The Cape and the Kaffirs: A Diary of Five Years' Residence in Kaffirland. Ward
Perhaps, they expect a feast, unless they are aware of the chief’s illness. The doctor moves through the assembly, examines the countenances of this man and that, retires, deliberates, returns, and at last points out the unfortunate man who has already been devoted to ruin. The victim protests his innocence. It is of no avail. The wise doctor can prove where he has hidden the charm which works the mischief. He goes to the nook where he himself has concealed it. The people follow. Wonderful;—he discovers it—brings it to the chief, who orders the victim to pay so many head of cattle, the tax imposed being always so heavy as to injure the unfortunate creature beyond redemption. Frequently, he is condemned to death, and frightful cruelties are to this day practised on men and women accused of witchcraft, who, with their heads smeared with honey, are bound down on an ant-hill, and at their feet a blazing fire. Unable to move, they lie for days enduring this torture, till they are released or die. In the former case even, they are crippled for life. A case came to my knowledge, in which a rain-maker, a character similar to that of the doctor, but whose business is curing the weather, caused a poor creature to be put to death; and, strange to say, on the following day, though we had not had a drop of rain for nearly four months, and were very short of water, the torrents which fell deluged the country, and filled the tanks and rivers beyond what had been seen for a considerable time.
I confess that, as I have ridden through the kraals, and seen the groups of Fingoes, or Kaffirs, sitting about the fires, surrounded by their children, cooking their corn, chattering and laughing, while at a little distance young boys basked in the sun, playing with pebbles at some game, or, lying on the grass, idle, and happy in their idleness, without a thought beyond the present, any more than the herd that cropped the green herbage round them, I have said to my companions, “How can we expect these happy wretches to be other than savages?” The earth yields them food, and their cattle, milk and clothing. Trees provide them wood for the frame-work of their huts, and their fires, and the clay on which they sit is shaped into utensils for their use. Wise in their own conceit, they must be but too happy and independent to change their condition of their own free will. They have no idea of the sin of a theft, or a lie, being equal to the folly which permits it to be found out.
I shall have occasion by and by to describe a council at which I was present, wherein Umhala, a Kaffir chief, was summoned by the Lieutenant-Governor, to show cause why he had threatened to “eat up” Gasella, another chief, his step-brother. The secret of the threat was said to lie in Gasella’s friendly feeling towards the English, and his consequent determination to prevent the inroads of the Kaffirs upon the colony, for the purpose of abstracting cattle; but I strongly doubt the existence of such a feeling in any Kaffir whatever. The constant thefts of cattle give rise to “Commandos” to recover them, and after a successful one, a military party in charge of cattle, conducting them into Graham’s Town, is not an unamusing sight. How would some aristocratic papas and mammas be horrified at seeing their gentlemanlike sons heading the party, and playing the part of principal herdsman on the redoubtable occasion! Such expeditions require the utmost caution, and are frequently attended with danger; and, though it would be no addition to the soldier’s wreath of glory to be assegaied, or shot, in the execution of such a duty as that of driving cattle, he would be not the less killed “for a’ that,”—dead,—lost to his sorrowing friends and his unsympathising country for ever.
The restless desire for plunder among the Kaffirs speaks much in favour of their Arab origin. So do their tent-shaped huts, their riches consisting in herds of cattle, and their wandering habits. The Kaffirs’ principal instrument of war is the spear, or assegai. Such, a weapon is now in especial use among the Arabs. The poising and hurling this spear constitute a trial of dexterity which they love to exhibit; and there could not be a finer subject for a painter than a tall Kaffir, majestically formed, with one foot firmly planted before him, his head thrown back, his kaross draped pound him, leaving the right arm and foot free and unfettered, in the act of poising an assegai before he sends it flashing through the sunlit air. Their wearing clothes will be an excellent thing for our manufactories, but will help to enervate the savage.
I cannot avoid reverting to the fact that writers have never, in their descriptions, separated the Fingoes from the Kafirs. There is no doubt that they once formed one vast nation, but are now not only distinct but opposed to each other. In advertisements relative to servants, and setting forth Government ordinances, mention is made of all the tribes of Kaffirs to the utmost limits of the known territory, also of Hottentots and Bushmen, but no reference is made to Fingoes, who differ from the Kaffirs in appearance as well as in habits.
Mr Shepstone, the Government agent, has kindly written down, from what he has gathered from them in conversation, the idea of the Kaffirs respecting their own origin. He says—
“The traditions among the native tribes on the south-eastern coast of Africa, which essay to describe the origin of the human race, are as various as the tribes themselves. Perhaps, the one most curious in its detail is the following:—It assumes the pre-existence of the sun, moon, and stars, etc, as also of our earth, with everything in it as it at present exists, with the exception of men and cattle. It then describes two chasms in the earth, from one of which emerged three descriptions of men; first, the Kaffir; second, the Bushman (the original Hottentot); and third, the white man. These are the fathers of mankind. Out of the other chasm came cattle; the greatest part of these were given to the Kaffir, and he was told they should be ‘his life and his children’s.’ The Bushman ‘was given the honey-bird,’8 and was desired to follow it, as its fortunes should be ‘his life and his children’s.’ The white man was shown the sea, and was told to ‘try everything.’ Another account represents the white man as having been incited by curiosity to explore the chasm whence had issued the cattle; that, after he had entered it, the mouth closed up; but that by extraordinary exertions he cleared his way out, which explains the cause of his descendants possessing such persevering ingenuity. Their different callings being thus defined, they were permitted to increase and multiply, and live in love with one another. This injunction was followed for a considerable period, when one morning, when the sun shone as brightly as usual in the heavens, one of their number was discovered motionless! speechless! cold! The utmost dismay was the consequence; all assembled to endeavour to ascertain the cause, and remedy what was felt to be a serious evil; some ran with water, to sprinkle the lifeless form; others hastened with broad-spreading leaves, to fan the rigid countenance, and every effort was made to restore their companion so far as to be able to tell the cause of such fearful apathy. All was in vain—not a ray of hope was left—despair took possession of their breasts. The form of their friend and fellow creature began to moulder.—Nothing remained at last but the more substantial parts of the person once familiar to them. Then a voice came and named it ‘Death!’ It is curious to observe,” remarks Mr Shepstone, “in all this the recognition of a superintending and benevolent power, independent of man; whereas, in every other tradition, the fortunes of the human race are represented as under the control of the good and evil spirits of their forefathers, whichever may, circumstances, predominate at the time.”—Fort Peddie, May 19th, 1843.
Part 2
Chapter I.
Five Years in Kaffirland—The Voyage Out
There was nothing very pleasant in the prospect before me of leaving England just as summer was opening her gates, and exhibiting her flower-strewn paths and fragrant hedgerows. My health was not good, and to my mode of travelling I looked forward as anything but agreeable; since a troopship can never be considered as affording even convenient accomodation for a lady, and the miseries of a sea-life must of necessity be enhanced by being shared with a crowd of fellow-sufferers of various classes.
Nevertheless, on reaching Ireland, (land of green spots and generous hearts!) my spirits rallied; my soul could not but respond to kindly sympathies and disinterested hospitality, and by the time the troopship, “Abercrombie Robinson,” arrived in Kingstown Harbour, whence we were to embark (in all upwards of 700 souls) for the Cape of Good Hope, I had shaken off my unavailing regrets in a great degree, and was prepared to meet my destiny with a fortitude worthy of a soldier’s wife,—a fortitude, indeed, earned by experience in my encounter with “perils by sea and land.”
But people now don’t care for rhymes romantic,
And I must cease to think of former years.
This, my third trip across the vast Atlantic,
Hath taught me to subdue a world of tears;
For worse than idle, on a joyous track,
Were the vain sorrow earned by looking back! – My Journal.
The
A small bird, which, attracting the notice of travellers by its cry, guides them to the wild bees’ nests in trees, or clefts of rocks.