrs Van den Berg saying that bandages would stop the medicine from flowing properly through the blood. Then she made him swallow her rheumatic medicine, and rubbed him hard with it, all against the will and knowledge of the doctor. The rubbing took nearly all the night, the women taking turns, till the old Burgher cried and begged them let him sleep. When Mrs Van den Berg came at six in the morning to rub him again and give more medicine, the old man was gone; and after a long search the Kafirs found him hiding in the stable, where he said he wanted to be quiet and have no medicine or rubbing.

This caused more trouble, and Mrs Van den Berg came no more to the hospital, she telling the Burghers that the wounded man had left the hospital because there were Hollander and English nurses, when the truth was that he only feared her and her medicine.

The next case we had gave me even more trouble. It was a young Burgher having something internal like fever or measles or perhaps my disease. Then it was that every old vrouw in the dorp wanted to try her own pet medicine upon him; and although the doctor sternly forbade them, they would not take nay, but secretly physicked the boy with twenty different kinds of certain cures. In a week the boy was dead, and each of the vrouws said it was because of the medicine given by the other. Whereupon the district surgeon gave orders that no more women were to be admitted to the hospital, and ordered me to keep them out. I might as well have tried to keep out the air, which was even easier. Not only did they come in as often as they pleased, but they petitioned the Government to remove the district surgeon for giving the order, saying it was his secret aim to get the Hollander and English nurses back. This I did not mind, for the district surgeon had told people I was now well enough to go on commando, but when the women told the field-cornet that if he did not send me on commando they would sjambok me, I saw that they are right who would keep women out of politics.

But the great blow came when the vrouws sent for Katrina Bester, who was with her mother in Pretoria, and bade her send me to fight. Katrina came to Prinsloosdorp, and my heart was secretly sad, for she is a bitter Boer vrouw with a rough tongue, and a great sorrow that she had no sons to send to fight the Rooineks. But there were other reasons why I did not wish to see Katrina. She was too ready to get married, for it was she who first asked me, and not I her, which fact I would have borne in mind by those who may, as usual, misjudge my later doings. It was useless my asking her to wait until I got a higher salary.

“I have a thousand pounds,” said she—“take it and buy cattle, which will make us rich sooner than if you keep on sitting in the police court making enemies by prosecuting your friends,” for at that time the Rooinek papers had made great fuss because no Burghers were ever convicted at the Court at Prinsloosdorp; and we had to convict the next guilty ones by order from Pretoria, and this had made great discontent.

Much against my will I took the money to buy cattle with, but they being dear because of rinderpest, I did not then buy any, but put the money into gold shares in Johannesburg, which will some day be worth very much.

As soon as I had done this Katrina wanted to marry, but I asked her to wait until my first wife had been dead a year, to which she agreed. But before the year was up came the trouble that caused me to leave the Transvaal for Natal, and no longer having any salary, and Katrina’s money being in the mine, I could not then marry. Katrina was all against my leaving the Transvaal, for, being a woman, she could not understand things properly or see that an honest man could not stay to hear his good name despoiled.

“If you must go away, why not go to the Orange Free State, or the Old Colony where your Boer kinsmen are, rather than to English Natal?”

This was what she preached, being strong in her hatred of all things English, and not knowing that in times gone by, before I knew her, I was cruelly assailed by jealous enemies in both those countries, and had even more unjust charges made against me there.

Almost the first words Katrina said when she saw me at Prinsloosdorp were—“Why are you not fighting, Sarel?”

“Katrina,” answered I, with great feeling, ‘if you love me, why would you have me go away when I am dying from an internal complaint?’ and I showed her the doctor’s certificate.

“Must you then die soon?” she asked.

“Ja, certainly; I am a dying man.”

“Then why not die fighting instead of being sick in the house, causing trouble and expense, and having no wife to look after you, as you might?”

I was much pained at this cruel speech, and cried much that night instead of sleeping, for though I did not wish to marry Katrina, I was angry that she should care so little for me as to wish to see me dying from lancers’ knives or perhaps lyddite.

“It is not that I want you to be killed,” said she next morning, when I told her how much I had cried at night; “I want you to live and be a commandant, and get more cattle and money and things.”

It was the old story. Again and again had she made my life a burden by whipping me with her tongue to go faster and be higher, she not being content that I was public prosecutor.

“Why not be landdrost?” she would say, “or even judge,”—she in her foolishness not knowing that such places were only for those high in favour in Pretoria, and that some judges were expected to know law. But Katrina could never forget that her sister Lizbeth had spurred on her man to be great in riches in Pretoria, when he only wanted to sit on the stoep and smoke and drink coffee; and ever since she had tried to spur me.

For a whole week she stayed not her tongue. “Go fight, and be a man,” was the psalm she sang day and night, for she was always at my house with her aunt, who took care of me.

It was of no avail that I showed her I was of more use in the field-cornet’s office, because I could write and spell well.

“Do you write and spell better than I?” she would ask, and I could not say nay, for Katrina was clever above Boer women, having a clever sister who had taught her.

This daily striving made me sick and weak, till one day I was really and truly too ill to go to the office.

“I shall go and tell the field-cornet you are sick,” said Katrina; and I was pleased, for it was the first time she had been kind since her return. Besides, I should have peace in the house while she was gone, which I had, and rejoiced that it was noon before she came back.

“Sarel,” said she, “there is no need for you to go to office any more. I have learned how to do your work, and the field-cornet will have me do it while you go to fight.”

And so it was. The hand that pushed me into danger and wrong-doing was that of my intended wife, for she herself filled in the form ordering me to join the commando under my old enemy, Ben Viljoen. It was known throughout the dorp what Katrina had done, and women watched the house to see that I did not get away. But it was not needed, for Katrina never left me, talking all the time and making me swallow large quantities of medicine for my internal disease, till one night she gave me medicine so strong to make me fit for fighting that I was really sick, and the doctor said I must stay in bed.

Never did a sick man have so many visitors or a sweetheart more attentive. Katrina stayed by me all day and most of the night talking war, and feeding me with every awful physic that any old vrouw brought and advised her to try.

On the third day Mrs Van den Berg came in with her rheumatic physic, and remembering what happened to the Burghers at the hospital, I got out of bed, saying I was quite well and ready to go to fight, which was untrue; but I resolved that it was less suffering to fight Rooineks against my conscience than to be physicked by all the vrouws in the dorp, and have to bear Katrina’s tongue all the time.

It happened that only half an hour before Mrs Van den Berg came in I had swallowed some of her medicine, Katrina telling me it was something else. I thought the old woman would go mad with joy. She kissed me, and made me listen to all the cases that had been cured by her physic, mine being the quickest; and then she went to the hospital and insisted that the two sick Burghers there—both bad with fever—should take some of the physic that had cured me so well and quickly.

If I had changed my mind and wanted to go back to bed it would have been impossible, for Katrina had got everything in readiness, even to the exact time the train would leave,—a most unusual thing for a Boer woman, who never believes time-tables,—and next morning she went with me to the station.

Nearly all the women of the dorp were there, and six other Burghers who, like me, had internal diseases and doctors’ certificates, but wives who loved war. The predikant, too, was there, and made a prayer so long that the train would have gone without us had not Katrina told the driver to wait.

“Good-bye, Sarel, and don’t come back till you have shot a hundred Rooineks,” were her parting words, making my heart sore at her unchristianlike cruelty. But I would not let her go unpunished. As the train went slowly out of the station—

“Good-bye, King David,” I said.

“What do you mean?” asked Katrina.

“Go home,” said I, “and read in the Bible what happened to David when he put Uriah in the forefront of the battle.”

“You are not Uriah,” said she, ‘you are the ewe lamb,” which caused great laughter against me, the six Burghers making jokes about ewe lambs for a long time, till I stopped their mouths at one station by buying whisky.

Sometimes on the journey I would get out of the carriage, and I noticed that the other Burghers never let me out of their sight.

“Are you sent to watch me?’ I asked at last; “and do you think I am not going the journey with you?”

“Nay,” said they, “we do not think that. What we fear is that you, knowing Natal better than we, will get farther into it, and that would make us jealous.”

“Certainly you would be jealous if you could not get away,” I said, and with that cutting answer I took away the whisky and spoke no more to them till we reached our station.