Oom Paul's People: A Narrative of the British-Boer Troubles in South Africa, with a History of the Boers, the Country, and Its InstitutionsHillegas, Howard Clemens
History
Oom Paul's People: A Narrative of the British-Boer Troubles in South Africa, with a History of the Boers, the Country, and Its Institutions
Hillegas, Howard Clemens
Afrikaners -- History; Kruger, Paul, 1825-1904; Transvaal (South Africa) -- History -- 1880-1910
It is a city of which Englishmen are proud, for its statue of Queen
Victoria is beautiful, the Government society is exclusive, "Tommy
Atkins" is there in regiments, and the British flag floats on every
staff. Cape Town, too, is the home of the politicians who manage the
Colonial Office, which in turn has charge of the South African colonial
affairs. Two cable lines lead from South Africa to London, and both
dive into the ocean at Cape Town, where live Cecil J. Rhodes, Sir Alfred
Milner, and the other politicians who furnish the cablegrams and receive
the replies. Farther north on the east coast, about three days’ sail
around the Cape, is the colony of Natal, peaceful, paradisaical, and
proud. Taken by conquest from the Zulus a half century ago, it has
already distanced its four-times-older competitor, Cape Colony, in
almost all things that pertain to the development of a country. Being
fifteen hundred miles farther from London than Cape Town, it has escaped
the political swash of that city, and has been able to plough its own
path in the sea of colonial settlement.
Almost all of Natal is included in the fertile coast territory, and
consequently has been able to offer excellent inducements to intending
settlers. The majority of these have been Scotchmen of sturdy stock,
and these have established a diminutive Scotland in South Africa, and
one that is a model for the entire continent. Within the last year the
colony has annexed the adjoining country of the Zulus, which, even if it
accomplishes nothing more practical, increases the size of the colony.
Durban, the entry port of the colony, is the Newport of South Africa, as
well as its Colorado Springs. Its wide, palm-and-flower-fringed
streets, its ’ricksha Zulus, its magnificent suburbs, and its healthful
climate combine to make Durban the finest residence city on the Dark
Continent. Pietermaritzburg, the capital of the colony, on the other
hand, has nothing but its age to commend it. The colony produces vast
quantities of coffee, tea, sugar, and fruits, almost all of which is
marketed in Johannesburg, in the Transvaal, which is productive of
nothing but gold and strife.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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