Pioneers and Founders: or, Recent Workers in the Mission fieldYonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
History
Pioneers and Founders: or, Recent Workers in the Mission field
Yonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
Missionaries
Sir Benjamin D'Urban had just been appointed Governor, and it was
apprehended that a war must take place, since the settlers were
continually liable to sudden attacks by these wild Kaffirs, who burnt,
slew, and robbed any homestead they fell upon. Captain Gardiner thought,
and justly, that it would be better to begin by proclaiming the glad
tidings of peace to these wild and ignorant people rather than to meet
them with the strong hand of war. The colony was lamentably deficient in
clergy, and the missions that existed were chiefly to the Hottentots and
Bushmen. The Moravians, whose work we have not mentioned because it is a
history in itself, had some excellent establishments, but no one had yet
attempted to penetrate into the home of the Kaffirs themselves, the Zulu
country, to endeavour to deal with their chieftains. This was Allen
Gardiner's intention, and on his outward voyage he met with a Polish
refugee named Berken, who had intended to settle in Australia, but was
induced to become his companion in his explorations in South Africa.
They rode together from Capetown to Grahamstown, where they obtained an
interpreter named George Cyrus, and began to travel in the regular South
African fashion, namely, with waggons fitted for sleeping in, and drawn
by huge teams of oxen, and taking seven horses with them. Their first
adventure during a halt at the Buffalo river was the loss of all their
oxen, who were driven off by some natives. They applied to the chief of
the tribe, named Tzatzoe, who recovered the cattle for them, but showed
himself an insatiable beggar, even asking why, as Mr. Berken had two
shoes, he could not spare him one of them. However, he was honest
enough, when Mr. Berken chanced to leave his umbrella behind him, to send
after him to ask whether he knew that he had left his _house_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account