•-." COLLECTION OF WILLIAM SCHAUS © PRESENTED TO THE NATIONAL MUSEUM MCMV A NATURALIST THE TRANSVAAL. 8 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL BY •jfj. W! L." DISTANT, MEMBER OF THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE, THE ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF FRANCE, FELLOW OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON, AND CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF STOCKHOLM AND OF THE BUFFALO SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCES. WITH COLOURED PLATES AND ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS. " Nature retains her veil, despite our clamours : That which she doth not willingly display Cannot be wrenched from her with levers, screws, and hammers." — 'Faust' (Bayard Taylor's Transl.). ^ ' o V 'Q c? o <^? 2. 5 J^posite ojiinion has been advanced by C. U. Whitman (' yVnierican Naturalist/ vol. xiv. p. (541, 1880). TO PRETORIA. 5 not calmed by the reflection that in the early days of discovery it took the Portuguese a hundred years with innumerable expeditions to double the same. Cape Town, with its thriving business community and its good shops, reminds one of a flourishing seaside town in England. The fishing- quarters are inhabited chiefly by Malays*, who seem, from long residence, to have quite lost the purity of their mother tongue, and the Malay women, in their best attire, affect a European costume, in which an enormous and hideous bloomer-skirt is the strongest point, a strange and unpleasant contrast to the graceful sarong I remembered in the Malay Peninsula. The South-African Museum, presided over by my old friend Roland Trimen, leaves nothing to be desired but • O greater space and more available funds for the acqui- sition of fresh specimens. One can form no adequate conception of the South-African fauna from the present compulsory crowded contents of this building. The arrangement of a museum should be the reflection of a man's grasp of Zoology, but a curator has no oppor- tunity of displaying the same if sufficient space is not at his disposal. A local museum should perhaps follow the ideal of a man's knowledge, to know a little about everything, and everything about something ; so it might be somewhat weak in several groups, but very strong and exhaustive in one particular branch of Natural History. This is the case here, for Mr. Trimen is a renowned lepidopterist, and the collection of butterflies is perhaps more complete and better worked out than can be found in any other of our colonial museums. One of its greatest treasures is the head of a " White Rhinoceros " (Rhinoceros simiis). This now practically extinct mammal, which has been shot by living sports- men, is unrepresented in any zoological menagerie, and its perfect skin or skeleton is unknown in any museum, thus affording a good illustration in the present day of * The large body of Malay Mus.-ulmans at the Cape have of late years come under the patronage of the Sultan. A school has also been founded at Kiruberley by the Sultan, which, after him, has been named Hamidieh (' Athemeurn,'' Oct. 17, 1891). 6 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. how a species may disappear*. In South Africa more than one species of Buck and Antelope is rapidly ap- proaching the same fate ; and if it would be exaggera- tion to say the clays, we may safely affirm that the years of the African Lion are numbered. There are now five routes for reaching the Transvaal from South Africa. The first is from Cape Town direct : miles. Cape Town to Kimberley (rail) . . . .647 flvimberley to Fourteen Streams (coach) . 47 Fourteen Streams to Klerksdorp „ .110 Klerksdorp to Potchefstroom „ .31 Potchefstroom to Johannesburg ,, . 80 Total miles . .915 This is the quickest and favourite passenger route from England, and with it we may describe what is usually a heavy-goods route, and by way of Port Elizabeth : miles. Port Elizabeth to Kimberley (rail) . . . 485 Coach journey as detailed in Cape route . 268 Total miles . .753 The next route via Bloemfontein from Port Elizabeth, recently opened, is now being pushed to the Vaal River to meet the connection from Johannesburg ; but before this can be done nearly a dozen either large rivers or spruits J have to be bridged over : miles. Port Elizabeth to Colesberg (rail) . . . 305 Colesberg to Norval's Pout (Orange River) 23 Norval's Pont to Bloemfontein (rail) . .121 Bloemfontein to Johannesburg (coach) . 250 Total miles . . 699 * In 'Nature,' vol. xlii. p. 520, Dr. Sclater has written on this matter and figured both the heads of R. simus and the common species R. bicornis. t The rail now extends to Vryburg, by which the amount of coach- travelling is diminished. J A " spruit " is a small stream or rivulet. TO PRETORIA. 1 The East London line via Aliwal North to Johannes- burg is the least used : miles. East London to Aliwal North (rail) . .280 Aliwal North to Johannesburg (coach) . 320 Total miles . . GOO The Natal, and the most pleasant, route is by way of Durban : miles. Durban (Point) to Charlestown (rail) . .304 Charlestown to Johannesburg (coach) say 130 Total miles . . 434 The last way the Transvaal may be approached is via Delagoa Bay: miles. Delagoa Bay to Moveni (rail) .... 62 Moveni to Barberton (coach) .... 98 Barberton to Pretoria (coach) . . . .167 Pretoria to Johannesburg (coach) .. 32 Total miles . . 359* I had business to transact at both Cape Town and Durban, so necessarily approached the Transvaal through Natal. The voyage between Cape Town and Durban, calling at Mossel Bay, Port Elizabeth, and East London, occupied a week. We reached Mossel Bay on Sunday morning, and the church service, which on previous Sundays had seemed to have been of very strict ob- servance, was now suspended for the important opera- tion of discharging cargo. Port Elizabeth has no claim to beauty, but possesses an exceedingly healthy climate, is renowned for having the most genial and hospitable community in South Africa, can justly be proud of its * The accuracy of these figures can be relied upon, and they are extracted from some statistics specially prepared for the ' Johannesburg Standard and Digger's News/ by D. C. Stevens. 8 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. Botanic Gardens, which by Scotch industry and skill were made on the site of a sandy waste, and exhibits the most unsatisfactory local museum it was ever my lot to enter. A new curator is now engaged, and will probably remedy many of its present defects ; but a com- mencement might be made by eliminating common Indian Lepidoptera, which are unnamed and unlocalized as such, and also by removing some of the brilliant paint of various hues by which it has been sought to ornament a Shark which hangs pendent from the roof. At East London rough weather prevented a comfortable landing, but here an ichthyologist would find much to interest him. Two Hammer-headed Sharks (Zt/gajna sp.) patrolled the ship, whilst some of the crew threw out lines and caught Sea-Perch, Cape Salmon, and Dog- fish. Both here and at Port Elizabeth sea-bathing is rendered dangerous by the presence of many large Sharks. Durban, washed by the Indian Ocean, has a more or less Oriental aspect : gaily-dressed Klings walk the roads and show their old partiality for selling fruit and vegetables ; it is the Hindu race that provide the rail- way porters and the hotel waiters, and a large number of the stores are kept by what are styled " coolie ' merchants. Although it wras still winter there was a warmth and colour about Durban that made the con- trast to the Cape very pleasant and very tropical ; but as Natal forms the subject of another chapter little need be said here, and our stay was very short. We landed at noon and left by the evening train for the Transvaal via Newcastle. The railway passes through some of the finest scenery of Natal ; but this part of the journey was completed during the night, and when daylight broke we were near Ladysmith, and mountain, ravine, and rivers were giving place to those bare and generally treeless tracts that are so universally known in South Africa as veld. From Ladysmith to Newcastle the rail ascends some steep inclines, which eventually lead to the high plateau on which Johannesburg and Pretoria stand, thus TO PRETORIA. 9 accounting for the temperate climate of that inner south-eastern portion of the continent. Scarcely a living thing could be seen from the carriage windows, the parched aspect of an African winter, which made the wilderness look more forlorn, was qualified by the clear light, the cloudless sky, and the pure dry but invigorating atmosphere. This railway is the main artery by which Natal carries on its large and increas- ing trade with the Transvaal. It is but a few years ago that Pietermaritzburg was the terminus, and from thence wagon and coach were the only further .means of transport ; then the iron wray reached Ladysmith, after- wards pushed on to Biggarsberg, and at the time of our journey extended to Newcastle*, which we reached about midday. Biggarsberg particularly exhibits the migratory nature of these small termini. At the time when it represented — though but for a short period— the railway boundary, a very fair hotel was erected, large sheds were necessary to hold the merchandize that continually arrived and waited for wagon transport, whilst the neighbourhood became the residence of the different transport agents. Possessing nothing in itself, when the line extended to Newcastle, hotel, sheds, and transport agents passed on, and Biggarsberg to-day is a small village with a rather large railway station. New- castle is in a different position, and although the carrying trade is now transferred to Charlestown, it possesses coal, and has a wool trade which will maintain its already somewhat advanced development. It is singular to renew- the old coaching days of England in South Africa, yet it is probable that the nearest approach to that method of travelling is to be found to-day in and near the Transvaal. AVe left New- castle on a clear July Sunday noon, with a full load of twelve passengers, extra luggage (for each passenger is only allowed 28 Ib.f ), and the Natal mails, in a kind of open break with a team of eight horses. Of regular * This was in ]890 ; in the spring of the year 1891 the line was opened for traffic as far as Charlestown, and now reaches the confines of the Transvaal. t On my return journey by coach from Pretoria to Vryburg I was charged £7 extra for my trunk, although my personal passage was only £9 10s. 10 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. roads there are none, what we drove over are better described as good wide paths, like footways — but broader — across rugged common lands at home, with dips and hollows, large half-buried stones in some places, and small streams and rivulets — spruits — to cross occasionally, with jolting and bumping, which is the more noticeable on a first journey. But these rolling grassy plains and bare hills, stretching for hundreds of miles around, are not only invigorating, but positively exhilarating. It is winter, though the days are hot. No rain now falls, and the veld is covered with a close dried-up growth of herbage, giving a light brown tinge to the landscape till it meets the clear blue sky-line. It is at sunrise when these hues become intensified and tinged with the reflected solar light, and pale carmine and deep umber tints are then exhibited. We change horses about every hour at small wayside posting-houses, gene- rally covered with the universal roof of corrugated iron, for here there are neither tiles nor slates, and wood has to be imported or transported to these treeless wastes. CHANGING MULES ON THE VELD. One man drives — " Cape Boys " excel at this work, — the conductor sits by his side, and it is he who wields the long whip and helps to pilot the driver. The road is up-hill, amidst mountains and glorious views ; Natal here bids her farewell to the Dutch Republic, and a wilderness again reigns beyond. We pass through the scene of the late Boer War, past Majuba Hill, and through Laings Nek : but it is a sorry subject ; all these fights took place on Natal territory which the TO PRETORIA. 11 Boers had invaded, and brave English soldiers sleep around slain by the unerring bullets of plain Boer farmers who were held too cheap. Both sides were composed of brave men, but the rules of war observed by our commanders were too little marked by the subtlety of border warfare and too much by parade and field-day observance. Two small trees, since planted by his wife, mark the resting-place of the bold, genial, but unfortunate General Colley. These trees stand alone, the silence of the veld surrounds them ; by Colley's side lies the body of a companion in arms, whilst Majuba Hill at a short distance frowns above. It is a bitter and a sad spot for Englishmen, and we feel re- lieved as the night covers us while passing through Laings Nek, and painful memories are left behind. Volksrast and a small posting-house or hotel is reached about 8 P.M., and now we have entered the Transvaal and our luggage is searched. The search is thorough, but courteous. Individuals who have lately had their word accepted by the Inspectors that they carried no- thing excisable have afterwards boasted at Johannes- burg and Pretoria how they have " done " the Customs and smuggled through their duty-paying effects ; hence greater care is now taken and Englishmen have certainly no reason to complain. We take dinner and go to bed — always two and sometimes four beds in a room ; but at 2.30 A.M. we are again aroused, and by 3 A.M. we are huddled up in the coach, for now the break is exchanged for the real mail-coach with a team of ten horses. It is perfectly dark and very cold, the windows are all pulled up, and though we have three ladies — who do not object — nine pipes are put in active work. One passenger tried very hard to start a conversation, but the darkness and the early hour were too depressing, and silence and tobacco resumed their sway. The dawn broke about 6 A.M., and a white frost was seen on the veld ; but as the sun rose and the mists were dispelled the view once more asserted its lonely grandeur, the clear atmosphere became positively tonic, whilst a small herd of Buck were seen about a mile away. These 1^ A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL animals are now rarely met, and then only in small numbers. AM thin quite recent years great herds were passed as one travelled through the country, and these plains actually swarmed with Ruminants. The Rehbok (Pelea capreolus), Steinbok (Tragulus rupeslris), Spring- bok (Gazella euc/wre), Hartebeest (Alcclajtltus caama), and Koodoo (Strepsiceros kudu) were generally seen and could always be found, but now only a few of the smaller " Buck ' reward the hunter's toil. It is the scattered Boers who have thus altered this aspect of nature ; they slaughtered the animals for their skins when they found a small price could be obtained for them, and in former days their dress, including boots, were made of buckskin. A buckskin kaross kept them warm or provided the substitute for a carpet, whilst the same animals provided them with a good covering for furniture. No animals could long withstand such per- sistent slaughter, and to-day the lifeless veld bears wit- ness to one of the Boer influences on nature *. I have often heard old residents and sportsmen describe the panorama of Antelopes once to be seen moving across these scenes, which now are only vast solitudes. It is difficult to estimate the amount of nature's modification through man's influence. Even on these grassy plains, where superficially plant-life looks so poor and uniform, the extirpation of these vast herds of browsing animals must have produced botanical changes and modifications which only a local Darwin could have estimated. But here the growth of trees or shrubs that might have pre- viously been kept down by the ruminants is again frus- trated by the periodical grass-fires of the Boers (to be alluded to further on), and thus man again modifies the appearance of nature. Time passes much more quickly during these long coach journeys than would be expected ; there is a freshness in the air and an absence of restraint that * Methuen, in 18-J8, describes Springboks migrating- in tens of thousands, literally concealing the plains and devouring every preen herb, their ravages exceeding those of the locust sAvarin (' Life iu the Wilderness,' p. £9). Methuen is speaking of the upper regions of the Colony, but the Transvaal must have been equally undisturbed at that time. TO PRETORIA. lo contrasts with long railway-trips at home. Thus, though we started at o A.M. and did not reach our sleeping-quarters till 7 P.M., fatigue was in an inverse ratio to impatience. Little was seen during this day : a number of widely-scattered Guinea-fowl (Nuinida coro- naia\ which generally frequent more wooded country — "Bushveld" -were passed on the open veld; and occasional Vultures, soaring beneath a cloudless sky, emphasized what has been well called the " Trade-mark of Africa," in the shape of skeletons or carcasses of oxen and horses which had perished by the way and now ornamented at intervals the margins of the road by which we travelled. We did not start till G A.M. on the last day of our route ; but the charm of the journey is broken, for we are leaving South- African solitude and approaching the domain of the merchant, the miner, the company promoter, and the speculator; and this combination reaches its apotheosis in Johannesburg, the Chicago of the Transvaal. Long before we reach it clouds of thick brown dust meet and cover us, for a high wind has arisen, and soon the town itself is in view. There is no reason why Johannesburg should not be one of the healthiest spots in the world, its natural position and climate should render it such ; defective sani- tation a short time back made it a veritable plague- spot, and typhoid fever, often attended with pneu- monia that usually attacked both lungs, carried off too many victims, and those who sought gold too often found death. It is the most English town of the Transvaal, and will eventually prove the real capital. In enterprise and business it bears the same relation to Pretoria as the City of London does to Westminster, though both the last and Pretoria are the seats of Par- liament. Johannesburg is now * in sackcloth and ashes, the occupation of the company promoter is gone, mining companies close almost daily, mining scrip is nearly valueless, and a settled apathy denotes the shareholder. Numbers leave the town, rents fall, the * This applies to the year 1890. 14 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. restaurateur no longer reaps a harvest from champagne- drinking customers, and machinery can be bought for almost half its cost in London, with the loss of the heavy transport cost to the Transvaal. But recently the " booms " of Kimberley and Barberton had found a home in Johannesburg, but now it is merely an abode of baffled financiers, unemployed promoters, and more or less mined shareholders. But Johannesburg will as surely recover from this depression as the French Republic shook off the disaster of Sedan, but it will be only on the ruins of the gambler's wreck with which it is now strewn. The present dreadfully monotonous appearance of the town will be altered when the nume- rous plantations of trees, which are now growing well, shall have grown more, and perhaps of all towns in the Transvaal, Johannesburg has the future. Even now, in 1891, improvement has commenced, and, as an acquaint- ance told me in Pretoria, " I can now go to Johannes- burg without all my old friends wanting to borrow money of me." Everywhere you are told the same tale by men with whom the times are now hopelessly out of joint — "If I had only realized in time I could have gone home with a fortune." One speculator was pointed out to me who three years back came up from the Cape to Johannesburg with scarcely five shillings ; he turned company promoter, and twelve months since could have realized scrip for at least £80,000 (some said £120,000). At the time I saw him he was not worth five pounds. The same thing occurred at the collapse of the " boom " at Barberton. I met a man who had been a canteen keeper there, and who told me he opened a small bar and billiard-room in that town when it was at the height of its pseudo-financial prosperity. As soon as finished he was offered £2000 for it, then £75 per month for four years, both of which proposals he refused. The collapse occurred shortly afterwards, and he sold the place for scarcely the price of the furni- ture and fittings. He sold, as he told me, " because there was no one who could afford to come in and take a drink.' TO PRETORIA. 17 We left Johannesburg at 3 P.M., and after a five hours' coach journey reached Pretoria and sought the comforts of Lapin's Fountain Hotel. A railway-line is now being constructed between these towns and the days of this coach-line are numbered. Pretoria is the seat of government and capital of the Transvaal, and its numerous trees give it a pretty appearance compared with the barren veld on which it stands. It is almost surrounded by high and barren hills and lacks the invigorating climate of the more exposed Johannesburg. The trees which ornament it are not all indigenous and consist principally of a weeping-willow (Sal'tx (/ariepina, Burch.), always a favourite of the Dutch, and here attaining a superb growth ; and stately gum-trees (Eucalyptus), which either form noble avenues or fringe the borders of the roads. Peach-trees are everywhere abundant, not grown as at home trained to walls, but forming a large and sturdy growth resembling apple-trees. Towards the end of August and beginning of September peach- blossom is so universal as to give a pink hue to the general landscape, and is then one of the most effective botanical sights of Pretoria. This tree, as a general rule, is quite uncared for ; it is neither pruned nor manured, though fruit is most abundant but poor in quality: the yellow peach is almost the only kind grown and is moderately hard and flavourless ; it is more adapted for cooking, and the Boer farmers use it for making " Peach-brandy," which they sell to the Kafirs. One may obtain an acquired taste for most " liquors," but anything more abominable to a fresh comer than this decoction is difficult to imagine. The peach here seems to revert back to its uncultivated condition, and is found like this in most parts of the Transvaal *. By the 1st * Mr. Wallace remarks that " the peach is unknown in a wild state, unless it is derived from the common almond, on which point there is much difference of opinion among botanists and horticulturists " (' Darwinism,' p. 98). According to Hern, this tree " originated in the interior of Asia, beyond even the cherry land, and became known in Italy during the first century of the lloman Empire " (' Wanderings of Plants and Animals from their First Home/ p. 320). C 18 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. of October the peach-blossom had altogether disappeared and was succeeded by the prodigious bloom of roses, which often constitute whole hedges to fields and gar- dens. There are a few white blooms, but the majority are of a pale pink colour, mostly single, some semi- double, and there are also small double button-hole blooms which grow in clusters ; these roses flower con- tinuously during the whole Transvaalian summer. An occasional passion-flower (Passiftora) is also found with the roses and blooms during the same time. Oleanders (Nerium oleander) thrive remarkably well in Pretoria. In one private garden are two specimens, each some fifteen to twenty feet high and of the circumference of a large fruit-tree ; these at the early part of October became a mass of red bloom and were a glorious con- trast to the puny examples wTe grow in our greenhouses in England. The oleander — cut and trimmed — forms a considerable portion of the hedge which encloses the cemetery. I did not meet with our old friend the Oleander Hawk-Moth (Chcerocampa nerii), though its non-appearance in my path was probably purely acci- dental, for I found two other hawk-moths common to our English fauna, which in Pretoria were not scarce and quite unmodified from their usual form : I allude to Aclierontla atropos and Protoparce convolvuli. In gar- dens the Hibiscus is hardy and blooms freely, but is not so much cultivated as such a handsome plant deserves, whilst the useful and robust " Indian shot-plant "(Canna indica) everywhere abounds with its striking foliage and its deep red bloom. Flower-gardens, however, exhibit most of the features of those at home — the geranium, verbena, marigold, stock, dahlia, sunflower, phlox drum- mondi, and mignonette being very common. Zinnias here attain to particular excellence and growth, and the scattered seed has produced a small wild or degraded form which is found on the hard veld. It will thus be seen that the greater part of the plants and flowers of Pretoria are, like its inhabitants, migrants and colonists. The winter season, during which I arrived with its ever- green and deciduous trees, its orange-trees bearing ripe fruit, and its leafless willows, the August noon and the TO PRETORIA. 19 March sunrise and sunset, is incongruous in the extreme, and is better described as the cool dry season. Towards the end of August gardening operations commence, for the rains are soon expected, and I received a Spring Catalogue of Plants and Seeds from a firm in Port Elizabeth that reminded one of the Carter and Sutton publications at home. The streets of Pretoria are wide and well designed. Their width, however, had a lowly origin, for they were thus devised and constructed for the convenience of ox- wagons, wrhich could not turn round in narrow roadways. Years hence, when the rail shall have entirely or almost completely replaced the old Boer wagon, this require- ment will be forgotten, and those who originally laid out the town will probably be credited with more artistic and less utilitarian tastes. All the Transvaal towns are designed on one scale : given two parallel squares — a church square and market square — connect and ap- proach same with a straight road, and let shorter trans- verse roads branch off on each side. Pretoria was thus laid out as Pietersburg is to-day, and the grass-grown paths and squares of the last are only like what the first was a few years since. Pretoria is now going through a building phase ; its giant government build- ings are equal to accommodate the official servants of a State twice the size of the Transvaal ; its mercantile buildings are sufficient for twice its present trade, so that business profits have already approached the com- petitive attenuation. A large market building is being reared upon the market square ; the town will shortly be lighted by electricity ; churches and chapels abound, and a Church of England Cathedral — small, of course. A water company now supplies pure water — though at a present prohibitive tariff — to supplant the former typhoid beverage of the sluits ; there is a permanent race-course, and a prosperous and gigantic distillery sheds a lurid light on three struggling breweries ; there are judges, a national flag, and a national anthem — but are these really Boer institutions 1 and what part have the true Boers taken in producing such results ? c2 BOER WAGON WITH FJKKWOOD. CHAPTER II. THE BOER. AV here are the Boers? — The Boer a farmer. — Grass-fires and their conse- quences.— Habits of the farmer. — Peculiar theology of the Boer which governs his life and action. — Boer relations to the Kafirs. — Violence of Church disputes. — President Kriiger. — Some causes of the Boer War. -The Boers as soldiers. — Homely life of the President ; his great influence with the Boers. — Many farmers now wealthy men. — Physical characteristics of the Boers ; their supposed dislike to the British ; their mistrust of the Hollanders. ONE of the first questions I asked after residing a short time in Pretoria, the capital of Boer-land, was, where are the Boers "? They are not to be found employed in the Government offices, for here Hollanders are generally engaged ; they do not keep stores — at least, so seldom, that the exception proves the rule ; there are no Boer clerks in mercantile offices, no handicraft or manufac- ture carried on by them. British, Dutch, and German are the nationalities which compose the population ; but where are the Boers ? Beyond the farmers who bring in their produce and firewood for sale, and can be found at the early morning market, the Boer is a visitor at Pretoria, and the same remark applies to all the towns of the Transvaal. The Boer is a farmer, or, more correctly, a dweller on the veld — he loves solitude and cares nothing for the outside world. I had frequent business relations with one, which occasioned almost weekly visits, and as we THE BOER. 21 became fairly good friends, this farmer may be taken as a typical example of the Boer. This man possesses a tract of ^0,000 acres, which is called a farm. Scarcely any of this domain is cultivated ; it embraces part of a range of hills which forms a boundary, and contains several isolated eminences as well, whilst in most places its level ground is strewn with rocky debris. These hills are sparsely wooded and it is from them that he obtains the firewood he sells at Pretoria and Johannesburg. He lives in a small and wretchedly kept and furnished house, the most con- spicuous articles of which are a small Dutch organ and a large family Bible, for he is a conventionally pious man. He cultivates a very small patch of his farm and leaves the rest, as nature gives it, to grazing pur- poses, and relies on his flocks and herds. Towards the end of the winter he fires the veld, the withered and dried grasses of which readily burn, and this allows to the new shoots, that will rise after the rains, light and air to commence growth. At that time of the year the illumined horizon almost nightly denotes the process of this primitive farming, and day reveals dismal black areas which tell the same tale. The young grass soon starts, and in a fortnight from the conflagration I have seen scattered and small patches of bright green, even before the rains have commenced. But these continuous fires help to keep the country in its present treeless condition, for nothing but a few stunted trees of the hardest wood can withstand the ravages of the flames, whilst young seedlings have no chance of surviving their first season's growth *. I believe the o o * The same thing occurred in the early days of the settlers in North America, when the Indians annually burnt the grass on their pasture- grounds. " The oaks bore the annual scorching, at least fora certain time, but if they had been indefinitely continued, they would very probably have been destroyed at last. The soil would Lave then been much in the prairie condition, and would have needed nothing but grazing for a long succession of years to make the resemblance perfect. That the annual tires alone occasioned the peculiar character of the oak openings, is proved by the fact, that as soon as the Indians had left the country, young trees of many species sprang up and grew luxuriously upon them." See Marsh, quoting from Dwight's Travels- (' Man and Nature,' p. ]36). 22 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. Government have to an extent prohibited these burnings ; but as the practice is carried on by the Boers, who are a law unto themselves, the enactment is more honoured in the breacli than in the observance. The Boer farmer usually passes his time in riding about or sitting in his house smoking and drinking coffee. His vrow sees to the house-work, his sons drive the ox-wagon. The living is wretchedly poor and vilely cooked, but the Boer has few wants and is happy if left alone. Kafirs do the farm-work, which is principally attending to the cattle, who neither re- quire food nor water, as the veld provides the first, and they are always kept where some small stream can be found. These people retire to bed at about 7 P.M., but rise early. Illiterate and uneducated to a greater extent than our own rustic population, they possess a keen and intelligent grasp of the government and politics of the Transvaal, and in this respect are intellectually superior to our own men of the shires. They have won their position by hard fighting and hard living. Forty years ago they had to wage war with lions and leopards on their farms, where now scarcely a buck is to be seen, and not only did they struggle against wild beasts, but sustained sanguinary Kafir fights. They showed no mercy to one or the other, but fixed their boundaries and protected their farms. They are the nearest present approach to the old Hebrew patriarchs ; like them they value wealth in flocks and herds, and, away from the world in almost lonely wilderness, worship God, and often possess the same strong and unruled passions as were exhibited by some of the biblical personages. Wild tales of wild doings are sometimes told as having occurred in far- away farms ; but I incline to the view that these are often exaggerated and that the average Boer is, accord- ing to his lights, a citizen pioneer, and a rough, God- fearing, honest, homely, uneducated philistine. My Boer friend once showed me the two books which appeared to form his library ; they were both large Bibles — one in Dutch, which he read ; the other in THE BOER. 23 English, which he did not understand, but which had been taken as security for a debt. Both were illus- trated in that primitive and almost outrageous fashion which seems to have often inspired biblical artists, and no doubt these pictures considerably influence the minds of these primitive Boers. Science, literature, and criticism being unknown quantities, one can specu- late on the theological crudities of these good people. Alone on the veld, with the silent plains often more or less surrounded by the " everlasting hills," the Jehovah of the Jews seems to supplant in their minds the God of the Christian, and these biblical pictures of the pastoral patriarchs must have an attraction and sense meaning to them which are unknown to us. They are alone by themselves and the God of the Illustrated Family Bible. I often ask myself if it is better to be a joyful savage Kafir, or a sombre civilized Boer. The Calvinistic sabbath is supreme on Sunday in Pretoria : the Europeans drive and frequent their hotels and clubs on that day, or, at least, the migratory portion of our race do so ; the Boer rejoices in that respectable gloom dear to Scotchmen (at home) and themselves. To understand the Boer you mnst understand his theology, which rules his life and guides his actions, and you may as well fight him at once as seek to argue with his prejudices. In the early days of the Boer Trek, they absolutely thought that they would even- tually reach Jerusalem *. Their favourite scriptural reading is the Old Testament, and especially the Book of Joshua, where the command to go forward, enjoy the promised land, and smite the heathen was freely adopted by themselves as referring to the Transvaal and the treatment of the Kafirs. It is owing to this feeling that you find towns in the Transvaal called by names such as Bethlehem and Nazareth, and when in their Transvaal advance they approached a river which over- * For this and some subsequent information, I have the absolute authority of a Protestant clergyman of long experience in the country, -\vhose name I naturally refrain from publishing. 24 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. flowed its banks they absolutely thought they had struck a source of the Nile, and called it the Nile River — " Nyl- stroom," which name it still bears. The same clergyman to whom I have referred also told me that in his travels in the interior he had met most friendly Boers, who told him they could not understand why such an intelligent Englishman should preach to the Kafirs, who possessed no souls. I have been assured by other competent and long residents in the country, that the Boers look upon the Kafirs as the descendants of Cain, and consider any attempt to christianize them as trying to nullify a curse of God. It is difficult to hear these views openly expressed at the present day, and it will be more so in future, now that there is a foreign and critical community around ; but it is these esoteric beliefs that often govern the volitions of a people and the government of a country. A friendly Boer once speaking to an acquaintance about Matabele Land, assured him it was a beautiful country and would one day be taken over by the Boers, adding, seriously, "• God Almighty never made such a beautiful country for Kafirs." The Boer treatment of the Kafirs is now certainly much better than it was ; but in saying this I feel a great reticence, for there are, and always have been, many Boers of natural kindness of heart, than whom Kafirs could have no better masters. But of others, and in former times, the reverse is the fact, and they treated their Kafir labourers with savage harshness *. They had not forgotten the long and sanguinary fights necessary to dispossess the natives of their country, nor of the savage reprisals and murders incidental to the same. Reports are current, for which I will not vouch, that, by degraded Boers, labourers once were sometimes only paid at the expiration of their term and then followed and shot for the recovery of the * Burchell gives an instance (' Travels in Interior of South Africa,' vol. ii. p. 9-j). See also Living-stone ('Popular Account Missionary Travels and ilesearches/ new edit. p. :28). THE BOER. 25 money ; whilst the poor wretches have often been bound to an apprenticeship of 21 years (which they did not comprehend), any attempts at escape being met with savage floggings and shootings. But these are not purely Boer characteristics. I remember the floggings on English-managed eastern sugar-estates twenty-three years ago, and the flagellations of the Stanley expedition are not yet effaced from memory. This conflict between Boers and Kafirs still quietly exists. The following was published and guaranteed as true by the ' Uitenhage Times ' of this year * : — " A Dutch farmer and his wife living far north in the Transvaal, witli no near neighbours, were surprised one day by twelve strange Kafirs. The farmer, who was outside the house, was bound hand and foot ; then, entering the house, the Kafirs began ill-treating the poor wroman, but on the suggestion of one of their number, ordered her at once to cook a large pot of mealie pap. This the poor woman did in the presence of the Kafirs, although her clothes were torn from her back, and she was almost naked. When the pap was ready they all squatted round the pot and ordered the woman to get them sugar. She had only a canister and that was in the wagon box ; she was told to fetch it. She remembered also at the same time that there was a bottle of poison in the wagon box, which- her husband had bought for killing wild animals. Swiftly and secretly she shook the contents of the little bottle among the sugar, and shaking the canister well up, handed it to the Kafirs who helped themselves liberally, with the result that in a short time they were all suffering agonies and went outside one by one. Trembling at what she had done, at the escape she had from death or worse, and for the safety of her husband, the poor creature waited in the house for some time ; but eventually went out and found all twelve Kafirs dead, and her husband bound hand and foot in the kraal, but otherwise uninjured. She * Copied by the < Press,' Pretoria, Feb. 18, 1891. 20 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. immediately released him. He quickly buried the bodies of the dead Kafirs, and they resumed their farming-operations as if nothing had happened." Not only docs a crude theology colour the life and guide the political existence of the Boers, but it absolutely threatens to prove the source of their dis- integration. From the earliest days of their history church disputes have been readily fomented and violently contested. At the present time one of these is raging to the edification of the whole community, and is consequent to the amalgamation of the two churches, Ned Herv and Ned Gereformeerde, which took place about five or six years ago. There were many dissentients to this amalgamation who refused to join it, and obtained a minister from Holland. It was agreed at the fusion that all properties should be transferred to the amalgamated churches, but this the dissentients refused to ratify, and a lawsuit was commenced in the High Court. But this is little to what occurred at Zeerust last year, when fifty armed Boers entered a Church, took possession of the same, forcibly ejected the minister from the pulpit, and turned the congregation adrift. It is no exaggeration O O to say that over this dispute the Boers were in mea- surable distance of civil war. My friend the farmer, of whom I have previously spoken, assured me with anger and sincerity that before any alteration was made with the present government of the Pretoria church, the contents of his rifle would have to be reckoned with, and that a notice would be sent to all the Europeans to avoid the Church Square on a certain day. The President at the time of writing is en- deavouring to bring about, if not a reconciliation, at all events some form of arrangement ; but feeling runs so high, that a cartoon on the subject just exhibited in a stationer's window was compulsorily removed, in obedience to the threats of angry men, who would otherwise have demolished the windows. The Boer has no sense of humour. These disputes are a real danger to the State ; their THE BOER. 27 solidarity to the present moment is the only strength of the Boer government, and when once faction commences the liquidators of the present Republic will step in *. On October 5th occurred the first Dutch church festival during my residence, and of which there are several annually. To attend these the Boers travel in their wagons with their families from all the sur- rounding districts. Members of the church take the Sacrament, and the younger people are examined and admitted as church members. In former years the Church Square was covered with tents and wagons on these occasions, as the Boer has the right to out- span on the Square, and still possesses the privilege, which does not improve the sanitation of the town. The government now by quiet persuasion endeavours to induce these worshippers to camp outside ; but most stand upon their "rights," though, as amongst all people, there are found the few reasonable spirits who listen to advice. I counted thirty-five wagons on the Square this Sunday morning, with the tents under which the families had slept, and towards evening the oxen were gathered together, ready to inspan and start homeward at daylight. Truely these Boers are a strange and unromantic people, a mixture in religion of the old Israelite and the Scotch Covenanter, and a nasty people to manage if their religious prejudices are attacked. I met the President walking to attend this service with his Bible under his arm and his pipe in his mouth. The President, however, belongs to the Dopper branch of the Church, which still remains intact, and the church is opposite the presidential residence, and is regularly attended by his honour, who sometimes conducts the services. The Doppers are the Quakers and Plymouth Brethren of the Dutch Church in the Transvaal. As a rule no instrumental music is used in their services, and no hymns are * Since this was written the President has by conference settled this dis- pute and has stated " that a serious danger to the State had been happily averted by the combined ellbrts of the delegates '' ( ' Press ' Weekly Editiuu, Sept. 5, 1891). 28 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. allowed, the Psalms of the Old Testament alone being sung. I could not help noticing that the Dopper congregations were better and more neatly dressed, and possessed that appearance of comfortable independence as is observed among the Friends at home. President Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kriiger was born on the 10th October, 1825, in the district of Colesberg in the Cape Colony, and is without doubt the greatest and most representative man that the Boers have yet produced. Uneducated or self-educated, he possesses a very large amount of that natural wisdom so often denied to men of great learning and of literary cultivation. With many prejudices he is fearless, stubborn, and resolute, and he really under- stands Englishmen little better than they understand him. In his earlier days lie has been a somewhat ardent sportsman and a good shot ; he has been engaged and honourably mentioned in most of the Kafir rights of his time, and at the end of a rough and stormy life he fills the Presidential chair of a country that has passed Boer aspirations, and attained a financial character and position due to its mineral wealth and the energies of its Colonists, in which Boer industry and Boer influence have played but a small part. Socially he has always lived in a somewhat humble position, and it is to the credit of his nature as a man that he bears not the slightest trace of the parvenu. Plain and undistinguished in appearance, he combines the advantages of a prodigious memory with a remark- able aptitude for reading his fellow man, and this last quality would be more valuable were it not leavened by a weakness in resisting flattery and adulation. He is very pious and self-reliant, which is provocative of bigotry and hot temper ; and surrounded and approached on all sides by clever and often unscrupulous financiers and speculators, his scutcheon has worn wonderfully well, and his character and reputation passed through many fiery ordeals ; he is also a rough diplomatist of no mean rank. He has been twice married : by his first wife he had PEESIDENT KRTJGEB. THE BOER. 31 one child ; by the second, who still survives, he became the father of sixteen children, seven of whom died when young. Each morning, about 9 A.M., he may be seen driving to the Government Offices, and in the afternoon he holds with pipe and coffee a reception on the " stoop " under the verandah of his house. Here he is daily seen by a heterogeneous assembly of visitors- men with a grievance, applicants for posts, would-be concessionaires, and even Boers, wTho seek his advice 011 family troubles. During the British annexation this was one of the features of Boer life we quite ignored, and for which we afterwards paid a heavy penalty. I have been assured by old and non-official residents, both by English and Dutch, that had " Shepstone remained," the outbreak might have been avoided. The Boers have a patriarchal form of procedure, and when they have, or think they have, a grievance, some elders are deputed to visit Oom Paul, as the President is usually called. President Kriiger listens to all they have to say, has a long talk with them, argues the point, hammers in his own convictions with his own private reasons and perhaps a few texts of scripture, and the elders go back, explain to their constituents that they now see it all clearly and that they must all be satisfied for the present. Shepstone was trusted and liked, pursued the same policy, possessed their con- fidence, and had touch with the whole state, and these qualities Lanyon had not. The longer one lives it is seen that people are governed by their prejudices and illusions, and the mystery becomes greater how the British Colonial Empire exists, governed by pro-consuls who do not possess that idea, and act as though the contrary prevailed. If a West-Indian Governor was transported to rule these Boers, and had the slightest trace, of Creole blood in his veins, he would be looked upon as a half-bred Kafir, and despised by the most ignorant and unwashed farmer in the territory. The late Boer war should never have broken out. Incapacity caused it; incapacity fought it; incapacity finished it. 32 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. The Boers are trained irregular troops from their birth. A lad is first taught to ride a calf, and then a horse. At a certain age he has a rifle given to him, and two cartridges at a time. After a few occasions he must not return empty handed, even if he only brings a bird, or punishment ensues. A Boer in a fight stands behind his horse if in the open, like a dragoon ; only the dragoon is taught late in life, and the Boer and horse have grown up together and are one. In a campaign he only requires some dried meat — beltong — attached to his saddle, and a bottle of hollands or water ; his rifle and cartridges are secured around his body ; his horse will live on the grass of the veld : thus he is fully equipped, and baggage and commissariat unrequired and unknown. Whether in future years they will maintain their wonderful proficiency as marksmen, now that the big game is almost exterminated, is at least open to much doubt ; and in after years it is probable that the Boer (not the Hollander), with all his weaknesses, prejudices, and undoubtedly fine qualities, will be but a story that is told. It must always be remembered that not nearly all the Boers were called up in the late war ; while some of the richer combatants had two or three young Kafirs behind them with spare rifles, which they loaded and passed to them. Another cause of the war was the question of the official language. The convention clearly stated that English and Dutch were to be used ; but English soon became dominant, and thus a grievance arose. English residents in the Transvaal at the present time must not therefore complain overmuch that Dutch has been made the official tongue. The President lives in a homely style, and receives no company. His house is not situated in the best part of Pretoria, and there is nothing to denote the abode of the chief of the executive, save a flag-staff and a lounging sentinel. I advisedly use the word lounging, for I passed daily, and have seen these sentinels looking perfect victims of ennui and assuming such positions as would drive a European drill-sergeant to despair. THE BOER. 33 Thrift marks the Presidential residence. In the spring I witnessed his small front flower-garden being arranged for the coming summer. Two small beds were being bordered by reversed empty glass bottles, the outer border being composed of wine-, the inner border of lemonade-bottles. It was a pity that all the labels had not been washed off; but still the arrangement illustrates the homely and economical, if not artistic, tastes of President Kriiger. It must not, however, be imagined that these bottles had been emptied in his establishment, as his honour is practically a total abstainer. The power and influence of the President are best exemplified at the deliberations of the Eaad. When great opposition is manifested to a measure which the President is anxious to pass, he will frequently adjourn the House to the following day, and in the meantime have an interview with the principal dissentients and afford them further reasons for its advocacy. Many of the Boer representatives are bewildered by financial schemes they do not understand, and by political moves which they think affect their rugged independence, and it is then that these personal explanations so largely contribute to the progress of business. The President is thoroughly in accord with his people as to the belief in direct action of a Special Providence guiding the fortune of the Transvaal ; and their present position is still a source of devout wonder to most of the Boers, many of whom really believe that at the last war they actually beat the whole British Army. Of course the President — who has three times visited this country — and the other officials are not under these hallucinations, but looking back at their early experiences much crudity of thought is readily explainable. An extract from the President's speech at Krugersdorp last year, when the memorial stone was laid of the new Government Buildings there, will readily show his strong feelings on this point *. " Burghers," he exclaimed, * The speeches recently made at the Paardekraal celebratiou last De- cember more strougly emphasize these views. D 34 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. " when I cast an eye about this spot, I cannot but acknowledge the hand of the Supreme Being who rules the Universe. The wailing that was once so lamentable here, is now changed into sounds of joy and gladness. From the earliest days the Ruler of the Universe has guided and guarded us. He has protected us from the rude attacks of barbarians when this land saw but few white people — attacks which, if not providentially averted, would have extinguished us. Who does not remember in years gone by the moaning even of women and children when attacked by the savage Kafir hordes I Who can forget when their husbands were fighting for their very lives, their wives brought branches of trees to make a fortification round their wagons and tents I W7ho, I say, can forget the torture to which some of the voortreJc Jeers of this country were exposed 1 " * Of course the Kafirs would take quite another view of these matters ; but like the successful man of business, so it is the victorious people who most often trace the hand of Providence. It seems easy, all the world over, to be thankful for great blessings, and much more difficult to appreciate those more frequent and untoward events which by some have been styled " blessings in dis- guise." I have remarked that the President has a slight O weakness for adulation, and the following remarks were dished up in the Government Journal on the occasion of his last birthday (1890) : — " While lie has accom- plished much that in other countries would immortalize his name in song and idealize him, as it were, to future generations .... a section led by unscrupulous speculators and mean and degraded journalists, whose name it is not necessary to mention, will probably take no notice of the day at all." Many of the Boer farmers are now wealthy men — not only in land but in cash — owing to the large sums paid them by mining companies and syndicates for their auriferous farms. Frequently this cash is kept in some * As reported in the ' Press ' of Pretoria, Sept. 20, 1890. THE BOER. 35 sure hiding-place, for the Boer has not yet acquired a confidence in Banks ; and I have been assured, on good authority, that some of these primitive folk who have deposited sums at Banking institutions have called and asked to see their money. A ready cashier will at once produce a quantity of gold from his drawer, and con- fidence is restored. In former days little cash was handled by the Boers ; they possessed large farms or, rather, unworked tracts of land, but money was scarce, and heavy and laborious wagon transport was under- taken for small sums. In stature the Boer is tall and strongly built, but seldom stout. Living in one of the most healthy and invigorating climes — I speak of the high veld — he possesses, as a rule, a splendid constitution and a capacity for much more work than he cares to undertake ; his ordinary spare and meagre diet prevents much aptitude for corpulency. For bathing he has no desire, and he is as economical in the use of soap as any white race found on the globe. It is generally thought, and especially in this country, that the Boers have a hatred for Englishmen. This is a fallacy, for, in spite of all that may be said and done, the Britisher is respected though not loved. His word is taken, his honesty accepted, but his arrogance is over- estimated. The Hollander, on the contrary, though so near by blood, is neither respected nor loved. English- men improve the country, even if their old colonial instincts prompt a desire to fly the old flag; the Hol- lander is often a financial parasite. The Englishman will toil if he can reap : the Hollander will reap if possible, but not toil. It is the Hollanders in the Transvaal W7ho dislike the English, and are alike detested by the Boers. The longer I remained in the country, the more absurd it appeared for the English to have lost it. England could have worked well with the Boers by proper management, and Hollanders would no longer have had the opportunity of exploiting them. But a Boer is a plain man : he can understand an English farmer but not an English aristocrat, and why a pious D2 36 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. straight man like Sir Bartle Frere could not manage the President is only explainable on faults of individuality and not of character. An Indian proconsul, with his acquired hauteur and social exclusiveness, which are so often more apparent than real, is no diplomatist for the Transvaal ; the imported Hollander, however, is, and has been, too often a financial curse to the Republic. The Boer to-day is what may be called " smart " in the little business he does with the community, and this applies principally in the relation of sample to bulk of the produce he disposes on the market. But it must not be forgotten that he has learned much of this through bitter experience and from those who now speak the strongest on the subject. The Chosen People swarm in the Transvaal and have pitted their financial and com- mercial talents against the once unsophisticated farmer, with of course one result. One Israelite, whom I fre- quently saw in Pretoria, and of whom many good and other stories were told, had acted as produce agent for a Boer, whom he generally cheated of a few pounds, in the settlement. One day the Boer arrived indignant, and with a " ready reckoner " in his hand demanded a balance. "What book have you there 1" enquired the clever Semite. "A ready reckoner." " Let me see it;" and then returning it contemptuously to the dissatisfied one, added with withering scorn, " why it is last year's edition you have got!" The Boer retired mystified. The Boers seldom laugh, and have 110 gaiety ; they know neither the pleasures of music, literature, nor even the table ; they are fond of shooting, and are perhaps the finest shots in the world, though they have now nearly exterminated all the big game. No people have ever made the wagon such a home, or driven it with such skill. They possess all the virtues of home life, and are sober and thrifty, drinking perhaps less alcohol and smoking more tobacco than any other people. They have a character for inhospitality, as many a lone and weary traveller or prospector who has sought the shelter of their houses, or asked for food, will declare. But the Boer wished to be left alone, his early treks were made THE BOER. 37 for solitude as well as freedom. He is amazed at the developments of the big towns and prefers the quietude of his farm. Other people are now supplanting him in the Republic ; his habits of retirement will prove his effacement, and his want of education will consign him to oblivion unless he treks still further on. If the records of these early treks could only be gathered before the chief actors, who are now old, have passed away, much zoological and ethnological information would be saved, often of no mean importance ; whilst deeds of endurance and heroism would be recorded, and a love of exploration disclosed, that would rival the doings of some of our modern travellers who write big books and receive great receptions. I have sought to be impartial to the Boer, whom I respect but cannot love ; and my principal remarks apply to the real Boers, the farmers, the dwellers 011 the plains, and not to the official Kriigers, Jouberts, Smits, and others, who really constitute the Boer aristocracy, and no more represent the average population than the inhabitants of the West-end of London are typical of the real population of England. The shadows are deepen- ing over these hardy farmers, the pen will conquer what the sword could not subdue, and they must be either absorbed in or fly from the busy mercantile population that is now surrounding and must ultimately dispossess them. In the nineteenth century there seems no room for this old pastoral life, especially when nature has baited the soil with auriferous deposits ; but I shall ever remember the family wagon of the Boer when my fancy recalls the peaceful wilderness of the veld. Cliera proynv. Male in nuptial plumage. CHAPTER III. PHASES OF NATURE ABOUND PRETORIA. Natural aspects in the dry "winter season. — Orthoptera and Coleoptera. — Commencement of the rainy season. — Protective resemblance in butter- flies.— Vegetable tanning-products. — Survival of spiued and Lard- wooded trees in the struggle for existence with herbivorous fauna. — Baboons. — Bad roads. — A Boer farm. — Grass-fires. — Dust-storm. — Vast quantities of beetles under stones. — Bad weather and heavy losses in live stock. — Appearance of winged Termites. — Swollen streams and their dangers. — Accidental dangers in animal life. — Birds of Prey. To a naturalist who has seen the glorious profusion PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 39 of plant and animal life in the Eastern tropics, the bare, withered, treeless veld as it appears in the neigh- bourhood of Johannesburg and Pretoria at the end of the dry or winter season is most dispiriting. The few thorny acacias are almost universally destitute of leaves, the few plants that should be green are more or less covered with fine brown dust, and the only charm is the clear and invigorating air and the bright blue sky. Insect life is almost absent at this period. The first insect I saw was a large locust with red underwiugs, flying along a road in Pretoria, and chased by clogs who eventually secured it — the strangest hunt I ever wit- nessed. At this period, the end of July, five butterflies alone enlivened the scene — the ubiquitous Danais chrysippus was the most prevalent, a close ally to our English Clouded Yellow was found in Colias electra with its two forms of the female sex, a small Teriad (Terias brigitta}, the wide-ranging Pieris mescntiua, and last, but not least, an old friend, known in England as the " Painted Lady " (Pyrameis cardui) *. A few orthopterous insects are even then found amongst the dried and scanty herbage of a cast-iron soil ; but these are few in number, still fewrer in species, and poor in size and colour. The coleopterist now only finds his prey under stones near banks of streams or in other damp places, and it was in such spots that I secured rare species of Cithern us, Tetragonodems, and other good things, besides finding the large earwig (Lapidura riparia] sometimes seen in the south of England. Even these were, however, very scarce, and the searcher for Carabidse must have energy, patience, and experience. The stones must rest in spots neither too dry nor too damp for these small and usually brilliant beetles to seek a shelter beneath them, whilst the labour of turning over the numbers under which nothing is found becomes monotonous and fatiguing. On the dry and hard ground of the more open veld, the removal of a large stone or piece of rock frequently clis- * Excluding the Teriad, these butterflies are found all the year round. 40 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL, closes the retreating form of a small and elegant beetle down a narrow hole made in the irony soil. It is under these stones that vast colonies of ants are frequently found, and in the immediate neighbourhood of these it seems useless to search for beetles, save the small Pentaplatarthrus natalensis, which, as well known, is a messmate of the ants. Two species of "Bombardier Beetles " are not uncommon ; one of these, Pheropsophus litigiosus, is found under and amongst stones by the banks of streams. When handled its peculiar and protective anal explosion gave a distinct sound, and a considerable puff of smoke was emitted*; -the resultant excretion thereby not only deeply stained my fingers, but actually in one case caused a feeling of a smart burn which lasted for fully a minute. The stain on my fingers was indelible for five days. One naturally became anxious for the promised rains, which would transform this sterile scene, and afford some illustration of African insect-life. On August 5th the clouds gathered about 4 P.M., and a- strong wind arose bringing clouds of dust from Pretoria, and a ™ o moderate shower of rain. But this was of short dura- tion, and in half an hour the wind blew strongly from the opposite quarter and carried the dust back again. This was premature rain, and no more denoted the arrival of the wet season than a warm January day in England is a harbinger of the spring. But in August the nights became warmer, trees commenced budding, and in a few places the veld showred signs of fresh life. In some spots a few more butter- flies now appeared. Junonia cebrene and Hamanumida dcvdcdus took wing, and the last named afforded me an opportunity of observation which supplemented, if not corrected, some previous statements. Since Darwin taught naturalists to seek and read the story of cause and effect, where genera and species had alone been formerly observed, butterflies have been much studied * It is possible for these Bombardier Beetles to have their artillery arti- ficially discharged after death, as I once found on pinning some dead specimens. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 41 and with great effect on the questions of " mimicry ' and " protective resemblance." It has been eloquently remarked by Mr. Bates, that on their wings " nature writes as on a tablet the story of the modifications of species, so truly do all changes of the organization register themselves thereon " *, and a cabinet of butterflies in the possession of a competent naturalist now not only exhibits what used simply to be called the " works of nature," but absolutely in many cases shows how nature works. Hamanumida dcedalus, formerly and generally quoted by its better-known synonym Aterica meleagris, has been recorded as a good instance of " protective resemblance." Mr. Wallace has recently stated that it " always settles on the ground with closed wings, which so resemble the soil of the district that it can with difficulty be seen, and the colour varies with the soil in different localities. Thus, specimens from Sene- gambia were dull brown, the soil being reddish sand and iron-clay ; those from Calabar and Cameroons were light brown with numerous small white spots, the soil of those countries being light brown clay with small quartz pebbles ; whilst in other localities where the colours of the soil were more varied, the colours of the butterfly varied also. Plere we have variation in a single species, which has become specialized in certain areas to harmonize with the colour of the soil f . But in the Transvaal this butterfly never settles on the ground with closed wings, and the only example sent from Durban by Colonel Bowker to Mr. Trimen was described as " settled on a footpath with wings expanded " £. I saw and captured a large number of specimens, and always found them resting with wings expanded, and nearly always on greyish-coloured rocks or slaty-hued paths, with which the colour of the upper surface of their wings wonderfully assimilated. Large tracts of bare ground of a reddish-brown colour exist with which the under surface of the wings would be in perfect * ' The Naturalist on the Amazons.' t ' Darwinism,' p. 207. t ' South African Butterflies,' vol. i. p. 310. 42 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. unison ; but though I watched for months to see a specimen thus situated, and with its wings vertically closed, I never succeeded in doing so. Thus, if the reports as to its habits in Seuegambia, Calabar, and Cameroons are correct, we have not only a change of habit with difference of latitude, but also what I have elsewhere ventured to describe as an instance of " Compound Protective Resemblance " *. For we see that while in Senegambia, Calabar, and Cameroons, where (according to report) the butterfly always settles with wings vertically closed, and which " so closely resemble the soil of the district, that it can with difficulty be seen, and the colour varies with the soil in different localities," in the Transvaal and Natal it rests with horizontally-expanded wings f , by which its protection is almost equally insured by the assimilative colour of the same to the rocks and paths on which it is usually found. My friend Mr. Trimen, with whom I discussed this matter, suggested that I should observe whether the upperside might be protective in the wet season, and the underside in the dry ; but what- ever may be the case elsewhere, I saw that its habits W7ere uniform in the Transvaal in both the diy and wet seasons. I was afforded a good opportunity of watching the gradual approach of spring and summer, with their transforming effects in the production of plant and insect life, as business weekly compelled me to drive some 15 miles out from Pretoria to a Boer farm, on the hills of which grew a tree capable of supplying bark for tanning-purposes. This was called the " sugar-tree ;" but the bark Avas coarse and possessed little strength. The best and strongest tanning-material in the Transvaal appears to be the leaf of a tree (CoJpoon compression}^ * ' Nature,' vol. xlii. p. 390. f Although as a general rule the species of Nymphalidse, to which family this butterfly belongs, do rest with vertically closed wings, the species of the tropical American genus Ageronia have a similar habit to //. (hcdahis as observed iu the Transvaal. J For the exact identification of this species, I am indebted to the Curator of the Durban Botanic Gardens, PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 43 called bv the Boers " Bers* bas.' It is found scattered * O about in the woody portions of the country, but grows most plentifully — at least it was there from whence we obtained our largest supplies — on the hills of the Waterberg district. The sugar-bark was obtained on the farm I have mentioned, which was situated in what was known as " Ward Crocodile River," and at no equal distance from Pretoria could a greater diversity of scenery be found. I drove in a " spider " drawn by what appeared to be two sorry nags ; but in this country it is such looking animals which show an endurance and aptitude for the peculiar " roads," not to be equalled by better horses at home. The first part of the journey was along the somewhat good road which crosses the level veld towards the Crocodile River ; but after an hour's drive we turned off, and leaving the plain, struck across country for the mountains or kopjes on the left. At this spot, on a clear day, these ranges could be seen rising one above another in the distance, the farthest only seen in greyish outline, and a blue sky and fresh air prompted that joyous feeling that moun- tain slopes produce under similar circumstances in all parts of the world. The shadows of these bare hills are thrown one upon another in an almost artificial manner, sometimes in colour nearly black, and in shape fre- quently an almost perfect parallelogram, as though the slopes were a screen on which a solar lantern threw its magic shapes. The road now becomes much worse, and large rocky stones are freely strewn about the track over which we drive. Trees are more plentiful, but are principally long-spined acacias and " iron " and other hard-wooded species. These trees are the silent witnesses of what was once the head-quarters of the ruminant mammalia, now practically exterminated or driven back by the incessant warfare waged against them by the Boer farmers, and by the opening up of the country to a mining and mercantile civilization. There was a time when a deadly struggle went on between the plants and trees of this region and the vast herds of herbivorous animals that swarmed over it. 44 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. These long-spined acacias and hard-wooded trees alone possessed an adequate resistance to such attacks, and their survival proclaims that they were the fittest in the long struggle for existence which in that phase has now passed away. To-day their danger is from the grass-fires of the Boer or in their capacity for supplying fuel. We meet the river — which in its serpentine course has twice to be crossed — the first time at the base of a quartzite cliff which affords a dwelling-place for a small colony of baboons *, one of which, that has been late in returning from his nightlv excursions, I have sometimes C* t_7 v surprised early in the day. It was at this spot also where one could meet and secure a specimen of the migrant " European Bee-eater " (Merops apiaster\ a bird of the gayest plumage to be found in the neigh- bourhood ; whilst it was here and beyond my reach that I have watched the wild and majestic flight of a Charaxes butterfly, a species I was never able to secure. This river, so clear and shallow during the dry season, was sometimes found impassable during the rains. Our way becomes more tortuous as we ascend and descend the ridges of the higher ground till we reach about the roughest piece of road that man ever drove over, or that can be surpassed in South-African driving. A hill with a surface of broken rock and bearing a few trees has to be crossed ; the road, if it can be called one, rises steeply up one side, crosses the crest, and abruptly descends the other extremity. The whole way is one mass of broken quartzite jumbled together in titanic undulation, and one hardly knew at which to be most thankful — for having driven up one side, or safely travelled down the other. A narrow road ensues, with trees overhead, a river beneath on one side, and the quartzite hills rising high and rough-heAvn around us. Great blocks of rock strewn here and there, now peace- fully surrounded by herbage, tell the story of the wild crash in which at some bygone time, they have broken away from the parent block above and plunged head- * These kill the young sheep, and are therefore assiduously shot by the farmers. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 45 long. It was on these rocky cliffs that I made my first acquaintance with the Eupkorbice and Aloes, so typical of the South- African flora. The farm is soon reached in all its simplicity. Twenty thousand acres, including hills, is not a bad stretch of country for one man to own ; and when it is considered that nearly the whole of this tract is in the same con- dition as it was when first allotted at the time of the early Boer settlement, with the exception that all the large game, including lions and leopards, are now slaughtered or driven back, a peculiar feature of the Transvaal problem is apparent. Sitting on one of the hills which surround this homestead, and looking at the lonely grandeur of the scene, one wonders why these Boers, under the laws of the average of genius, have not produced a Robert Burns or the founder of some new religion. It was on these hills that our Kafirs felled the trees and stripped the bark, and looked forward to my weekly visit with their w^ages, as " one day further on " their return to their kraal with the cash sufficient to negotiate the arrangement for another wife. Towards the end of August the nights became decidedly warmer, though no rain fell. Dragonflies somewhat suddenly appeared hovering over small ponds, of which d'ocothemis erythrwa and die giant Anax mauricianus were the most common, two oak trees growing near the Church Square were approaching fair leaf, and the universal peach-bloom gave a warm colour to the whole scene. Small patches of Sedum, sp.?, were blooming on the adamantine veld, and the representa- tives of butterfly life were increased by the appearance of some species of Acrwa and of Papilio demolcus. A few bugs (Lygoeidce} could now be obtained by sweeping ; but the rains were still absent, and the full spring was not yet, though small water-beetles (Aulonogyrus aldominaUs] in the noonday sun skimmed the surface of the clear brooks, on the shady banks of which quantities of the Maiden- hair Fern (Adiantttm, sp.jwere now growing luxuriantly. During this dry cool season of the year many strange 46 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. insects are found in a semi-torpid condition under stones. In these situations I have found Carabidce, Staphylinidce, Pausstdce, Curculionidce, Chrysomelidce, Gallerucidce, and Coccinellida? among beetles, and Pen- tatomidce and PyrrhOGOridas among Hemiptera, but few in numbers, and at this season the Pretorian province of the Transvaal is most uninviting to the entomologist. The weather is still like spring at home, the nights and mornings quite cold, and it is difficult to believe that one is living in Southern Africa. With the advent of September the thorny acacias were found to be thickly covering with leaves, and the long white thorns being thus hidden, their striking protection was scarcely visible. It is only when these trees are bare of leaf that it can be clearly appreciated what impregnable objects they are to any herbivorous animal. The grass-tires were now being pushed on by the Boers, and I frequently noticed that blackened areas of some miles in extent, often embracing several hills, replaced what quite recently resembled in colour a field of ripe oats. The veld has thus three aspects — the dull ochraceous hue of the dry season, the blackened tint following the spring fires, and the green coloration of the summer. Numbers of insects in their immature stages, as well as small reptiles, must be destroyed by these fires, and, as remarked before, small seedling trees have little chance of reaching that stage of growth and hardihood necessary to survive the conflagration. During September some of the acacias bloomed, con- sequent upon the undoubtedly higher temperature, and these flowers were visited by swarms of Diptera ; but still scarcely a beetle was to be seen, excepting a few Scarabceidce. The butterfly list was increased by Hypanis ilithyia, Precis cloantha,and Catopsilia florella, whilst Anoplocnevnis curvipes, on the wing, gave promise that Hemiptera would soon be seen, though represen- tatives of various families of this order, as well as of Coleoptera, could still be found, but only under stones. On Sept. 25th a heavy shower at midnight gave hopes of the advent of the rains ; but it did not last long, and PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 47 in the morning scarcely a sign of wet was to be seen. It was not till October 4th that the rainy season really commenced. All day the weather had been close and oppressive, and those who suffered from weak chests had found much inconvenience. In the afternoon occurred our first Dust-storm, and that of unusual severity. No rain had fallen for five months, and the consequent accumulation of dust in the town and on the neighbouring roads can be easily imagined. It was under these circumstances that a heavy south-westerly gale broke upon us, and a vast and majestic cloud of tons of dust and small stones rose high in the air, and rapidly reaching the centre of Pretoria, soon cleared the streets both of passenger and vehicular traffic*. Rain fell for about an hour, vivid lightning subsequently illumined a particularly dark night, and nature pro- claimed that the long-continued drought was broken up. It was on the day following this storm that I visited some rocky debris lying under an acacia-tree on the open veld. To my surprise I found under these stones thousands of two small species of beetles (Itutelidce) belonging to the genus Adoretus (A. luteipes and an unidentified sp.), in a perfectly dormant condition, though the light and warmth of the sun soon aroused them, and they made for fresh shelter. Three weeks previously, and again a week later, I examined this spot and turned over the same stones, but the beetles were on both of these occasions only represented by a few specimens, and not by the prodigious quantities which I have described. It appears that this vast aggrega- tion was preparatory to their segregation and dispersal over the surrounding area, as subsequently during the evenings these Adoreti, like moths, flew into rooms, attracted by the light. Showers of rain fell on the days that immediately succeeded the storm, and the wind shifting to the east blew a gale and wras bitterly cold. In the evening the * In Johannesburg houses were unroofed. 48 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. streets were nearly empty — a fire indoors would have been comfortable, and a heavy ulster was found none too * warm. At night thunder rolled, and the rain falling with a rattle on our roof of corrugated iron effectually banished sleep. In a few days reports came in from all sides of the Transvaal detailing the severity of the weather. From Barberton we learned that the intense heat prevailing there for some time had broken up, and a furious gale had ensued, followed by heavy rain and intense cold, the surrounding mountains beina; snow- 3 O O capped. From Ermelo news came of a heavy snow-storm and anticipations of severe losses in live stock. In the Klip River country the snow also fell, and one farmer lost four hundred sheep and twenty horses within twenty-four hours. At Lydenburg snow fell in some instances two inches deep, though this weather was pronounced to be an unusual phenomenon. Between Pretoria and Barberton, on the high veld, I was assured that thousands of sheep and oxen were lying killed by the cold acting on their present half-fed and poor con- dition. All the month of October was wet and usually cold ; the veld had become perfectly saturated, and we now only anticipated a clear sky to enable the increasing strength of the solar rays to act as the magician's wand in the transformation scene of Nature. During one of these rainy October days the air was filled about noon with numbers of a small winged form of the Termite, or White Ant (Termes, sp.), which pursued a slow flight through the drenching rain. I found them emerging in continuous columns through small holes on the level veld, which scarcely allowed for the passage of more than one, or at most two, at a time, when they immediately took wing and hovered around. They were, however, being devoured by the large and handsome frog (Sana adspersa), which I had not seen before, and which also issued from holes on the veld. These frogs stationed themselves near the holes from which the termites emerged, and literally gorged them- *• O selves to repletion. A smaller and duller-coloured toad regularis] and a handsome green and spotted frog PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 49 also assisted at the banquet. The termites began to issue about noon, and were still flying, though in less numbers, at sunset ; but none were seen the following morning, and the toads and frogs had likewise disappeared, though it was still cloudy and wet. I caught many of these termites, but, though I put them in a strong cyanide bottle at once, they almost Bufo reyularis. Rana adspersa. BATEACHIANS DEVOURING TERMITES. invariably dispossessed themselves of their wings before death. About a month afterwards (in November) a much larger species (Termes angustatus] as suddenly and in equal quantity appeared. This time they were largely destroyed by the Cape Wagtails (Motacilla capensis), which, however, fortunately for the termites, were in far less numbers than formerly, as they appeared E 50 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. to have left for their breeding-grounds. A small terrier dog in our possession also played havoc with the ants, which it not only caught, but eat in large numbers. After a fortnight's intermittent rain, the weather became sufficiently favourable, or rather the roads were once more passable, for another visit to my Kafirs at the Bark farm. A new world of animal life now met the view as I drove along the roads, which in many places were composed of marshy mud, where on my last visit I raised clouds of dust. In Coleoptera giant Anthias (Anthia thoradca and A. maxillosa) were seen foraging about, and the huge Manticora tulerculata was very abundant, whilst Polyhirma macilenta ran about the roads where the surface was sandy and gritty. In this way I frequently stopped and obtained some fine species. In the wooded tracts I found Cetonias on the wing, many adhering to the leaves of trees, and one (Diplognatha hebrcea) even on the long stalks of last season's dried but now damp grasses. In the wet but scant herbage Blue Cranes (Anthropoides paradisea), usually in pairs, searched for the orthopterous insects which now almost daily became more plentiful, whilst the Widow-bird (Chera proyne) had now again deve- loped its long tail-feathers for the breeding-season, and frequented the long sedgy grasses that grew on the marshy portions of the veld. These long tail-feathers appear to offer a direct hindrance to flight, and the birds always seemed to proceed with difficulty and great encumbrance, like a Court Lady dragging a heavy train. Nature frequently reminds mankind of her forces, and she did so with these heavy rains : small spruits became torrents, and insignificant rivers raging floods. As usual, accounts slowly came into Pretoria — -for it is the press which allows civilized man to rise above tradition and hearsay, and newspapers give to prosaic life the romance of current history. The " Six-mile Spruit," a stream through which the coaches drive, and at a distance from Pretoria which its name specifies, came down with a suddenness that has made it famous among the streams PHASES OF NATURE ABOUND PRETORIA. 53 of the Transvaal. It came down with such force, with a quantity of water so enormous, and so swiftly, that upwards of a hundred oxen that were feeding on the banks of the river were swept aw^ay and drowned. Carcasses, which were estimated at about 150, were found when the waters subsided, either washed out on the banks or stuck in trees at the turns of the river, so that the Kafirs and vultures had an opportunity for high banquet. But besides oxen numerous Kafirs, mostly cattle-herds, were swept away by the flood ; bodies were seen floating down the stream, and others were found on the banks. A buck- wagon with a span of eight mules and two horses arrived at the spruit towards evening. No sooner did the wagon reach the middle of the stream than it was completely turned upside down and swept away, and the bodies of the mules and horses were found the following day entangled in the harness. A heavy hailstorm passed along the valley of the river, and the hail floated down in such quantity that large blocks of ice, several feet in thickness, were carried down the stream. One day, in the early part of November, I was able to appreciate the sudden rising of these Transvaaliaii streams. Behind our works, and crossing the veld, was a narrow deeply waterworn river-bed, at the bottom of which usually flowed a shallow streamlet of not more than a few inches deep, and which I easily strode across in the morning. By 3 P.M. this was a roaring rushing current some ten feet deep. This was caused by two very heavy falls of rain, the first one continuing from about 12 to 12.45 P.M., the second and heaviest lasting from about 2 to 3 P.M. The roads were flooded, the water poured down the sides of the hills in streams, and a roaring noise could be heard some distance from what was only a few hours previously a shallow brook. The water, which was of a deep reddish clayey hue, boiled, whirled, and tore down its bed, the many bends of which caused whirlpools and some nasty backwaters. Nowhere wider than 20 feet, and generally narrower, it would have been certain death to have fallen therein. By 54 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. 4 P.M. the principal rush of water had drained down, and, though the river was still full, it was now silent, and by the next morning it had almost resumed its ordinary obscurity. Thus sudden and dangerous are the results of these heavy rains. Insects in numbers must have been carried away, and some were found in a wet and exhausted condition clinging to low shrubs, and o o I thus obtained an orthopterous insect (Pycnodictya adustum) and the rare Dragonfly (Tramea basilaris), neither of which I ever found again. It was interesting to observe the different sculpture in many parts of the banks after this visitation, and one could now under- stand how it was that the usually shallow brook flowed at the bottom of so deeply an excavated river-bed. As November advanced flowers and insects became more plentiful, and the most abundant beetle was the large heteromerous red-striped Psammodes striatus. These beetles, when they first appeared, were most abundant on the roads which crossed the veld, and, though globular and ungainly in shape, yet actively ran on their high legs, but were so numerous that we crushed many under the wheels and horses' hoofs as we drove along. I believe that these form a considerable portion of the prey of the different species of Anthia, and also of the Manticorce, which actively patrol these spots ; and in the dry season I had often been puzzled to explain the number of empty shells of the Psammodes which I found strewn about. Beautifully marked Longicorn beetles enlivened the scene, and about this time I was much struck with the numbers of two species of Weevils (Polyclaeis cquestris and P. cinereis), that literally covered the acacia and others shrubs to be found on the veld. These two species were always found together, and it was only because the sexes of each could be found, and often in cop., that my doubts as to their being one species were dispelled. When we first arrived and saw the long white spines of the acacias, I involuntarily wondered why no signs were seen of the larder of the Shrikes, of which there are a fair number of species in the Transvaal. I at PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 55 length came upon their haunts, and, strange to say, a frog was the first animal seen impaled. I afterwards found that small lizards were very common victims, and the black-and-white shrike (Lanhis collaris), the most abundant species in our neighbourhood, was as fearless as it was predatory. I once followed one of these birds amongst some trees to see what it held in its beak, and approached close to the shrike before it took flight, when, after impaling a large mole-cricket close before my eyes, it flew away to another tree in the vicinity. But nature is "red in tooth and claw"; the small clump of shrubs that bore these impaled lizards were visited by numbers of the previously mentioned weevils, many of which fell victims to the numerous spiders that inhabited cocoon-like structures and spread their webs across the ends of the small branches. Accidents also happen to all living things alike. I once saw a weevil (Poli/claeis cinereis), when suddenly alighting from flight on the stems of an acacia, run a spine through one of its underwings and hang suspended. I liberated this unfortunate after watching its ineffectual struggles for some time, and if it had eventually extricated itself from the thorn, it could only have done so at the expense of a mutilated wing. On a subsequent occasion I saw a migratory locust strike in its flight the barbed wire used in fencing, and impale itself by driving a spike through the front part of its head. These un- toward events occur much more frequently than we suppose ; man has not a monopoly of the miseries of life. Amongst the Vertebrata, if the sportsman or naturalist examined the skeletons of his prizes, he would occasionally find the tr'aces of past fractures and dislocations ; and even amongst insects this can be discerned, but usually, or most clearly, in the large Orthoptera, whose long limbs are particularly liable to the accidents of field and flood, and the size of which renders the marks of these misadventures more visible than is the case among smaller insects. Many birds of prey visit the immediate neighbourhood of Pretoria, and are a considerable danger to young 56 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. poultry reared in open situations. The most common of these depredators is the Rufous Buzzard (Buteo deser- torum] and an occasional Yellow-billed Kite (Milvus cegyptius). These birds, especially the former, were par- tiuteo desertorum. Post of Observation. ticularly numerous about the month of December, and were a great source of trouble to the small squatters on the veld, who erect their shanties (for no other word will adequately express the poverty of these dwellings) PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 57 on the outskirts of the town. Most of these people kept a few poultry, and their young chickens and ducklings too often served as food for the active and rapacious birds. I skinned several specimens that were shot about this time, and they were lined with layers of yellow fat, similar to what is found in an over- fed Christmas goose. These buzzards were particularly fond of sitting on the telegraph-poles that crossed the veld, or using the tops of ant-hills as a post of obser- vation, and were a terror to all the domestic birds of the neighbourhood. The dread of impending evil sits as heavily on the minds of these ducks and fowls as the fear of poverty chills the heart of so many men ; and I once witnessed this instinctive or inherited terror, in the wild alarm shown by a brood of young ducklings at the shadow and sudden appearance of a tame pigeon just above them. This poor pigeon unwittingly caused a Buzzard panic, and proved unmistakably the frequency of a real danger, though giving at the time a false aliirm. DENDRITIC MARKINGS IN QUARTZITE. CHAPTER IV. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA (continued). Geological features. — Dendritic markings. — The highlands and the sea. — Heavy rains and floods.— A protected butterfly and its enemy.— Mimicry. — Cicadas. — Species found both in England and the Transvaal. -The Secretary-bird. — Vultures. — Locust-swarm. — The Paauw and other Bustards. — The Monitor. — Partridges. — Evolution and struggle for existence. THE geological feature of the country surrounding Pre- toria is quartzite, through which the granites frequently outcrop, as may be best observed by following some of the spruits and smaller watercourses. This quartzite also largely contributes to the rocky mass of the Maga- liesberg mountains, which form so considerable a shelter to Pretoria, as I had a good opportunity of observing during the blasting-operations by which a carriage road was made through the rocky defile called the Daas Poort. Dynamite was the agent used to rend the stratified quartzite, and in the blocks thus detached and broken up dendritic or arborescent markings abounded. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 59 These results of the infiltration of oxide of manganese so strikingly resemble the impressions of ferns as to make one believe, on seeing them for the first time, that veritable fossils had been found. On one after- noon, whilst entomologizing in a river-bed just beneath the field of these operations and unaware that a number of mines were just ready for explosion, we were only observed and warned just in time to enable us to retreat in a shower of small rocky debris, and thus to fulfil the parts of spectators and not victims. Some surface auriferous deposits may be found around Pretoria ; but these extend to no depth, and gold is practically absent as a mining industry, though thirty- five miles south is found the celebrated Main reef which has created Johannesburg. Pretoria must, in a mining sense, rely on its argentiferous copper and lead, with which is also found antimony. No observer who stands upon or looks at the mass of the Transvaalian quartzose matter can help speculating on its origin. That it was due to the erosion and disintegration of some former vast accumulation of granitic rocks is plain geological interpretation ; but where were these granitic masses situate ? * There is a charm in life on this high tableland six thousand feet above the sea and which really forms the heart of the Transvaal ; but to all it does not convey the same impression. A recent lady traveller has remarked, " to me it seems quite natural that the centre of a con- tinent is its healthiest point, for one is furthest away from the detestable moisture of our vaunted sea-breezes. Of course we praise sea and sea-breezes here because we cannot get away from them " f . But clever sayings are not always of universal application. It is easy to under- stand the physical basis of thought, and how a particular constitution may be vigorous in the Carpathians and depressed by the sea ; but in the Transvaal the recurrent hills and plains of the tableland only seem to accentuate * Mr. C. J. Alford has recently remarked : — " Certainly the land-surface from which these materials are derived has long ages ago been obliterated from the surface of the earth." ('Geological Features of the Transvaal,' p. 14). t Miss Dowie, British Association, 1890. 60 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. the loss of the sea that we have left behind. I have frequently driven over the grandest undulating scenery in the most clear and faultless weather ; but the feeling always was that behind yonder headland must be the sea. A long residence in England impresses its particular features of physiography upon the mind, and I found I was apt to read nature with a similar insular bias as that with which one studies foreign politics or observes the different arrangements in family life of other branches of humanity. I know it is usual to overpraise the sea, to feel the despair of a long voyage when left alone with it, to curse the monotony of the view from the seaside lodging when we have ceased to curb our im- patience of quiet ; but still our thoughts travel back to our first love, and the rough health wafted from the ocean is not altogether replaced by the invigorating at- mosphere of the hills. Beside which there is a stillness appertaining to the " everlasting " hills compared with the troubled waters of the ocean. Experience a night at sea with a night on the veld. The stars shine above both, there is the same silence, the same quiet ; but there is a rigidity of thought amidst the solitude of the plains and hills compared with the poetic buoyancy produced by the sea. Amidst the solitude of the first our mind reverts to the genesis of creeds ; on the wrater we breathe sonnets and listen to old Pagan music. The summer of 1890-91 was remarkable for the heaviest rains that had occurred for many years. As we read in the papers of the phenomenal winter at home, so we were assured that the continuous summer down- pour we experienced was equally unusual in South Africa. Towards the end of January the rivers were frequently flooded and dangerous, the roads in many places almost impassable, our homeward mails frequently missed the steamer at Cape Town, and our mails from home were uncertain of delivery. It was in this month that three Dutch anglers, who were sleeping in their wagons on the banks of the Pienaars River, within five yards of the stream, were swept away by a sudden flood or "coming down" of the stream, and the papers frequently PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 61 recorded other fatalities from all sides. In February the bridge at the Six-mile Spruit was washed away, and all that month and during March fatalities to life and loss of property were of intermittent record. Outside the Re- public the weather was equally bad ; from Natal we heard that at Umbilo many Indian huts were destroyed and the Indians had to take refuge in trees, whilst in Durban itself we learned that at the end of one week in March for forty-eight hours there had been an exceptionally heavy fall of rain, the heaviest for twenty years. On the Sunday the people were practically weather-bound. There were no services in the churches in the morning, the streets and tram-lines were seriously damaged and the Berea tram-traffic was partly stopped. Perhaps the most vivid illustration of the effects of these river-floods in South Africa was obtained from Uitenhage, where one noon, whilst the Sunday river was rushing down with terrific force, the spectators on the bank observed in midstream a cart with two horses harnessed to it, dead, and dragging behind, as if fastened to the conveyance, was the body of a white man, which none could recog- nize as the ghastly flotsam sped swiftly to the sea. The last fall of rain before the dry season commenced occurred at Pretoria on May 12. Flying all the year round is the ubiquitous butterfly Danais chrysippus, which is found over the whole of Africa, in South-eastern Europe, and generally dis- tributed throughout Asia. 1). chrysippus is also possessed of distasteful qualities which render it un- palatable to the usual insectivorous enemies, and thus affords an instance of a thoroughly "protected" butterfly. Its bright colour and slow flight show that it is subject to no fear of attack, or in the struggle for existence to which all living things have been and are, in a less degree, still engaged, this appearance and habit would have proved positive dangers to its long survival. It is not attacked by birds or other insectivorous animals, and is absolutely refused by them as food when kept in captivity. It is wonderfully tenacious of life, and specimens, after being pinched and pinned, have been seen, on the pins being withdrawn, to fly off in a &2 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. nonchalant manner. Even when a dried and neglected museum-specimen, mites have avoided this butterfly, while they have destroyed other insects in the same box or cabinet-drawer. Its caterpillar feeds 011 a genus of Asclepiadaceae (Gomphocarpus) which is everywhere abundant and also possesses distasteful qualities, so that its whole existence seems to be environed by natural chevaux de frise. How is it, then, that this insect does not positively swarm 1 is the question I frequently asked myself when watching the numbers which everywhere pursued this highly protected life. There must evidently be some great check at work, or the propagation of the species must result in pro- digious flights, which would surpass anything to be seen in the whole Rhopalocerous order. I am inclined to think that these highly protected butterflies, which experience an immunity from attack on account of distasteful qualities or resemblance to some inanimate object or other protected insect, may have some inherent weakness or danger which produces great mortality in their early stages and that the wonderful protections we observe thus only enable them to escape extinction. This view would help to explain how it is that the extra- ordinary guises by which natural selection has enabled so many insects to escape the attacks of their enemies have not led to an enormous increase in their numbers. It is the weak that require protection, and like consumptive patients who live by escaping the rigors of a northern winter by visiting a warmer clime, but still possess the inherent weakness of their system, so nature grants these insects immunity from one danger, which allows them a possibility of surviving another. We know by the great gaps between the continuity of some species in the same genus how many must have reached oblivion in the struggle for existence, and I look on these " protected " insects as surviving by such means some incipient mortality of which we are at present ignorant, or their numbers must indefinitely increase. I carefully watched the Danais in the endeavour to find some danger to its life and the means by which its { ^ .$&. Hemisaga prcedatoria, n. sp. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 65 increase was curtailed; but though generally unsuccessful, I did discover what I believe up to the present to be its only recorded enemy. This is a moderately large or- thopterous insect (Hemisaga prcedatoria, n. sp.), which I found lurking among the tops of tall flowering grasses, to which it has a considerable assimilative resemblance and which in this case enables it to secure its prey. The Danais hovers about, or partly settles on, the flowers and is then secured by the Hemisaga, which, in one instance, I found dismembering a freshly-caught speci- men *. It is just possible, during the dry season, Avhen insect-life is very scarce, that some insectivorous birds may, in a somewhat famished condition, make an experimental dash at a Danais. At that season I captured a specimen which was certainly mutilated as though by the bill of a bird, for the wings were not bitten symmetrically, as is the case when the attack takes place by a lizard or mantis, whilst the butterfly is reposing with its wings vertically closed f . As is well known, the female of Hypolimnas misippiis is a wonderful mimic of this butterfly. To an expe- rienced eye the Hypolimnas may be distinguished from the Danais by its flight ; but this is scarcely noticed without both species are known to be present and attention is thus directed. So close is the resemblance that well knowing both insects, I was not aware of the female Hypolimnas being present with the Danaids till I observed one in copula with its dark blue male. A purely English lepidopterist, not knowing these facts in mimicry could cross the veld and merely observe that D. chrysippus was very abundant. But these mimicking resemblances, by which the fema\eHypolimnas has found protection by being mistaken for the uneatable Danais and avoided accordingly, are even still more complicated. D. chrysippus has two varietal forms, alcippus, Cram., and dorippus, Klug, both of which occur in South Africa ancl both of which I found in the Transvaal. * When in Natal that old lepidopterological veteran, Col. Bowker, informed me that he had frequently observed the Mantid(c to prey on butterflies. t I am bound to affirm that this view, formerly advocated by rny 1'riend Prof. Meldola, was at the time contested by myself. F 66 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. These varieties are very scarce, but both are also mimicked elsewhere by the female Hypolimnas. The same thing occurs in India, where, however, the mimicker of the var. dorippus is somewhat abundant, while the mimicked form is very seldom seen. Thus we have a butterfly mimicking a form which is almost extinct, and to a superficial observer weakening the theory which explains these anomalies. But it is necessary in all these cases to carry the mind back to the time when the butter- flies, like all other living forms, were slowly establishing themselves by those qualities and appearances which, under the law of natural selection, enabled them to survive the struggle for existence. It was then that what we call " mimicry " — which is only one of a multi- tude of laws which govern the coloration of animals — first arose, and butterflies which slightly resembled uneatable species, or had somewhat the appearance of inanimate objects, would escape perils common to their kind, and these would thus become the dominant breed of the species, and be continually under the same selective process, till the disguise was almost perfect. If, then, we now find the present scarce form of the species so largely mimicked, it seems absolutely certain by the sur- vival of the mimicry that it must have been once the dominant form of the species — at least in India — and has since, in the recurrent changes of nature, been almost replaced by the present form we so well know *. The food-plant of this butterfly (Gonipfiocarpus, sp.), which grows and blooms upon the most dry and barren parts of the veld as well as where moisture is found, is universally distributed in patches or small groups and is one of the earliest plants to spring up and bloom when the cold nights of the dry season become less severe. Its flowers are visited by many insects. From them I have collected some half-dozen species of Cetoma and some showy representatives of the Heteromera, as well as Galleruciclre and Coccinellidic. Many Diptera and Hymenoptera visit the bloom, ' For these views regarding the evolution of the species in India, I am largely indebted to Colonel Swinhoe, the well-known Indian lepidopterist. PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 67 and among Hemiptera a species of Lygceus is particularly abundant. At about the end of November the shrill cry of the Cicadas was constantly heard from the willow and peach- trees in Pretoria, but principally from the first. The dominant species was Platypleura divisa, and I was surprised to find that it wTas captured and eaten by spiders. On once hearing a particularly loud chorus from a peach-tree, I visited the same to capture specimens, and found that spiders had industriously spread their webs between the branches, and remains of the Platypleuras were suspended in a more or less de- voured condition. I made use of these wTebs to procure specimens, for when first disturbed the flight of the Platypleuroe is wild and headlong, but by getting between them and the meshes of the spiders I was soon enabled to obtain what was required. It is reasonable to believe that these insects pair during their mature stages or breeding-season. We passed daily a small willow tree wrhere I constantly noticed a solitary couple of the species, and this was also known by the fact that we drove them out on walking by and frequently endeavoured to capture them. The male was always tuning, and was probably addressing his mate. At length, unfortunately, the singer allowed us to capture him ; the tree was henceforth mute, and I afterwards felt quite a remorse when my path took me by the then silent Cicadau home, for there was not the consolation of having captured either a ne\v species or one new to my collection. I was surprised to find how many living creatures one had known in Britain were also to be found in the Transvaal. In birds the European Bee-eater (Merops apiaster] and Montagu's Harrier ( Circus pygargus] were not at all uncommon, whilst in insects one was continually meeting with some old friend. A List is appended to this volume of all these comrades one finds across the sea, or rather near the extremity of another continent ; but with fixed ideas of geographical distribution, and our natural conception of an Ethiopian region, it was F2 68 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. somewhat surprising to find that man alone was not the only migrant. My earliest English schoolboy days wrere recalled when I caught the Convolvulus Hawk-Moth (Protoparce convolvuli), bred the Death's-head Moth (Acherontia atropos), or gazed upon the numbers of the Painted Lady (Pyrameis cardui] ; whilst an earlier friend than all appeared with the summer rains. The Crim- soned-speckled Moth (Dciopeia pulchella) was a very old acquaintance. 1 had caught it in Surrey, met with it again in the Malay Peninsula, received it from Mogador, and now at the other end of Africa found it somewhat an abundant insect. The time of its appear- ance in the Transvaal is very protracted. I first cap- tured it at the end of September, and found it still active on leaving the country in the following July. Flying in the strong sunlight, I have often mistaken it for a large Lyccenid, as the pale azure-blue of the poste- rior wings is wonderfully reflected, and the red and black spots of the anterior wings are, during flight, scarcely, if at all, visible. Its flight is short and it is easily captured. It was very soon after my arrival that I first saw the Secretary-bird (Serpentarius secretaries), that well-known African snake-eater of which we have all read. It is generally believed, and I was assured as a fact, that a £50 fine was inflicted for killing one of these birds ; but in the Transvaal, as elsewhere, I soon found that the " vox populi ' must be taken " cum grano sails." I enquired of several well-informed men, including a newspaper editor, who stated that such was the fact ; but at last I induced a friend on whom I could rely to make proper enquiries at headquarters, and after consi- derable trouble he discovered that there was no fine whatever on the statutes, but that a healthy and deter- rent legend only existed *. Another legend appertaining to this bird and copied in popular books on ornithology is that its legs are so long and brittle that they will * For this and much other reliable information I am indebted to my friend Meinheer J. II. E. Bal, of Pretoria, who has long been a resident in the country. PH A SES OF NA TURE ARO UND PRETORIA . C 0 snap if suddenly started into a quick run. My man, Donovan, who accompanied me to the Transvaal, and, imbibing the zoological furore, assiduously spent his Sundays in shooting birds, procured me a very fine specimen of the species. By a long shot he broke its wing, when it made off at a terrific pace across the veld, followed by a spider and pair of horses as hard as they could go. Eventually it was come up with, and on the Kafir boy endeavouring to secure it, the bird showed fight, beat him off, and again started running across the uneven ground. My man now outspanned one of the horses and on its back galloped after the creature, which had obtained a long start. For more than three miles did this chase continue over the veld interspersed with ant-hills, and eventually it required the contents of two more barrels (buck-shot) to stop and secure it. This fact effectually disposes of its reported incapacity for violent running, as the hunt was over a long stretch of country of the most uneven surface. The crop of this bird was full of the remains of orthopterous insects *. But the bird of the open treeless veld is the Vulture ( Gyps Jcolbii\ and in places like the outskirts of Pretoria, where dead oxen and horses in some seasons plentifully strew the plain, these birds act the part of a sanitary board. A specimen I obtained weighed in the flesh 32 Ibs., and as it was a full-grown example and a large bird, I think this may be accepted as the maximum weight. On clays when none are apparently to be seen, if one carefully looks upwards towards the clear sky and scans the expanse, the diminished form of one of these huge griffons is sure to be made out, as from its lofty vantage it surveys a large tract of country. Should a bird be seen to alight, it is not long before others arrive from all sides and hover about the spot. There can be little doubt that high in the air these sentinels are always on * Dr. Sclater informs me, however, that the legs o f specimens confined in the Gardens of the Zoological Society are very brittle and liable to accident. The range of this bird is somewhat restricted. Emm Pasha did not meet with it on the East-African steppes, though he believed it existed there (' Emin Pasha in Central Africa/ p. 402). 70 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. the look out, so that the whole level country is thus under constant supervision, and when a bird is seen to descend or to be making off, that act serves as notice of probable quarry for miles around, like the early signal of the beacon-fire flashed from hill to hill. The usual sailing motion of the hovering bird is at once changed for a direct route, and its flight then, as far as I ob- served, was always four or five strong flaps of the huge wings, succeeded by a short straight motionless forward movement caused by the impetus thus obtained, to be followed by another four or five flaps as soon as the former motive power was exhausted. Usually shy, when gorged with food their habits are quite modified and they are easily approached. I once came across more than a hundred settled about two dead oxen. On eacli carcass were ten or twelve vultures at work, whilst the others in listless and gorged apathy rested around. The naturalist who has skinned a full- grown and full-fed vulture will not easily forget the operation. Now that the vast herds of game which once roamed over the veld are practically exterminated, the vulture becomes more dependent for its provender on the deceased domestic oxen bred by man, and the body of an ox is much preferred to that of a horse. Their food around Pretoria may become scarcer, as a movement was on foot to form a commercial company for gathering up these carcasses to boil down for soap. About the town gardens a bird almost as common as the sparrow in England is the Cape Wagtail (Motacilla capensis], but which by its tameness and partiality for the habitations of mail reminded me of our robin, and, like that bird, is as little molested, save by boys, the natural enemies of all birds. Many entomologists have recorded the fact that they have never seen a butterfly attacked by a bird ; but I not only obtained an Arctiid moth (Einna madagascariensis), which I surprised one of these birds in the act of killing, but also saw another actually pursuing a butterfly belonging to the genus Acrcea, which is generally exempt from these attacks. After an interval of some fifteen years Pretoria was PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 71 visited early in the month of May by a prodigious swarm of locusts (Pachytylus migrator oides] *. Travellers from the coast had passed through these devastating insect hordes, which apparently were working their way up from the Cape Colony. On the morning of May llth our attention had been directed to myriads of locusts flying near the hills, and some few stragglers were LOCUST-SWABM IN PRETOBIA. found in the town ; but shortly after noon the air was darkened, as swarms only to be computed by billions came with a rushing sound over our heads and across * The traveller Molir met with similar swarms of probably the same locust " on the banks of the Vaal Kiver in 1869 (' To the Victoria Falls of the Zambesi,' p. 94). 72 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSl'AAL. our path. The light was obscured as with clouds of dust, whilst to walk through the flitting insects re- minded one of the driving snow-flakes at home, as the pale hyaline wings and not the dark tegmina are ob- servable during flight*. Stragglers continually fell out of the ranks, and we heard them drop on the iron roof of our dwelling. The flight was directed at different angles of one common direction, and stragglers constantly kept up a small counter-stream to the main body. The ground was thickly covered, and at sunset most of the flight had probably settled for the night. The heaviest portion of the main body, which might be described as the centre of the army, crossed us in about half an hour, but the flight continued long after and before. Their extraordinary numbers could be appreciated by the non-observable effect of their immense losses. Myriads were trodden under foot, our Kafir workmen collected them for food f , the poultry of Pretoria gorged themselves on their bodies. Two Crowned Guinea-fowls (Numida coronata) which I kept in confinement, and were always supplied with food, devoured so many of the locusts that I feared that they must die of repletion J ; a large " Gom Paauw " (Otis kori} that we shot shortly afterwards had its crop crammed with the bodies of these invaders, but the great cloud seemed to suffer no diminution. On the next morning the ground was thickly strewn with the locusts ; but they took wing as the sunlight became * Carl Lumholtz was also reminded of a snow-storm whilst standing1 among- a swarm of locusts in Queensland (' Among' Cannibals,' p. 186). t Holub, after eating these insects, felt he "could recommend a few locusts to any yourmand who, surfeited with other delicacies, requires a dish of peculiar piquancy ; in flavour I should consider them not unlike a dried and strongly-salted Italian anchovy " (' Seven Years in South Africa/ vol. i. p. 199). According to Livingstone, "locusts are often roasted and pounded into meal, when they will keep for months. Boiled they are disagreeable, but when roasted I much prefer them to shrimps, though I would avoid both if possible " (' Popular Account of Missionary Travels and Researches in S. Africa,' new ed. p. 31). J Mohr's ostriches "ate locusts from morning till night, and four of them soon afterwards died of dyspepsia " (' To the Victoria Falls of the Zambesi,' p. 201). PHASES OF NATURE ABOUND PRETORIA. 73 stronger, and by the afternoon we were moderately free. On May 25th we were again invaded, and again from the same direction. We had learned from travellers of the preceding day that another locust army was ap- proaching, and a " transport rider" assured me that his oxen had refused to go on against the dense moving mass. This time the living cloud broke upon Pretoria about 10 A.M., and had virtually passed from us by 3 P.M. * This swarm was afterwards reported from Waterberg and Zoutpansberg, showing that its night was in a northerly direction. In the early part of June, in crossing the Magaliesberg hills, I found them somewhat plentiful in a defile on the summit. This small colony were evidently stragglers from the higher portion of the night and had thus ceased to form part of the main body, which was now some hundreds of miles in advance. News was brought down to Pieters- burg from the Spelonken that the locusts had been so numerous as to prevent the informant driving a cart and four horses against them f . On the journey to the Cape in July I met with a considerable number near the boundary of the Republic, a larger swarm the following day about 50 miles beyond Kimberley, and another swarm about 40 miles further south. All these were flying northward, and would probably pursue the same routes as their precursors. This was my last experience of Pachytyluis migrator oides. The year 1891 might be styled by entomologists a " locust year," for Southern Africa was not the only region invaded, and almost simultaneous reports were received from Egypt and India J. As the colder and dry season commences the natura- * Of this swarm a correspondent of the ' Transvaal Mining Argus ' calcu- lated that he passed through a cloud of locusts 2o miles long, about a mile and a half broad, and something under half a mile thick, giving about 12 cubic miles of locusts. Taking a low estimate he reckoned there would be about 2000 locusts to every cubic yard (an estimate much too low), and altogether he calculated that he must have passed over 130,842,144,000,000 locusts. t ' Zoutpansberg Review.' j ' Zoologist,' vol. xv. p. 221. 74 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. list can obtain many good specimens on the Pretoria market, for the Boers are then able to bring their game in for sale, which is impossible in the damp hot weather. The farmers are fond of shooting, but are equally glad to find a market for the game, which with forage, fire- wood, and other articles are sold by auction off the wagons before breakfast by the market auctioneer. Amongst birds, the Paauw (Otis kori] may often be bought, and I have known a heavy bird to fetch as much as £2 10s., for its flesh is very rich and highly flavoured, and I cannot agree with Mr. Ayres that the flesh " is too coarse and oily to be good eating " *. My man secured me a fine 20-lb. specimen, which he killed with No. 6 shot a few miles out from Pretoria. Its crop, as I have remarked before, was full of locusts, and it was certainly the fattest bird I ever skinned, my hands being saturated with grease by the time I had finished the operation. The bird does not seem at Pretoria to reach the great weight it does in other parts of South Africa. The proprietor of the hotel at which I boarded told me that the largest specimen he ever bought weighed 28 Ibs., and a friend who had been an energetic sportsman for many years had only once bagged a Paauw that reached 32 Ibs. On the other hand, I met a gentleman at Potchefstroom who said he had shot a specimen that weighed 41 Ibs., and this was the largest he had ever seen or heard of in that neighbourhood. This I believe is about the maximum weight of which we have any authentic record, and I am somewhat sceptical as to the existence of the reported 50-lb. or GO-lb. Paauws f . The smaller Bustards, Otis ca-rulescens and Otis afroidcs, are not at all difficult to obtain 011 the market, and the Spur-winged Goose (Plectropterus gambensis) is * Layard's ' Birds of South Africa,' Sharpe's edit. p. 633. t Mohr states that he has shot specimens weighing thirty-five pounds (' To the Victoria Falls.' p. 33). Mr. Ayres, though he had often heard of 40-lb. Bustards heing shot, never saw one of anything like the weight, though one of 40 Ibs. was reported as shot by Mr. Buxton (Layard's ' Birds of Africa,' Sharpe's edit. pp. 632-3). Burchell describes his typical specimen as measuring in extent of wing not less than seven feet (' Travels,' i. p. 393). PHASES OF NATURE AROUND PRETORIA. 75 rarely absent when game is brought in. Bucks of various species, the "jumping hare " (Pedetes capensis), the Monitor ( Varanus niloticus), and skins of Leopards and the smaller cats I have also seen for sale. It is rare, however, to find a bird in good condition, as they are usually badly shot and with the plumage ruined. It is somewhat strange that the Boer farmers do not show more energy in bringing game to the Pretorian market, for it is certainly remunerative. During my stay a resident went on a shooting-expedition to the wood-bush about 90 miles from Pretoria, and on his return sold the game to a butcher for £27. Amongst the spoil were two bucks, two small paauws, ducks, partridges, and blue bustards, which at this price averaged 5s. per head all round. They were then retailed, blue bustards at 6s. each, partridges and ducks 6s. per brace, paauws from 3 Os. to £2. From this man I secured a very fine specimen of Otis ccernlescens. All specimens, both living and dead, fetch fair prices in Pretoria, and a pair of healthy young Quaggas (Equus quagga) were brought in and sold during my stay for £55. We occasionally obtained good sport among the so- called Partridges (Francolins), when the grass had died down in the early part of winter. The commonest species met with in the neighbourhood of Pretoria was Francolinus levaillantii, sometimes in good coveys, but never far away from water. These birds lie uncommonly close and can be easily passed. A Kafir boy once pointed out a grassy spot, not more than a yard or two square, where he assured us he had seen a bird settle down. We thoroughly, as we thought, threshed this spot, walking apparently over it again and again, and yet, subsequently, the boy with more perseverance and a desire to prove himself right, turned it up from under a tuft of tall dried grass that we had just missed treading down. Later in the afternoon of the same day, a single member of a covey which I had disturbed squatted in a small hole in the path about 80 yards in front of me, and depressing its back level with the earth, exhibited a good instance of the protection 70 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. obtained by assimilative coloration. So perfect was the illusion, that partly owing to the diminishing light I failed to add it to my bag by a charge of shot. The longer I observed living nature in South Africa • the deeper became my impression that the colours and habits of the animals and plants around me were, like the geological contour of the country, a story of a by- gone time. The colour of every feather, the appearance of every seed-capsule, is due to causes which in many cases are now almost inoperative. But it was then in the dire struggle for existence, subsequent to the last great geological change in the surface condition of the earth, that those varieties of plants and animals only survived which could in some way pass the severity of a competitive examination by natural selection. Hence we must not always expect to find a philosophical explanation of the bizarre colours of animals and plants by simply considering their present conditions of life. If it is difficult to trace the evolution of a civilized community of mankind, with its customs and superstitions, to its primordial elements, many of which belong to a pre- historic period, how gigantic is the task to attempt to go behind the very evolution of man himself! and yet it was at that time when the small birds and insignificant insects obtained the maximum of their colour-markings, not to add to the beauty of the scene, but to enable them to survive an eliminating process which took place in the great struggle for existence. Many of these gorgeous living forms are to my mind fossils, of a past epoch which we cannot read. THE MONITOR (Varanus niloticus). CHAPTER V. THROUGH WATERBERG. Scarcity of timber in the Transvaal. — Leave Pretoria fur Waterberg'.— "Waterless region of the Flats. — The Warm Baths. — Beautiful scenery. —Euphorbias and their poisonous qualities. — Fe^er districts. — The Massacre at Makapan's Poort.- — Sanguinary retribution at Makapan's Cave. — A fine orthopterous insect. — The Prospector. — Reptiles.— Ravages of the "Australian Bug." — Majuba day. — Mimicking insects. EARLY in the month of February I made a journey through the Waterberg district, to procure a supply and estimate the quantity that could be obtained of the best tanning-material of the country, the leaf of the tree I have already referred to (Colpoon compressinn}. As the industry of the Transvaal progresses, an investigation of its tanning-products will doubtless be undertaken, for it can scarcely be credited that the few vegetable materials now only known as available for a trade that must have a future adequately represent its wealth in this matter. A process of tanning in small quantity for household wants has long been understood and 78 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. practised by the Boer farmers, who, I am informed, use the leaves of other trees than the C. compres^um for the purpose ; and when the government really takes up the necessary question of forestry, a most important one for the country, the preservation and planting of these trees, upon which will depend the success of a Transvaal leather manufacturing trade, must be seriously dealt with*. At present the Transvaal may almost be described as timberless, so far as building-operations can be carried on. Even the wagon-builders have no local material, or at least none that can be obtained in any quantity, and it is absolutely cheaper to import wagons from the British Colonies, where there is an official Inspector of Forestry, than to manufacture them in the heart of the Transvaal. Vast quantities of deals and other European and American woods are brought up from Durban with all the incidental cost of rail and ox- wagon f ; and when at last the railway is allowed to give to the development of the country its natural and much-desired impetus, the sleepers for the lines will have to be imported. At present the great drawback to all local industries is that articles, despite duties, and in the face of monopolizing concessions, can be imported as cheap or cheaper than they can be manu- factured on the spot. The wealth of the Transvaal has hitherto only been sought beneath the ground ; it must now be cultivated on its surface. I started just after a period of heavy rains, and as the coach passed through the Wonderboom Poort, signs of the recent floods could be observed by the vegetable * This lias been thoroughly done in Australia, and Mr. Maiden, in his ( Useful Native Plants of Australia,' has described over thirty species of " Wattles" and about half as many Eucalypts which have been tested for tanning-material. In all eighty-seven Australian species have been under examination. liurchell found that the Hottentots used the bark of the Karro-thorn for tanning sheepskins, and amongst other plants used for the same purpose were a kind of J-Vcw-s and Mesembryanthemum cvriariiim, B. (' Travels in Interior of Southern Africa,' vol. i. p. 243). t In October 1890 the following quotations were obtained : — Deals, 3x9, Is. 5d. per foot ; flooring, f Xt>; 4c?. per foot. THROUGH WATERSERG. 79 debris left stranded in the tops of trees growing by the banks of the river; many of the trees were at least fifteen feet high, and one could thus realize the dan- gerous and relentless force of these flooded streams. After leaving this mountain pass, short scrubby trees become plentiful, and the soil is loose and sandy. As the journey is advanced, the country is found to be much more wooded and is in pleasant and strong con- trast to the monotony of the bare veld which marks the higher lands. To drive along a narrow road through thick woods was, indeed, a novel experience, and we reached the banks of the Pienaars River about 4 P.M., and shortly afterwards commenced the longest and most severe stage of our journey. The " Waterberg Flats " occupy a waterless region of some twenty-five miles in width, where there are no stages, and the mules have at least a four hours' stretch ; but on this occasion, owing to the state of the road, in which the wet rutty ground had dried just sufficient to be bad for the feet of the mules, we were five hours in transit. During the last hour one could not help sympathizing with the poor jaded beasts, and the shouts of the driver and the crack of the whip were constant sounds. Pas- sengers and mules will probably soon be spared this unbroken stage, as an enterprising American was then sinking a well, already 108 feet deep, through the rocky ground at his own expense. When he reached water, and had completed the well, he proposed building a store and stables, and as the spot is about midway across the Flats, his enterprise should be repaid. It was 9 P.M. when we reached the hotel which bears the name of the Warm Baths. The warm water rises from a mass of peat and reeds in the neighbourhood, and is conveyed to the hotel by pipes. After the dust and fatigue of the road these baths are most refreshing, and now that the property is leased and managed by a small British company in Pretoria, the spot bids fair to be the retreat and sanitarium of the capital. The Boers visit this spot and use the waters ; but in their case a hole is made in the ground, into which the water 80 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. flo\vs. In this rude and muddy bath, covered with a tent or other screen, the farmer will remain for hours. A real night's rest is quite an unknown quantity to the coach-passenger; this journey was, of course, no exception to the rule, and WTC were aroused at 2.30 A.M. to resume our route. By 7 A.M. we had reached Nyl- stroom, a forlorn spot, where the imposing appearance of a post-office and landdrost's court, unsurrouuded by any apparent business life, give it the appearance of a still-born township. But fever has been the retarding cause of Nylstroom's future, and its character for un- healthiness will long survive, though the natural beauty of the surrounding country, and its little-disturbed con- dition, should make it a district beloved of sportsmen. As the traveller leaves this spot it is difficult to believe that one is still in. the Transvaal, after an experience only of the country between Pretoria and the Cape and Natal frontiers. Woods, park-like tracts, undulating country, from which views could be obtained of endless and varied landscape, tall, wooded, isolated hills, and ranges of mountains with forest slopes, alternately meet the eye. Scattered Euphorbias quite transformed the appearance of the flora, and broke, as it were, the sameness of the short forest growth. The irritant properties of the milky juice obtained from these plants is well known * ; but the bloom possesses the same attributes, and honey is unfit for use that has been made by bees which have visited the flowers. A resident friend once purchased some honey from Kafirs, and this, Avhen used by himself and companions, caused an intense burning sensation in the throat ; they then made careful enquiries as to its origin, and traced it to a Euphorbian source. New birds were observed in the trees such as never appeared at Pretoria. A hornbill was common, but more abundant still was the pretty Lilac-breasted Holler (Coracias caiidata). At intervals on the tops of trees perched Buzzards, that seemed by their numbers to have the whole neighbourhood under * Used by some of the tribes of South Africa for poisoning water to obtain game (Parker Gillmore, ' Days and Nights by the Desert,' p. 01). THROUGH WATERBERG. 81 observation, and yet when I traversed the country again about two months subsequently, scarcely one of these birds was to be seen. A large portion of the avifauna is migratory in a local sense, and the Buzzards follow their prey. We now approached localities which will always be remembered in Boer history and recall the days of the Boer and Kafir struggle for supremacy. Potgieter's Rust is associated with a name attached to a tragedy about to be related. The place had been an improving hamlet, and had enjoyed a healthy reputation till the year 1870, when fever in a most violent form broke out among its inhabitants. By April of that year eighty- one out of the ninety-three settlers had died or were prostrated, and in May the locality was deserted. It is now again inhabited, and may in time become a town- ship. A spot, however, which is still called Makapan's Poort, is the central point of one of those wild deeds which so often give a lurid glare to the struggle be- tween native races and white settlers. At Makapan's Poort, in the year 1854, a particularly diabolical murder w7as perpetrated by a clan of Kafirs under a chief named Makapan upon a party of hunting Boers. The hunting party consisted of thirteen men and ten women and children, and were under the head of a Field-cornet, Hermanns Potgieter. Potgieter had visited Makapan to trade for ivory, although the volksraad had passed laws prohibiting this manner of barter, with the view of preventing the danger of disputes and quarrels arising between the black and white people. Whatever the provocation may have been in the demeanour of the Boer, if provocation there was, as has been currently reported at the time and since, it remains that these unfortunate people were barbarously murdered, women and children sharing the same fate, and Potgieter himself flayed alive, his skin being afterwards pre- pared for a kaross. Blood once being shed and the die cast, the Kafirs commenced to pillage the surrounding neighbourhood. Needless to say the fiercest passions for retribution G 82 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. were now aroused among the Boers, and a sense of danger demanded a swift reprisal ; no homestead was safe if this Kafir attack was allowed to develop, every farmer instinctively apprehended the emergency, and soon upwards of four hundred armed burghers had arrived at the scene of the tragedy determined on vengeance deep and terrible. The Kafirs fled to a huge cavern some two thousand feet in length and four or five hundred in width, which was closely blockaded by the Boers. Now commenced that wild revenge which is common to man's nature under similar circumstances ; it has been practised by the French in Algeria, and by ourselves during the Sepoy revolt in India. Frantic with thirst the imprisoned Kafirs sought at nio-ht to reach the water that flows near O O the cave, but were shot down in the attempt ; quarter was a word unknown, and after twenty-five days' blockade, the cavern was entered and its horrors seen. According to Commandant Pretorius — who would have 110 interest in exaggerating the figures — nine hundred o O Kafirs had been killed outside the cavern, and more than double that number had died of thirst within it*. Makapan himself is reported to have perished by poison introduced in water, but the true story of the wild vengeance will probably never be told. It was during the blockade that the present President Kriiger exhibited an act of that bravery which he has else- where displayed. A Boer commander was shot when standing near the mouth of the cavern, and Mr. Kriiger volunteered to bring away the body, which he did. This man was afterwards buried on his farm, and I have visited the grave ; it was silent and alone, as befitted the last rest of an old voortrekker. Some eight hours were at my disposal before the return coach could convey me back to Pretoria, and I seized the opportunity to visit the cavern, guided by one who knew the neighbourhood and had once been * The South-African historian, G. McCall Theal, who is cautions and not biassed against the Boer, adopts these figures (' History of South Africa, 1854-72,' p. aO). THROUGH WATERBERG. S3 an English soldier. The weather was clear and hot, we crossed large fields of maize grown by Kafirs, who are here the only agriculturists, and as we walked Clonia wdhlbergi. through these high and flourishing plants one was reminded of the fields of young sugar-cane in the East. It was in these fields that I first captured the fine orthopterous insect, Clonia wahlbergi, and experienced G2 84 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. the severity of its bite. I had previously sustained the pincer-like grip of the beetle Manticora tuberculata, which was much less painful than that of this Ortho- pteron, the mark of which on my finger was carried for several days. An hour's walk brought us to the first cave, which the Kafirs visited before proceeding to the second and larger one, where they sustained the blockade and in which most of them perished. It was very hot, and when we reached the abrupt rocky side of the hill up which wre had to climb, for the cavern is situate some distance from the base *, we were glad to quench our thirst at the small stream of cold clear water that flows along the valley at its foot. It was this stream that the thirst-maddened Kafirs sought to reach at night, when, however, the Boer bullet was usually received. Inside the gloomy pre- cincts of the cavern skulls were strewn in profusion, but generally without the lower jaws, and many have been taken away by visitors : the dung of the sheep and goats possessed by the imprisoned Kafirs was still intact on the dry floor, and handles of axes, grinding- stones for corn, baskets, &c., bore their witness to the retributive slaughter of 1854. We could not penetrate into the recesses of the cavern, as we had not brought candles ; but it was an uncanny scene, and a large dog that accompanied us seemed very ill at ease and kept near the entrance. I was able to select six very fair crania 'f*, both juvenile and adult, which I brought away, and we retraced our steps, glad to reach the " hotel " once more and drink a bottle of English ale, which, however, in this part is priced four shillings and sixpence J. All the way, both coming and going, we saw the * Mr. Alford describes these caves, of which there are a number in the neighbourhood, as "large water- worn cavities in the stmtitication of the quartzites, formed by the removal of portions of the softer beds '' (' Geolo- gical Features of the Transvaal,' p. 4!)). t These crania are now incorporated in the fine crauiological collection belonging to the Museum of the Royal College of Surgtous; and are fully described by Professor Stewart in the Appendix to this book (see p. 157). t In the Spelonken I once paid 5s. Qd., which may be taken as the high- water price for our English beverage. THROUGH WATERBERG. 85 commencement of the Mashonalancl trek. Wagons, drawn principally by donkeys, well equipped, were bearing young and enterprising spirits to Rhodes' new country and England's new Protectorate. Prospectors were hastening to find and peg-out claims which con- tained the precious reef, and though much fever and more hardship will be encountered in the early days, it Avill probably be the South- African land for the future colonist and will remain under the old flag. It is bound to absorb some of the capital of investors which might have otherwise reached the Transvaal, and though Boer and Hollander may sometimes think the Republic can do without the English, it will still miss the influx of English money. When a man has once gone prospecting he finds a charm in the life which he seldom deserts. Of course I am speaking of those free spirits who are no use in business, have a moral law unto themselves, and love the solitude of nature, diversified by an occasional carouse in a large town. Such a one wre carried in our coach on the up-journey. He was bound for Mashona- land, and had purchased the wagon and oxen to carry the party, his friends having contributed the other necessaries. The wagon, however, had gone on without him, as he informed us he had indulged in such a " paralatic drunk " that his friends had become tired of waiting, and he was now endeavouring to overtake his party. Another member of the staff had still to follow. Four times had this susceptible man driven to the Poort where the wagon waited to start, and each time accompanied by a " lady " friend to see him off, but on each occasion his will failed and he returned to town with his fair companion. These men when they do get out and settle down will be sober slaves, but they are like sailors on shore when a town is reached. My com- panion was a lump of good-nature, of strong build and constitution, and in all my experience at home and abroad I never saw a man drink so much and show the effects so little. Consequently what the nature of the banquet was which prevented his joining the wagon, can be more easily imagined than described. 86 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. The rain again commenced on our return, and we found Pretoria once more a scene of mud, with the usual results of detained mails and an almost impossibility of heavy transport. The arrival of the weekly mail is to the European exile an event of the first importance. Seven days' intellectual stagnation, in which the only recorded events are found in the dismal swamp of Boer politics, Church squabbles, and mining reports, render the new home journals most attractive, though the con- trast— apart from purely literary studies — is the record of the same motives being applied to a larger and more complex field. The same elements that compose the social and political fabric of Boerland are found at the root of our own national institutions ; but in Europe the stage is larger, the principal parts are acted with more dignity, and the scenery and decorations more im- pressive. The subject matter is the same, but the oratory has been more developed at home ; the " Oom Paul " of the Boer and the " People's William " amongst our- selves represent only a difference in degree and not of type. So it is with the civilization of Pretoria, which has reached a gaol and permanent gallows, but not yet acquired a workhouse ; it has recognized crime, as ours has, but still lacks the accompanying abject poverty of our own more developed towns and cities. Thus our home papers recorded the acting of a great national tragedy or superb social comedy, whilst the Transvaal existence has only yet advanced in politics to an ordi- nary drama, and in social distinctions to a farce. Midas may arise and does appear in the Boer republic, but he has not the potentiality for display which the plutocrat possesses in Europe, and appears ridiculous where our own creations are sometimes only offensive ; it is the difference between the processionary splendours of a travelling circus and the more gorgeous vulgarity of a Lord Mayor's Show. Tims a long and late night with the London papers was always a weekly treat compared with the uninteresting records of Transvaal communities ; but how different the impression became when leaving the townships one once more visited the solitudes of THROUGH WATERBERG. 87 South-African nature, and then the petty aims and sordid cares of our boasted development appear like an agony or a nightmare. The young Briton without family ties at home who has once roamed over these wild plains, and lived the free life, will visit, but pro- bably never die, in the old country. The anomalies of our so-called civilization are seldom really experienced or so clearly seen as from the vantage-ground of Nature's solitudes, and we there learn a lesson which we never forget, and acquire habits which last for a lifetime. Reptiles are not abundant in the neighbourhood of Pretoria. Lizards (Mabuia trimttata\ which live in holes on the banks and hillocks of the veld, may be often seen in fine weather curled up at the entrance to their abodes apparently enjoying the air ; they then ar- range their bodies in a circular manner, their legs falling flat by their sides, and thus have all the appearance of snakes. They were difficult to capture without shooting, and I frequently dug them out, when they were always found living in the company of Toads. A Monitor ( Varanus niloticns] was not uncommon about the banks of the spruits which here and there intersect the veld ; in the stomach of one I found the remains of two freshly- devoured rats and a frog. Among the different car- casses brought to the morning market by Boers for sale maybe frequently found the body of one of these animals. One Lizard (Agama kispida} is not at all uncommon, and I have secured three or four specimens from under one stone. Snakes are certainly few in number, and no Irishman need fear meeting too many specimens of his pet abhorrence near Pretoria. The Python is scarce ; I heard reports of solitary examples having been seen in widely separated spots, but was unable to obtain a specimen. One of the most mythical animals is the Crocodile, wThich is often reported as inhabiting streams which certainly do not possess a single individual. This was particularly the case in the Spelonken, where I was prevented from bathing in the deepest and best pools of the river by reports of these Saurians, of whom none of my informants had ever seen a specimen at the spot. 88 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. As the untutored mind is apt to people the air with ghosts and goblins, so the Kafir loves to imagine the waters of the dark stream as inhabited by river gods and great reptiles. Even sailors find it difficult to believe that the vast silent ocean is not peopled by huge sea-serpents and other monsters ; but, alas ! all things, and even fancies, die a natural death, and the sea-serpent has now nearly followed the mermaid. Zoological science has made it impossible to " Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea ; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn." The dangers of these rivers are not from their in- habitants, but from their swollen and sudden rush during the heavy rains. We once narrowly escaped in driving through one of these augmented streams. The water rose over the floor of the spider, which floated, and for a few moments the horses lost their foothold ; but I shouted to the Kafir boy to use the whip, and we got through. The Boer farmer I visited would scarcely believe we had driven through the stream (which was certainly due to ignorance and not courage on my part), and on our return he sent two of his sons to the river to help in an emergency, or to witness a foolhardy Britisher have at least a dangerous ducking. Of course under such a challenge the thing had to be again attempted, and we succeeded in accomplishing our purpose, though with an unexpressed resolution to try no such experiments again. The Kafir boy showed no fear, nor did he on another occasion, when the horses breaking from con- trol took fright in going down a rocky hill and bolted, while for several moments I was asking myself whether it was to be broken limbs or broken neck ! Although, as before remarked, the high veld is an almost treeless region, and Pretoria by planting has been made an exception to the somewhat general rule, its arboriculture is in danger by the arrival of the Coccid, or so-called " Australian Bug" (leery a 'purchasi], which lias ruined many trees and shrubs. Already a formidable pest in Australia, New Zealand, and North THROUGH WATERBERG. 89 America, it was first observed in the Botanic Gardens at Cape Town in 1873, and has since spread over nearly all South Africa, this scale-insect being now too frequently seen in the Transvaal. It specially attacks the orange-tree, which in the high Transvaal is the only really eatable fruit to be obtained, and hence its arrival and depreciations are the more to be regretted. This Coccid* in time may prove as serious a trouble to the arboriculturist as the prevalent lung-disease already is to the cattle-farmer and the horse-keeper. Man's development of this country is a long struggle with the different forces and agents of Nature ; if his cattle survive the sickness in the Transvaal they will not conquer the little Tsetse-fly (Ghssina morsitans) of the interior ; heavy rains and floods destroy his crops, and the scale-insect attacks his trees ; in the rich low- lands, where the most luxuriant crops can be produced, malarial fever dwells ; in the townships of the healthy highlands defective drainage is attended by malignant typhoid epidemic. Man's greatest happiness is living in conformity with Nature's laws, his greatest intel- lectual achievement has been in conquering and utilizing her forces. Dynamite is a progressive power in the Transvaal, and is an invincible force in hewing the railway-track through the quartzite rocks, constructing roads across adamantine defiles, or blasting the gold- bearing reefs. The boom of its explosion is a sound often heard, always denoting industrial enterprise ; and the word dynamite had a strange significance in my ears in this land as I observed its destructive force utilized for constructive purposes, and remembered its felonious notoriety in London a few years previously. * To those who would consult the literature relating- to this insect, its life-history, and the proposed preventive measures against its attacks, maybj recommended the following- works :• — ' Report of Prof. C. V. Riley, Ento- mologist of U.S.A., for 1886,' Washington, pp. 4(16-492 ; — ' Insects Noxious to Agriculture in New Zealand. The Scale Insects (Coccididte) ,' by W. M. Marshall, 1887 ; — Report by Mr. Roland Trim 'n — Government Notice (Blue Book) No. 113, 1877 ; — and lastly, the excellent resume on the subject by Miss Eleanor A. Ornierod in her 'Injurious Farm and Fruit Insects of South Africa.' 90 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. February 27th, or Majuba day, is rightly remembered by Boers as a general holiday. Englishmen can accept a defeat, but need not necessarily celebrate its anniver- sary, and with my nephew and man, who had accom- panied me from England, I started on the previous even- ing for the small quantity of " wood-bush " that may be found in the Pretoria district on the Waterberg Road. An old colonist, who had reached Natal as a child, and wandered about South Africa ever since, often deserted but never quite forsaken by fortune, who seemed to have never failed and never prospered, and who, with- out any great financial reputation, was content in dis- position and seemed independent in character, invited us to spend the night at a small farm he rented in the neighbourhood. We reached the abode late, for the way was long, the roads heavy, and the night dark, and here in this small domicile on the vast veld, dwelling in all the plainness of the most primitive farm at home, was a colonist family who only just preserved in the parents' early life the slightest touch with home. And yet it is with these good people that the distrust of the Boer is most strongly felt. The wealthy Colonial or British merchant thrives with the Boer and respects his customer, but with men of small means and plain living the difference is most pronounced. The soldier accepts and forgets his defeat, but these humble and industrious Scotch and English, who were scattered over the country with farm or store at the time of the war, and went through much danger, and, what was worse, had to put up with much rudeness, have, doubt- less, forgiven but certainly not forgotten. Our sleeping accommodation was at least primitive : a straw pail- lasse stretched on the earthern floor of an empty cowshed, which, nicely ventilated by holes in the walls and roof, and agreeably perfumed by strings of onions suspended from the rafters, afforded us, in the absence of rain, excellent shelter. I was informed here of a sudden cessation to a bird pest. A small Finch had swarmed on the farm to the great destruction of certain crops, and all attempts to destroy them or thin their numbers THROUGH WATERBERG. 91 had failed. These birds roosted at night on the reeds O growing in a small river-bed or vley, and one night, shortly before my arrival, and after particularly heavy rain, the waters suddenly rose and covered the reeds to the almost total destruction of the birds, for my host said he had seen scarcely any since. We frequently see swarms of insects swept away by floods, but I had not hitherto heard of a wholesale destruction of birds by the same means. The wood-bush we visited wras only a few miles in extent and thin in appearance, and yet contained almost another zoological world to the bare veld which adjoined it. Birds of many species not seen before were now met with, and many new skins secured for the collection. In insects the fine day-flying Moth (Xanthospilopteryx superba] flew amidst the shade of the acacias, and in Butterflies Herpasnia eripMci and Teracolus eris and T. evenina were captured by myself for the first time. The fine Ant-lion (Palpares caffer] was abundant round the outskirts of the trees, and large and gaudily-marked Spiders (NepMla transvaalica)* occupied in family groups or industrial communities the immense webs that stretched from tree to tree. In the ardour and pleasure of collecting we had aimlessly wandered among the trees, with the inevitable result that about noon we found we had not only lost our- selves, but all held different ideas as to the direction we should pursue. It is at such times that the mind grasps the full benefit of both savagedom and civilization, for we possessed neither the wood-lore nor path-finding capacity of the first, nor did we carry the pocket com- pass of the latter. Of course we went miles out of our way, and after hard walking for hours under a broiling sun we at last reached our spider again, and arrived late in Pretoria on the evening of Majuba day. Since January our Coleopterous visitants had in- cluded the fine and showy Buprestid Sternocera orissa. The first time I saw this grand beetle — for in the Transvaal the Beetles, as a rule, are neither large nor * A new species, described in the Appendix by Mr. Pocock (Tab. V. fig- 4). 92 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. showy — it was resting in some numbers on the still leafless branches of a solitary acacia on the bare veld. Being far beyond our reach we threw large pieces of quartzite against the branches, and the concussion, as a rule, brought the insects to the ground, when they were secured before they could take wing. This species was always found on the branches of an acacia. Beetles are, however, difficult to obtain ; they are plentiful for a short time at the commencement of the rains, then become scarcer as the summer season advances, and are almost totally absent during the long dry season. Although the hedges were a mass of roses constantly in bloom during the summer, I w7as surprised to see how little they were visited by floral beetles. Certainly myriads of the Cetoniid Pachnoda flaviveiitris could generally be seen, and also the large Cantharid Mylabris ophthalmica, but the majority of all these flower-visiting Coleoptera confined themselves to the small and obscure bloom found on the veld. A new tree would burst into bloom, its flowers lasting but a short time, during which frequently a species of the Cetoniidse not hitherto seen would visit in quantity this fugitive blossom and again quickly disappear with it. From lono- observation in the field and of the contents ^j in my cabinets at home, I had become convinced of the phenomena and the truth of the theory of mimicry* in the insect world, by which under the law of natural selec- tion edible species showing any resemblance to inedible ones, have gradually been preserved by the protection thus afforded, and the same selective process going on among their progeny for long periods of time has re- sulted in those wonderful resemblances which we now find among distinct orders of insects. So strongly was this always in my mind that I frequently was stung by real Hymenoptera, when I expected too much and thought I might be handling an imitator. But the tables were quite turned when I first captured a female of the longicorn Amphidcsmus analis, which on a leaf has a surprising resemblance to a female of the genus * Long since enunciated and proved by my friend Mr. H. W. Bates. THROUGH WATERBERG. 93 Lycus belonging to a totally different Coleopterous family, and I was completely deceived till I held the insect in my hand. The objections urged against the theory of mimicry are generally based on a total mis- understanding of the theory itself. One frequently listens to arguments against a hypothetical assumption that an insect of its own volition, for protective pur- poses, copies the garb and appearance of an inedible species. Such a wild proposition would require no objection, for it could obtain no support. It is only when one has realized the struggle for existence in all animal life — including man himself, — has recognized the unbending, inexorable, and universal application of natural laws, appreciated that benevolence is an ac- quired product of the human heart and not of natural life, and observed that all life exists in an iron-bound environment, where strength reigns supreme and the strong taketh by force — it is only then one under- stands what Herbert Spencer has so well called the " survival of the fittest," and what Darwin had enabled him thus to see by his enunciation of " Natural Selec- tion." With these facts before us we can comprehend how this "breed" of the persecuted beetle, ever tending by the attacks of its enemies — a form of natural selec- tion— to perpetuate its race by its more favoured repre- sentatives who were mistaken for inedible species, in the course of time reached — in scanty numbers, it may be — its zenith in simulative appearance and escaped extinction. These mimicking species are the shadow of a past, when there was a great need and a great danger. ", V", '>*iVj»ffi^--v ' ^j: ~.£$ •' NATIVE IIux, SPELONKEN. CHAPTER VI. ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. Start for the Spelonken in Zoutpansberg.— Horse-sickness. — Pieter.sburg. — A line Convolvulus. — A castellated residence in the Wilds. — Night in a wagon. — Kafir traders. — Kafirs on the tramp. — Polygamy. — The Magwambas, their customs ai;d institutions. — An ox feast and dance. -The Makatese. — The Mavendas and their iron- work. — Birds' food largely orthopterous. — Good entomological spots. — Zoutspansberg with its natural riches still undeveloped. I HAD for some time intended to undertake a journey through the Zoutpansberg district, and Avas engaged in making enquiries as to the best mode of conveyance to be engaged at the termination of the coach service at Pietersburg, when I was introduced to Mr. G. D. Gill, a Spelonken trader, who kindly invited me to share his wagon on his return journey, and to accept his hospi- tality during my stay in his neighbourhood. We started for Pietersburg on a cold April morning, and although the coach was timed to leave at 5 A.M., it was not before ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 95 another hour had elapsed that our black driver appeared upou the scene, when to the repeated and somewhat energetic remonstrances of the coach proprietor he merely returned the soft answer : " No, Baas, it cannot be six o'clock, I am sure." The horse-sickness was now prevalent ; a few days previously, when travelling to Johannesburg, we had to unharness a horse and leave it on the veld ; on this occasion we soon had to dispose of one of our mules in the same manner. The number of animals lost by the coach proprietors owing to this epidemic wras something enor- mous. Within the few weeks previous to my journey, the small regiment of State artillery had lost twenty-five " salted " horses, and the detachment of ten men which escorted the President to Natal were deprived of four animals between Pretoria and the Transvaal border. At present there is little or no cure known for this disease, which is a serious matter for the welfare of the Republic. The journey through Waterberg has already been described in the previous chapter, and soon after leaving Eyting's " hotel " the country once more resumes its treeless and uninteresting appearance. We reached Pietersburg about 10 P.M., on the second day after leaving Pretoria, calling at Smitsdorp and Mara- bastad on our wray. Pietersburg is a township now in course of development ; it is planned out with sites reserved for Market and Church Squares, as in Pretoria and the other Transvaal towns. Already three churches were either quite or nearly completed ; it also possesses a Landdrost,has an exceedingly healthy and open situation, is the market town of Zoutpansberg, and as Mashona- land prospers, Pietersburg must grow, for it is the last Mart on one of the principal roads to Rhodes' eldorado. Its principal inhabitants are Germans, its stores trust to a Boer trade ; and though the first prosperity of Pietersburg had received a check at the time of my visit, the township has a future. Erven, or plots, that could have been purchased a few years since for £14, are now worth from £200 to £300. We stayed a day here waiting for our wagon, and time passed very 96 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. slowly ; there is nothing to be seen or done in Pieters- burg but business, and at the time of my visit very little of that was acknowledged. The scenery around is bare plain and mountain, and health may here be restored at the cost of much ennui. It was difficult to realize that this was once a great game country, and living Boers can still remember the time when not only bucks and antelopes abounded on the now silent and lifeless veld, but even giraffes, lions, and elephants were to be found. Animal life was now almost alone represented by large numbers of the White-bellied Crow (Corvus scapulafus), which were more numerous here than in any other part of the Transvaal I visited, and the scanty flora was made memorable by a cultivated Convolvulus with blooms twice the size of the ordinary Convolvulus major, which was also most abundant in gardens. I saw this fine flower again in the Spelonken, and obtained seed from it, but I have as yet been unable to effect its germination in England. After a day passed in Pietersburg, we started in a small wagon drawn by eight oxen for the Spelonken area of the Zoutpansberg district. The first clay's trek was over bare veld, and towards evening we passed one of the most incongruous sights I saw in South Africa. Here in the desert plain suddenly appeared an effigy of an old feudal castle, reminding one more of a stage effect than of an antiquated building. This extra- ordinary structure has been built by a retired native commissioner, Capt. Dahl, and here he proposes to dwell and, I believe, end his days. I never fully realized before the true horrors of false taste ; here where a bungalow with flowered trellis and garden rich in native flora would have harmonized with the natural features of the scene, we found a second-rate representation of what was most hateful in architecture and inconsistent with its surroundings. We rested at sunset near the base of a range of hills and then trekked on till about 11 P.M., when we again outspanned the oxen and passed the night on the outskirts of a field of .Kafir maize. The first night passed in a wagon has all the charm of .ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 97 novelty ; as one gazed through the opening behind at the clear starry sky, and realized the quiet of solitude, it seemed as though life was at last free, and social exist- ence deprived of its fetters. With the second day's trek CASTELLATED RESIDE>TCE IN ZOUTPANSBERG. the scenery altogether changed, the country was more or less thickly wooded, especially after fording the Dwaas River, which we reached about noon. A few hours from this spot we crossed a plain studded with granitic hillocks, which rose like rocks and islands from a shallow sea ; viewed from above, the whole scene reminded one of some portions of the coast of Brittany at low water, and it was difficult to overcome the impression that we were gazing on an old ocean-bed. Most of these elevated masses of granite were quite bare, with their surfaces highly heated by the rays of the sun. The only Europeans we met on our road up the Spelonken were the traders, who keep Kafir stores. They all seem to succeed, and some are moderately in- dependent after years of patience, industry, and solitude, for their life is a lonely one, especially when they are, H 98 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. as in many cases, unmarried. The living is bare and but little diversified, home comforts are in some instances of the fewest number, whilst in the small flower-garden near the house may frequently be seen the tomb of some loved one, who has lived and died with them in these African solitudes, and whose remains now really conse- crate the ground. Then, again, there is much leisure time, for the Kafirs come to purchase in a sporadic manner, and hours pass without the visit of a customer ; consequently these hermit merchants are glad to have a chat with any passer by, and I found them very hos- pitable to me on my journey. An old Matabele trader named Cooksley, whom Mohr mentions in his Travels, has now settled here and has the best establishment on the road. The beauty of the spot is its flowTer-garden and orchard, both of which are due to the horticultural taste and industry of Mrs. Cooksley, who kindly supplied me with a stock of fine oranges on both upward and return journey ; it is such cultivated spots and well-kept homes that are required to be distributed among the districts inhabited by the Boer farmers, for nothing but a healthy emulation can arouse that lethargic stock. These traders altogether depend upon their native customers, and in return are able to afford them considerable pro- tection, particularly if they happen to be in the hands of unscrupulous and oppressive native commissioners. I heard many reports of savage floggings and impositions when I was in Zoutpansberg ; and the government should remember that officials do not become valuable only as they collect native taxes, for it is possible at the same time to drive Kafirs from their locations, and thus not only destroy a source of revenue, but also depress a very valuable branch of trade in the country *. All along the road we passed small bodies of Kafirs tramping home after, working at Kimberley, Johannes- burg, or Pretoria, where they usually remain for a * The government quite recently instituted an enquiry into these charges, •which could not he substantiated. It was admitted, however, that the Commissioner had flogged a native servant girl with a riding-whip for " frequent acts of immorality," but her subsequent death was decided to be due to other causes. ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 99 period not longer than three to five months. By that time they have saved a few pounds, purchased blankets, and other commodities, and commence their long walk to their kraals or location, in the warmer and more beautiful Zoutpansberg district, while some even cross the Limpopo River. The distance they travel is fre- quently over six hundred miles, and three or four hundred miles is a common journey. When on one of these long tramps they "\\ill often average eighteen miles daily, but a frequent rest for a few days at other kraals they may pass reduces the average of their daily pedestrian record. To see them toiling along with their heavy loads on head and back, frequently foot-sore and weary, but encouraged and sustained with the prospect of home once more, showed that these men had reached the elements of civilization. The labour ques- tion to them is not a matter of life-long servitude, and the few months spent working in the towns or delving in the mines is exchanged for an equal or far longer period of rustication among their own people. Some die on the road, especially in wret and cold wreather, and we saw several who seemed to be thoroughly leg-weary and worn out. The money they have earned enables them to pay their yearly tax, but more particularly to find the purchase or " custom " money for another wife. Polygamy among these Kafirs is not necessarily a sensual institution. To women is deputed the whole manual work, both household and agricultural, and a wife will try and induce her husband to earn the means by which he can obtain another wife and thus lighten her own domestic duties. As is well known, oxen or money must be given to the father-in-law before his daughter can be obtained ; but the heavy outlay thus incurred is an investment, and will be well repaid if the husband becomes the father of female children and so in turn be- comes capitalist himself. In a savage or semi-savage community, women derive protection from such a custom. Female infanticide is unknown, the woman secures a safe and valued position in the tribe, and marriage thus having a financial value, any rampant immorality is discouraged and becomes an offence to the community. ii 2 100 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. Of course, some amount of immorality exists, as in the most puritanical districts at home, but at least a stand is made for the sanctity of marriage among these Kafirs by the prohibition of unmarried girls bearing children. It is very questionable whether these men lead more sensual lives with their few wives than they would do if they practised monogamy, and there are many occasions when the woman is avoided altogether, especially for some time after child-birth. At the stage of culture to which the Kafir has at present arrived, polygamy is a useful institution ; it is a protection to the women, and an incentive to the industry and enter- prise of the men. We are too apt to judge other social arrangements, especially when belonging to what we are pleased to call inferior races, by our own standard of civilization, which is often simply the subordination of the greatest good to the fewest number. Certainly, among these Magwamba Kafirs, woman only holds the place of a valued chattel (the women always kneel when handing anything to a man) ; but even then her lot is not worse, but probably better, than that of the well- abused drudge and slave of our own brickfields. The Magwambas, or " knob-noses," so-called from having their noses originally ornamented with notches or scars, were the tribe or clan of the Bantu race with which I was principally thrown in contact. They entered Zoutpansberg about twenty years previously from the other side of the Limpopo, under the control or chieftainship of a Portuguese named Joan Albasini, and they still style themselves " path openers." They are mostly refugees from Umzila's country, since joined by other refugees from the surrounding districts, and are now the most orderly and law-abiding inhabitants of the Speloiiken. At the death of Albasini they looked to the Transvaal Government as their head, and afterwards elected the government native commissioner as their chief, a proceeding they probably now regard in the same light as the early Jews did their insistance on having a king. At the time of my visit to the Spelonken these ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAQWAMBAS. 101 Magwamba Kafirs numbered, I was told, about twenty thousand. They do not live together in large numbers, but have small scattered kraals consisting of a few huts. A favourite dress of the men is a tiger-cat skin in front and often another one behind, and the women wear a short petticoat. , MAGWAMBA WOMAN CRUSHING MEAL. There was a small kraal a little behind the store at which I stayed, from which lamentation had ascended for the last three weeks and still continued to resound across the wooded veld. The head man of this village, who started to work at Kimberley, had died on the 102 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. road, and now funeral dances and loud songs of woe were still of frequent occurrence. An Induna who accompanied me to see these rites exhibited what is called the " scepticism of the better classes," and quietly remarked with a smile, as he handed me some Kafir beer, " it will not bring him back." All these men love strong liquor, and those who can obtain it show little moderation whilst the supply remains unfinished. Two Indunas visited the store daily, and patiently waited about during my visit, knowing that I had some whiskey, and by friendly smiles solicited the favour of being asked to take a drink. To look at these two men, there could be little doubt as to how they acquired their position. Good health, a stalwart and imposing appearance, the signs of mental capacity far beyond their fellows, a general air of good-natured cunning, and an absence of what might be called " morbid conscientiousness," made up the qualities that not only created success in a kraal, but with education would have made good men of business, who could have promoted Companies and held their own on a stock exchange. These are the attributes which for ever make impossible dreams as to the perfect " equality of man." With these two Indunas we arranged the prelimi- naries for a great dance on the basis of my host pro- viding an ox to be slaughtered and eaten on the occasion. On the morning of the dance troops of Magwambas, ornamented with their most showy if scanty wearing- apparel and singing their songs or rather dirges, gathered in from all sides. Several Indunas were arrayed in war-like attire, and the whole scene reminded one of a public holiday at Hampstead or KidcUesdown at home, but without both the drunkenness and vul- garity. The only vulgar-looking Kafir was an individual in European costume, who had just returned from working at the diamond-fields. He was dressed in a suit of cords, his waistcoat was ornamented with three distinct brass watch-guards, he also possessed boots and necktie and wore a round hat ; but, compared with his . 102. ARTS AND INDUSTRIES IN THE SPELONKEN. 1 & 2. Magwamba necklaces. 4. Mavenda pick or hoe. 3. Magwamba snuff-box. 5. Magwamba ladle. 6, 7, 8, 9. Magwamba head-rests. ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 103 less clothed but more artistically attired brethren, he looked like an East-end rough at home. Oh ! nine- teenth-century civilization, you have polluted the fairest spots with smoke and hideous erections, from which the factory bell tolls like a Newgate summons to the MAGWAMBA WAR-AXES. condemned labourers ; now in the Spelonken you send us such a vulgarized, if civilized, wretch as this ! He dances not, he smiles not, he only looks on, but in a short time he will dispense with these hideous robes and once more dance and eat his mealies with his happy friends. The dances might be described as of a " program " nature, and represented phases and events of Kafir life, such as " bearding a lion in his den," £c. ; they com- menced at about 11 A.M. and continued almost uninter- ruptedly till about 4 P.M. The men and boys formed a wide outer circle, inside which in two close phalanxes were the married women and unmarried girls. A Kafir really dances — he acts the dance, he enjoys it, he lives his part in it ; to him a dance is a lamentation or a rejoicing, the glory of a fight or the story retold 104 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. of a homely reminiscence : no wonder the labourer gladly tramps back from the large towns, where his existence is a compound of work and restriction, to the family life of the kraal. There freedom is com- bined with gaiety and excitement, wants are few, and their food simple and to hand. But the cry frequently heard from Europeans is that the government " should make the niggers work," and this by imposing heavy taxation. The advocates of this doctrine are often speculators, who believe that civilization consists in acquiring gold, and that the Kafir race should become one huge corps of miners to enable them to carry out the operation. For myself I often envied the simple wants and few troubles of these happy Magwambas. During the dance, the unfortunate ox that was doomed " to make a Kafir holiday " stood a quiet spec- tator of the scene, but was assegaied as the afternoon progressed, and the process of flaying was commenced before the animal was quite dead. Kafirs have no regard for animal suffering; they carefully tend their oxen while alive, but when once it is decided to slaughter an animal, all consideration for the beast vanishes and the same individual can be as cruel a butcher as he was formerly a kind and attentive shepherd. The meat was quickly stripped from the carcass, numerous small fires were made, and the ox was soon a thing of the past. It is during such feasts that savage instincts are really seen, and we recognize that self-restraint and gentle manners after all are the true marks of civilization. The authenticity of many travellers' accounts of the religious beliefs and origins of customs among so-called savage races have been long doubted, and on this journey I found the utmost difficulty in extracting any reliable or exact information from the Magwambas. I could only be told by one what was too often contradicted by another, and this, not because of their untruthfulness, but simply owing to our mutual ignorance of each other's meaning. Nor was it due to a want of knowledge of their language, as my host was a ft-, MAGWAMBA ASSEGAIS AND SHIELD. ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 107 thorough linguist, and, what was more, remained on the most friendly and trusted relations with them. One must live for some time with the Magwambas, and as a Magwamba, before any true insight can be obtained into their real speculative opinions, and then very few of them have clear notions on these points. It would be the same if a learned and anthropological Magwamba was pos- sible, who should visit England and in a short time endeavour to study the origin and meaning of much theological and philosophical reasoning found in our midst. If he mixed only with our lower classes he would find little opinion at all ; our middle classes would give him varied and often erroneous definitions ; whilst among those of leisure he would find Galileos who cared for none of these things. So it is, in a more moderate degree, among native races, where are also found the totally ignorant, the thoroughly mis- taken, and the supremely indifferent, as elsewhere. The Magwambas are not the only tribe of Bantu Kafirs living in the Spelonken. The Makatese, originally fugitives from the Basuto and Bechuana countries and taking their name from the supposition that they were all subjects of Ma Ntatisi*, are now the most numerous in Zoutpansberg, and, under the chief Magato, are located on a long mountain range which exhibits one of the glories of the landscape. The Makatese, I was informed, now number upwards of thirty thousand. The Mavenda Kafirs are a branch of the Makatese, and closely allied to the Basutos, and amongst these people iron-smelting and manufactured iron-work in a rough way is carried on. My friend arranged that I should witness the making of a "pick" or agri- cultural hoe, the principal article fabricated, and the head Mavenda sent me his pony on which to ride to his home on the summit of a hill, where I was received by himself and assistants under a thatched roof where the primitive forge was erected. The fire was soon * G. McCall Theal, ' History of the Boers,' p. 03. 108 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. lighted, charcoal being used, and a small calabash con- taining iron (the ore procured from an iron mountain in the vicinity and previously smelted) was produced, the contents of which were thrown on the fire when sufficiently heated. When the metal was fused it was laid on a large block of stone and beaten into shape by another heavy stone wielded with great force by a stalwart and adept assistant, and it was interesting to watch how, with these rough implements, the pick slowly but surely grew into shape. It was taken from the forge by a rough pair of tongs held by the head man, who always whistled during the time he thus held it on the stone anvil, and his assistant with a grunt brought down his heavy weight on the exact spot indicated by his chief. During the whole time two men took it in turn to blow the bellows made of buck or goat skin, with the hollow horns of antelopes for the funnel, whilst several visitors squatted round and watched the operation. It was living in the iron age, and thought travelled back to the bygone times in human progress. These picks are greatly valued by Kafir agriculturists, always maintaining a value of about five shillings, and are greatly preferred to those made in Birmingham, which can be imported and sold for less money. The manufacture of the pick forms thus a true native industry, and in this region is almost confined to the Mavendas, amongst whom, I was assured, there was a recognized compact that none should be sold under a certain price. The Mavendas by their industrial arts are thus more advanced in material progress than the Magwambas, with whom they live in contact, though the Magwamba women always wear a petticoat, and the female Mavendas have simply the ordinary waist- bandage. But though much less clothed, the Mavenda women are better-looking and exhibit the signs of more intellect than the Magwambas possess. Material progress and clothing certainly do not always go together. I considerably added to my natural history collection during the ten days I spent at the Spelonken, awaiting H M < S 09 g W f1 H M 3 O ZOUTPANSBEEG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. Ill the wagon for my return jonrney, and in this I was greatly assisted by the Magwamba boys, who, on finding that there was really a market, set thoroughly to work in procuring specimens. Birds were mostly brought alive, as the lads were adepts at trapping, or when killed they were generally in perfect condition, as the blunted wooden arrow-head was used. At first some of the men would bring a small bird pierced by a bullet shot from an old " Brown Bess " ; but they soon knew the requirements better, and a good ornitholo- gical collection could have been obtained had I possessed leisure to remain longer on the spot. The great trouble was to prevent them bringing the same thing over and over again, and to make them under- stand that insects were valueless when crushed ; but they really experienced pleasure in trapping and shooting birds, and would attentively watch the process of skinning. As the lads brought in my prizes, I recalled the same arrangement made years before with the Nicobarians in the Bay of Bengal and the Malays of Province Wellesley. Animal life was, however, scarce, the dry season had just commenced and birds had generally left the neighbourhood. The only predatory beast was the Jackal (Canis mesomelas), whose shrill cries or screams had broken our rest and disturbed the deep stillness of the night as we journeyed up in the wagon. On our arrival at the store we heard that these animals had been prowling around and had dragged away a dried hide a few nights previously. Buck were very scarce, one species only, the Duyker (Cephalolophus grimmii), being obtained during my stay. No quantity of big game can now exist near a Kafir location since the intro- duction of firearms, and the natives have learned to use a gun with much greater precision than in their early fights with the Boers, when they frequently shut both eyes before firing. The dry veld now no longer contained its rich variety and myriad numbers of orthopterous insects, and this, I believe, was the cause of the almost utter absence of 112 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. birds in the spots where they were previously so abundant. In the Transvaal I found that almost all birds fed on this rich banquet of the rainy season, and I have even seen the crops of Kestrels (Cerchneis tinnunculoides and amurensis) crammed with the remains of these insects ; the Short-eared Owl (Asio capensis] also feeds on large Coleoptera, the crop of one specimen I procured containing nothing else. As soon as the dry season recommences there is an absolute dearth of insect-life on the veld, and birds must then seek other areas in quest of food. The most showy bird in the Spelonken was the Roller (Coracias caudata), and the curious cry of the Grey Plantain-eater (Schizorhis concolor] wTas generally to be heard when one rambled among the trees ; whilst in Francolins, Francolinits subtorquatus and F. yariepensis replaced the Francolinus levaillantii which I had recently found so plentiful in Pretoria. Here also I observed and obtained the great Jackal Buzzard (Buteo jaJcal], which I never met with in the Pretoria district. The best entomological spot found in Zoutpansberg was on the banks of the Dwaas River near the ford which forms part of the high road ; on the damp sandy banks hovered clusters of small yellow butter- flies (Terms brigitta and T. zoe\ like constellations of primrose-blooms, and in the same spots the dragonfly (Trithemis sanguinolcnta) literally swarmed; besides these species I procured, during a half-hour's stay, the pretty Teracolus subfasciatus, besides several other species of the same genus, and on the wing captured different species of Bnprestidce and Longicorma. As this was at the end of the summer, it should prove a good locality at the right season for a travelling collector. I could have pleasantly passed the day 011 these wooded and sandy banks, but the oxen wrere once more inspanned and my friend was anxious to resume his journey home. Species of Teracolus abounded all along the road, and I often walked behind the wagon net in hand with the best results ; it was thus that I ZOUTPANSBERG AND THE MAGWAMBAS. 113 captured the only specimen of Teracolus vesta I found in the Transvaal. Zoutpansberg is one of the richest districts of the Transvaal, if not the very richest, so far as fertility of soil is concerned ; its auriferous deposits are highly spoken of; its scenery is in many places superb and in strong contrast to the melancholy monotony of the high veld. To leave Pretoria and in two or three clays reach the natural beauties of Zoutpansberg, after necessarily traversing the pleasant Waterberg district, is like exchanging a wilderness for fairyland. That high tableland of treeless veld, with its everlasting monotony of plain and kopje, is fit abode for the quiet and unimaginative Boer ; its very sameness reminds him, or, rather, appeals to his fancy, of the plains of Palestine, of which he reads so much and understands so little ; solitude not nature appeals to his mind, and Words- worth in these worthy folk would have found a people who had given their hearts away from nature without the excuse of the world being too much with them. But when we descend to the lower lands of Zout- pansberg, with its warmer air, its rich vegetation, and its happy Kafir population, our touch with Nature seems to be once more resumed. However, Zout- pansberg is not alone destined for the dreams of a Rousseau, it may yet prove the gem of the Transvaal. Give a rail connecting it with Pretoria and from thence to the sea, and this fertile land would produce the richest farms on the face of the globe. What incentive is there now to struggle for an agricultural produce that could find no market I this long and costly trans- port would prove the ruin of the farmer who culti- vated this life-giving land. Take maize alone and compare its value in Zoutpansberg with its price in Pretoria, and still the much lower figure is more profitable to the grower than the higher obtainable in the capital, for the cost of carriage would entail a loss, and the time employed for the same would prove the destruction of all fresh goods that demand early consumption. A rail would also develop its i 114 A NATURALIST IN THE TRANSVAAL. mining capacities, and had these lines been earlier constructed Pretoria might have become the terminus for Central Africa. As I returned the dry season proclaimed its advent by the frequency of grass-fires, and the few residents one met affirmed that the rains were over for the season ; so certain were they on this score that my wagon was not even provided Avith its sail-covering in case of wet, an omission that might have caused much discomfort, as a storm went before us to Pietersburg and exceed- ingly heavy rain fell there on May 2nd, the day before we arrived. At Pietersburg we met men going up to and coming down from Mashonaland ; and though much doubt still exists, we shall see whether British enterprise in that new Protectorate is not as capable of producing a country, from a " geographical expression," as successfully as other influences have created the Transvaal, thanks to its auriferous deposits and its attendant European settlers. i'-'l MAGWAMBA CARVINGS. Pachnodu Jiavii-entris. APPLE-DESTROYERS IN NATAL. CHAPTER VII. Plcesiorrhina pi 4. silicea, 194. Diptera, 46, 67, 244. Discolia caffra, 211. — prcecana, sp. n., 211, 222. preestabilis, sp. n., 211, 222. Dismegistusjimbriatus, 245. Distantetta, gen. n., 229. — trinotata, sp. n., 211, 230. Dopper Church, 27. Doryhis helvolus, 211. Dragonflies, 45, 54, 112. Dresser. H. E., 165. Dromica yiyantea, 187. Durban, 8, 121. Beach Wood, 123. Berea, the, 122. Bluff, the, 122. Museum, 121. Pleasures of the naturalist at, 124. Dim-ant, J. Hartley, 235, 242. Dust-storm, 47. "Duyker," the, 111. Dwaas River, 97, 112. Dynamite, 58, 89, 120. East London, 8. Ectobia en'cetorum, 153, 258. Edocla quadrisiynata, 248. Eyybolia vaillantina, 122, 237. Elanus c(snileus, 163, 165. Elriphinis iworata, 123, 194. - latecostata, 123, 194. Elasmopoda undata, 246. Eletica rufa, 198, 199. Elis barbata, 211, 223. Epiluclma bifasciata, 209. — dregei, 209. hirta, 209. Episeuxis cetkiops, sp. n., 239. Eqitus quayya, 75. Eremias lineo-oceUata, 174. Eriesthis yuttata, 192. semihirta, 192. Eronia leda, 123, 234. Esti'elda astrild, 107. Eubolia deercana, 240. - proxaulkaria, 240. - punicaria, 240. Eucalyptus, 17. Euchromia africana, 123, 236. Euclasta war rent, sp. n., 241. Eidcptus caffcr, 188. Eumenes tinctor, 210. Euphorbia, 45, 80. Poisonous qualities, 80. Eupoda, 203. Habits, 203. Euporus callichromoides, 20] . Euryope terminalis, 205. Eurytela hiarbas, 233. Exochomus iiiyromaculatus, 152, 209. Exoccetus lineatus, 3. Falco n/ficollis, 164, 165. Farm, Xatal model, 126. Farmer, British, wanted in the Transvaal, 138. Farmers, Boer, 21, 22, 34, 45, 113. Great want of education, 133, 138. Floods, and loss of life, 53, 60, 78, 88, 129. Flowers, common English, culti- vated in the Transvaal, 18. Flying-fish, 3. Francolinus yariepensis, 112, 168. - levaillantii, 75, 112, 168. Protective coloration, 75. • subtorquatus , 112, 168. Gahan, C. J., 201, 204, 206. 268 INDEX. Galerucidfe, 60, 206. Gametis balteata, 194. Gastracantha, sp., 180. Gellia cmgulicollis, 246. Geological features around Pretoria., 58. Gerrhosaurusjlavigularis, 174. Gill, G. D., 94. Gladstone, Mr., name of, in the Transvaal, 140. Glareola melanoptera, 169. Glaucidium perlatum, 105. Glauconia distanti, sp. n., 175. Glypsus conspicuus, 245. - mcestus, 245. " Gom Paauw," 74. Gomphocarpus, sp., 02, 66. Gonodela amandata, 240. OorffOpMs libania, 238. Gorham, Rev. H. S., 197. Graphipterus cordiger, 188. - ovatus, 188. - westwoodi, 188. Grass-fires, 21, 46, 114. Gryllotulpa africana, 258. Gryllus bimaculatus, 258. - compactus, 258. - leucostomus, 258. Guinea-fowl, 13, 72. Gymnopleurw ccelatus, 191. - wahXbergi, 191. Gynandrophthalma anisogramma, 204. Gynanisa main, 238. V, 69, 163, 165. Hailstones forming blocks of ice, 53. Halitonoma epistomata, 204. Halyomorpha capitata, sp. n., 245, 249. - pretoria, sp. n., 246, 250. Hamanumida d&dahis, 40, 41, 233. Haritala qiiaternalis, 241. Harpalus capicola, 188. Ilarpax tricolor, 258. Hfcyrida terrca, 202. Hedybius amcenus, sp. n., 197. Heidelberg, 117. Hdiocopris hamadryas, 191. Helioryctes melanopyrus, 210. Hemaris hylas, 236. Hemipimpla, 227. cfl/m, sp. n., 211, 227. calliptera, sp. n., 211, 228. Hemisaya preedatoria, sp. n., 65, 258. Devours Danais chrysippus, 65. Herpeenia eriphia, 91, 234. Hesperia forestan, 235. Heterocera, 235. Habits &c., 230. Ileterocorax capensis, 167. Heteroderes inscriptus, 195. Heteroniera, 67, 198. Habits of, 198. Heteronychus, sp., 193. Heteroptera, 244. Heteropternis hyalina, 260. Hibiscus, 18, 125. Hierodula gastrica, 258. Himatismus bitprestoides, 199. Hindu race at Durban, 8. Hippobosca rujipes, 244. Hipporhimis corniculatus, 200. cornutus, 200. pihilarius, 200. Hirundo cucullata, 167. semintfa, 167. If^fe/- cq/er, 190. fossor, 190. - hottentotta, 190. ovatula, 190. Hokostethus obscuratus, sp. n., 245, 249. Hollanders, 35, 134, 135, 148. Ilomceocerus annulatus, 246. maynicornis, 246. Homonotus cesntlans, sp. u., 211, 213. - pedestris, sp. n., 211, 214. Ilomoptera, 243. Honey poisonous, when derived from bloom of Euphorbias, 80. s, 191. INDEX. 269 Hoploterna valga, 246. Horse-sickness, 95. Humbella tenuicornis, 260. Hybosorus arator, 191. Hydrous, sp., 189. Hymenoptera, 67, 210. Hypanis ilithyia, 46, 233. Hyperacantha oculata, 206. Hyphantornis velatus, 167. Hypolimnas misippus, 65, 233. Hypolithus, sp., 188. Hypselogehia concava, 193. Hystrichopus coffer, 188. leery a purchasi, 88. Illicit diamond-buying, 138. Insects protected from their enemies by mimicry or protective resem- blance frequently thus survive some incipient mortality which would have otherwise helped to effect their extinction, 62. lolaus bowkeri, 234. Iron-work among the Mavenda Kafirs, 107. Ischnostoma nasuta, 193. Islam, a Priest of, 117. Jackal, the, 111. Jacoby, Martin, 204. Janson, Oliver, 193. Jews in the Transvaal, 36, 135. Financial ability, 136. Their cosmopolitanism and gaiety, 137. Their knowledge of the country, 136. Johannesburg, 13, 116. Absence of trees, 116. Hotels, 117. Most English town in the Transvaal, 138. '' Jumping hare," 75. Junonia boopis, 233. cebrene, 40, 233. clelia, 233. Kafir and Boer, 22, 24, 25, 81, 98. Kafir labour, 22, 24, 98, 104, 140. Distance travelled to work, 99. Manual labour at present de- pendent on, 141. Work to procure money to obtain another wife, 99. Kafir stores and Kafir traders, 97. Solitary life, 97. Kestrels, 112, 163. Kirby, W. F., 235, 256. Kriiger, S. J. P., President, 28, 33, M>. Labidura riparia, 153, 257. Ladysmith, 121. Lcelia adspersa, 237 . Layn'a, sp., 199. Laings Nek, 11, 120. Kailway tunnel, 120. Lamprocolius sycobius, 164, 167. Lampropliis rufulus, 176. Laniarius atrococcineus, 167. ffutturalis, 167. Lanius collaris, 55, 167. collurio, 167. Larra ornata, 210. Lebeda aculeata, 237. Lebia, sp., 188. Lepidoptera, 153, 231. Leptodira rufescens, 176. Leptosoma apicalis, 123, 236. Leucania amens, 238. cqyparata, 238. percussa, 238. substituta, 238. Lewis, George, 190. Life on the table-lands compared with that on the sea, 59. Lion, probably in the Transvaal con- fined to Zoutpansberg, 157. Liquor, love of, by Kafirs, 102. Lithosia ? fumeola, 237. Litopus dispar, 201. Livus, sp., 200. Locris arithmetica, 248. transversa, 248. 270 INDEX. Locust chased by dogs, 39. eaten by Kafirs, 72. eaten by poultry and bustards 72. - impaled on barbed wire, 55. swarm, 71. Longicornia, 201. Habits &c., 201. Lophoceros hiicomelas, 104, 166. Lophonotus, sp.,244. Lost in the wood-bush, 91. Luclola capensis, 197. Li/cfsnesthes liodes, 234. Lycauyes donovani, sp. n., 240. Lycus ceolus, 196. ampliatus, 196. bremel, 123, 196. constrictus, 196. dilatatus, 196. - distanti, sp. n., 196. integrypennis, 196. — kolbei, 196. •/. • -t f\r> pyfyoinnS) lob. rostratus, 196. subtrabeatus, 196. — zonatus, 196. Lygceida-, 45, 67, 247. Lyyceosoma villosula, 247. Lyi/aus campestris, sp. n., 247, 253. - desertus, sp. n., 247, 252. elegans, 247. - planitite, sp. n., 247, 252. - rivularis, 247. septus, 247. - trilweatus, 247. Lygdamid capitata, 258. Mabuia striata, 174. - trivittata, 87, 173, 174. Great resemblance to snake when curled up, 87. Inhabit holes with toads, 87. Machetes pvijnax, 169. Machla porc.dla, 199. MacLachlan, R., 256. Macroglossa true /til us, 236. Macroma cognata, 194. Macronyx capensis, 164, 168. Magato, chief of the Makatese, 107. Magwambas, the, 100. Dress, 101. Funeral dances &c., 102. Killing an ox and great dance, 102. Love of strong liquor, 102. Number in the Spelonken, 101. Originally refugees from sur- rounding districts, 100. Maiden-hair ferns, 45. Maize cultivated by Kafirs, 83. Majuba Hill, 10, 90, 120, 128, 135. Makapau's Cave, 82, 84. Immense slaughter of Kafirs, 82. Kafirs blockaded by Boers, 82. Makapan's Poort, 81. Scene of murder by Kafirs in 1854,81. Makatese, the, 107. Location in the Spelonken, 107. Malacoderrnata, 196. Malays at Cape Town, 5. Mamestra breciuscula, 238. renisigna, 238. Mammalia, 152, 157. Mangoes, 125. Man's development of the Transvaal a struggle with the different forces and agents of Nature, 89. Manticora tuberculata, 50, 187. Mantis sacra, 258. Maritzburg=Pietennaritzburg, 121, 127. Mashonaland trek, 85. Maura rubro-ornata, 259. Maveudas, the, 107. Iron-smelting and iron manu- facture, 107. Making a pick or hoe, 108. Megachile maxillosa, 210. Megalonychus inter stitialis, 188. Melanitis Icda, 232. INDEX. 271 Melinesthes umbonata, 194. Melittophagus meridionalis, lOli. Melybfsus crassus, 195. Men who early in life visit South Africa seldom finally leave it, 87, 138, 139. Menius distanti, sp. n., 205. Merops apiaster, 44, 152, 1G6. Mesa diapheroffamia, sp. n., 211, 225. Mesops abbreviatus, 259. Micrantems validus, 199. Microstylum dispai; 244. Milcus fpffi/ptius, 56, 165. Mimicry, 41, 66, 92. Mimosa-bark, 116. Miomantis fenestrata, 258. Mirperus jacuhis, 246. Mist and fog, 116. Monitor, the, 77, 87, 174. Monockelus, sp., 192. Monoleptajlaveola, 206. Monticola brevipes, 166. Morcegamus ylobiceps, 202. Motacilla capensis, 49, 70, 164, 168. Attacking a moth, 70. Pursuing species of Acrcea, 70. Moths flying to light, 122. Mus coucha, 159. - raffias, 152, 159. (Isomys) immilio, 159. Musca domestica, 244. Museum at Cape Town, 5. at Durban, 121. at Port Elizabeth, 8. Mutilla albistyla, sp. n., 211, 225. tetensis, 211. Mycalesis perspicua, 232. Mygnimia belzebuth, sp. n., 211, 218. depressa, sp. n., 211, 219. distanti, sp. n., 211, 220. -fallax, sp. n., 211, 221. Mijlabris capensis, 199. ffrondali, 199. lunata, 199. mixta, 199. ophthalmica, 92, 199. Mylabris transvwsalis, 126, 199. tristigma, 199. Mylothris ayathina, 234. Myoxus murinus, 159. Myriopoda, 181. MyrmecoricMaformicivora, 166. Myrmeleon triviiyatus, 256. Nanotrayus scoparius, 159. Nassunia bupaliata, 240. Native commissioners and treatment of Kafirs, 98. Naupliata eircumvagens, 258. Nectar inia fainosa, 166. Nemoynatha, 199. Nephila transvaalica, sp. n., 91, 179, 180. Small colonies living in gigantic webs, 91, 179. Neptis ayatha, 233. 'Nerium oleander, 18. Neuroptera, 255. Habits &c., 255. Neurosymploca ayria, sp. u., 230. - concinna, 236. Newcastle, 9, 119. Nezara capicola, 246. — virirlulft, 246. Night in a wagon, 96. Nilaus bnibrii, 167. Nomophila noctudla, 153, 241. Nucras tessellata, 174. Numida coronata, 13, 72. Nylstroom, 80. Nysius novitius, sp. n., 247, 254. Oceanic birds, 4. Ochrophh'bia liyneola, 259. Ocypete meyacephala, 180. CEcanthos capensis, 258. (Edahis acutanyulm, 260. - eitrinus, 260. - marmoratus, var., 260. - nif/ro-fasciatits, 200. , 260. (Edimemus capensi*, 169. 272 INDEX. Oleanders, 18. Oncqpeltus famelicus, 247. Oniticellus militaris, 191. Onitis caffer, 191. Onthophagus gazella, 191. Ootheca modesta, sp. n., 206. Ophisma croceipennis, 239. - pretorice, sp. n., 239. Orthetnimfasciculata, 255, 250. - sitbfasciolata, 255, 256. Orthoptera, 153, 257. Habits &c., 257. The food of many birds, 112. Oryctes boas, 193. Osteodes turbulentata, 240. Otis afroides, 74, 168. - carulescens, 74, 75, 168. - tori, 74, 128, 168. Food, 74. Maximum weight, 74. Oxytlnjrea eeneicollis, 194. - amabilis, 194. - cinctella, 194. - heemorrhoidaUs, 195. - marginalia, 194. - perroudi, 194. - rubra, 194. Ozarba densa, 238. - dubitans, 238. Pachnoda Jlaviventris, 92, 115, 126, 194. - leucomelana, 194. Pachycnema tibialis, 192. Pachymerns apicalis, 247. Pachytylus lucasii, 260. - migratoroides, 71, 260. Immense swarm, 71. j's decora, 236. Paliya infuscah's, 241. Palpares caffer, 91, 256. Palpopleura jucunda, 256. - /MCMZ, 123, 256. - portia, 256. Pamera proximo, 247. Painjj/iiln hottentota, 235. Pangonia subfascia, 244. Pantoleistes princeps, 247. Papilio demoleus, 45, 123, 235. morania, 123, 235. Paracinema basalis, 260. - tricolor, 260. Pnramecocoris atomarius, 245. ventralis, 240. Parathespis galeata, 258. Parga (/radii's, 259. Paroeme gahani, sp. n., 201, 202. Partridges, 75, 112. Pirwz/s Y W.Purkiss del. w 3. Mintern Bros . C}irom£> . 1. Amisntus un.dosus. ft.Bolboceras bs.tesii . 3. Tragocephala. sulph.ur-a.ta . 2 Hedybius araoetiua . 6. Meniios distan-ti . 10. yEnidea pretoriee. S.Lycus distonti . 7 . Paroeme gahani . 11 . Ootheca, modesta. 4.AcKeeixops facialis. 8. Crosaot.usklu.gii. 12. Spilocepkalus viridipenms . R.H. Porter, 1-ulolisher, London. NAT . IN TRANSVAAL . Ta.-v.II. 4. 7. 6. W.Porkiss del. Mirxtern. Bros . Chror 1 Hediivius capitahs 4. Lycauges donovani . 8 . Redavxus sertus. - Epizexucis astKiops . 5 . Euclasta Trarreru . i5 . Nexirosymploca agria 3.Redu.vius piolvisculatus. S . CrotKaema. decorata, 10, Pirates conspurcatus . 7. OpVusma. pret.oriae . R.H. Porter. Publisher, London.. f, IN TRANSVAAL . Tab. III. W Rirkiss del . Miritern- Bros . Chrorno . 1. Cimex figu.ra.Uis,va.r. 5. Veterna patula. 9 . Lygaeus deser-Lus . 2. Holcostetkus obscuratus. S. Antestia. transvaalia. . lO.Lygseus cajrapestris 3. 'Halyomorpha. ca.pjta.ta.. 7. Lygaeus planitiae 11 . Nysms n.ovitius.. 4. HalyomorpKa. pretoriee . 8. Plina.cKtu.s falca,tns. 12. TransvaaJi a. Ivigens . R.H .Porter, Publisher, NAT . IN TRANSVAAL . T.3LV. TV. 10. 11. W. Purkiss del. Mintern. Bros. Chromo. 1. .Xipkocera. distant!. 4,a,b,c,dl,e, Sematocera .gen.. chara.ct . 8. Mesa diapherogamia . . •2.Xiphocera, picta . 5 . Chrotogonus Tneridion.alis . 3. Discolia praestatilis . 3. Petasia. spumaris var. ater. 6. Ampulexnigroccerulea. . 10 Arxcylopus fuscipennis . 4.Sema.tocera iul]'girup-un.cta. 7-Mutilla altistjda. 11 .Discolia prgEcana.. R. H . Porter. PutlisKer , Lon.don-. ;N TRANSVAAL,. Tab V: W. Purkis s del . eL li Lh . 1 . Homonotas anemia 2 . CypKon.on.yx- an.tenna.ta . 3 . Eriocnemis im-siitus . 4 . NepKila. tratxsvaalica. . crn. Bros . imp . 5 Iviygruinia fallax. 6. Homonotiis pedestris . 7 My^rumia. distazvti . 8. Mygrumia belzetutK. 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