and red blanket, would gallop into the town by every road. In the afternoon they would gallop back again, nearly ail more or less tipsy. The ponies were excellent animals; in breed they were identical with the famed "Basuto pony," for which long prices are given today. It is a great pity that these ponies have been allowed to become practically extinct in the Cape Colony. For hardiness and docility they were unequalled. Like so much else, they melted away in the coffers of the canteen-keeper.
Socially, King William's Town was in a most curious condition. The military absolutely ruled the roost. Trade, whether wholesale or retail, carried the Mark of the Beast, and no one connected therewith was recognized. Neither beauty, intellect, nor wealth was allowed to count against the disgrace involved in one being in any way connected with commerce. I will give an illustration showing how strong this preposterous feeling was.
My sister was very popular with the military set. (We were poor enough, in all conscience, but we had not disgraced ourselves by, contact with trade.) She struck up a friendship with the daughter of the proprietor of a large business. He belonged to an old and much-esteemed colonial family. The girl was pretty, accomplished, and amiable. But she was "left out" of everything. Dance after dance was given, but Miss X never received an invitation. My sister was distressed at this, and, when a large military dance was projected, used every ounce of her influence towards having her friend invited. But all her trouble was in vain.
What made the situation hopeless was the circumstance that the civilians accepted it with contemptible humility. It was almost pathetic to observe how people, just on the border-line, received with humble thankfulness such crumbs of recognition as were occasionally thrown to them. Snobbery increases in offensiveness when it is transplanted.
Living was exceedingly cheap. I think the price of meat was twopence per pound. I have seen hundreds of bags of excellent potatoes offered on the morning market and taken away unsold because no one would bid a shilling per bag for them. Most people were poor, but they seemed somehow to be comfortable enough. There was no such thing as pauperism. Even the poorest could afford to keep horses. Journeys were generally performed on horseback, luggage being carried on a pack-horse, led by an after-rider. I had a splendid pony, which cost only 3. He grazed on the town commonage; besides grass, he never got anything to eat but an occasional handful of mealies. Yet he always was in good condition. On this pony I regularly followed the hounds for some months for the military kept a pack of foxhounds with which duiker antelopes were hunted and was usually in at the death.
After a time my father managed to hire what was believed to be a suitable farm near MacLean Town. It was called "Sunny Slope" and it belonged to Mr. Benjamin Norton, who lived on the farm adjoining. Here we began farming with about eight hundred sheep, and a few head of cattle. The farm contained long, gentle, undulating slopes, divided by shallow kloofs full of forest. The pasturage was rich and water was plentiful. But our farming was not successful; it was hardly possible that it could have been so. Farming is a trade, and has to be learnt. Moreover, wool went down in price and the sheep contracted various diseases. However, the latter evil was overcome with the kind assistance of our neighbors.
In the days I write of, the whole of the coast of British Kaffraria between the Kei River and the Keiskamma, with the exception of the then insignificant town of East London and a small area in its vicinity, was almost uninhabited. It was the custom for practically, all Kaffrarian stock-farmers to trek down to the coast with their stock for the three winter months. Then the range of forest-clothed sandhills forming the coastline held a succession of camps. The scenery was enchanting; every valley brimmed with evergreen forest, and between the valleys sloped downs, clothed with rich grass.
Game was abundant, and the lagoon at the mouth of every stream piercing the line of sandhills teemed with fish. The trek period was looked upon as one of holiday. Care was thrown to the winds; picnics, hunting, and sea-bathing were the order of the day. Social gatherings took place alternately at the various camps not too distant from each other. More or less impassable estuaries, where the larger streams broke through to the sea, divided the coast tract into so many separate blocks.
Horses were plentiful; probably every individual, not too old or too young to ride, had at least one mount available. Young men and maidens thought nothing of riding ten miles to tea, and riding back in the starlight when the gathering broke up. Homely song and the strains of the now much despised concertina mingled with the softened thunder of the surf, and, borne by the mild breath of the sea wind, no doubt surprised the wild creatures whose sanctuaries we had invaded. I have since heard some of the greatest singers and instrumentalists, but no music has ever given me such joy as those rudimentary strains listened to at night in a clearing of the forest near the mouth of the Gonubie River, with the chastened resonance of the Indian Ocean surf as an accompaniment.
I often recall our bathing. The beach was level and sandy, not a reef nor even a rock was within sight. Immense rollers fugitives from the wrath of far-off tempests used to sweep in continuously. Just before breaking these would tower aloft, their fine-drawn crests poised for an instant in the sunlight. Our favorite sport was among these waves. We would buffet our way out to the breaking zone. Then, as the mighty, walls of glistening water swept up, we would drive through them, one by one, or else lie flat on the water in the hollow, side to the advancing wave. In the latter case the wave would pick the bather up with a sudden swing, poise him for an instant on its trembling crest, and then whirl him round and round as it swept restlessly shoreward. This whirling was so rapid that I have occasionally almost lost consciousness when in the grip of an unusually, powerful breaker. We never considered that we were doing anything venturesome; the sport described was followed by all and sundry, quite as a matter of course. Nevertheless, I think the boys used to venture out farther than the men. Sharks we never thought of. It was not considered possible that we could be carried out to sea, for the greatest difficulty lay in keeping oneself from being flung back on the shore by the rapidly advancing waves. I wonder whether bathers nowadays venture out as far as we did.
The friends with whom I usually stayed were the Barbers, who lived at Grey Park, a few miles from Sunny Slope. I mean Mr. Hilton Barber, now of Halesowen, near Cradock, and his brothers Guy and Graham. The latter, one of the truest friends I ever had, is, alas! long since dead. He fell a victim to pneumonia at Johannesburg in the early days. Related to or connected with the Barbers were the Atherstones, Cummings, McIntoshes, and Dicks, whose tents usually, stood in the vicinity of the Barber encampment.
I recall one incident which caused a great deal of laughter. Mr. Guy Barber was then engaged to his present wife, who was Miss McIntosh, a girl of remarkable beauty. A certain Mr. Larry O'Toole, who had come out in the Asia under my father's protection, was staying at a camp in the vicinity. One day a wild-duck shoot was in progress. Larry, who knew little or nothing about shooting, was of the party. The sportsmen took their stations around the margins of a large, sinuous vlei. The ducks, after being disturbed, flew up and down. Miss McIntosh, with her fiance, was on horseback opposite Larry, on the other side of the water. Some ducks flew past and Larry fired. The birds were untouched, but the horse ridden by, Miss McIntosh was severely peppered and began to plunge violently. In the course of a severe reproof for his carelessness, Larry was asked by Guy Barber:
"Now, supposing you had blinded or otherwise badly injured Miss
McIntosh, what would you have done?"
"Oh! begor," replied Larry, "I suppose I'd have had to marry, her."
Poor Larry O'Toole! We met, years afterwards, in a remote mining-camp. He ventured into the Low Country beyond the Murchison Range at the wrong season, and contracted fever. In the delirium which supervened he blew his brains out. Larry had a brother, Edmund, who had been a sailor, and who joined Butler's Horse in the Zulu War. He gained the Victoria Cross the day before Ulundi. Together with the late Lord William Beresford ("Bill," as he liked to be called, alliteratively ) he saved a wounded man from the spears of the enemy. For this exploit the cross was offered to Lord William, but he refused to accept it unless
