South Africa -- Description and travel; South Africa -- History -- 1836-1909; South Africa -- History -- To 1836
I was taken down to Constantia where I visited one of the few grape
growers among whom the vineyards of this district are divided. I found
him with his family living in a fine old Dutch residence,--which had
been built I was told by one of the old Dutch Governors when a Governor
at the Cape was a very aristocratic personage. Here he keeps a few
ostriches, makes a great deal of wine, and has around him as lovely
scenery as the eye of man can desire. But he complained bitterly as to
the regulations,--or want of regulations,--prevailing in regard to
labour. “If an idle people could only be made to work for reasonable
wages the place would become a very Paradise!” This is the opinion as to
labour which is left behind in all lands in which slavery has prevailed.
The man of means, who has capital either in soil or money, does not
actually wish for a return to slavery. The feelings which abolished
slavery have probably reached his bosom also. But he regrets the control
over his fellow creatures which slavery formerly gave him, and he does
not see that whether a man be good or bad, idle by nature and habits or
industrious, the only compulsion to work should come from hunger and
necessity,--and the desire of those good things which industry and
industry alone will provide.
On the other side of Capetown,--the other side from the direction
towards Wynberg,--there is another and the only other road out of
Capetown which leads down to Sea Point, where there is a second pleasant
suburb and a second clustering together of villa residences. Here the
inhabitants look direct on to Table Bay and have the surges of the
Atlantic close to their front doors. The houses at Sea Point are very
nice, but they have nothing of the Elysian scenery of Wynberg.
Continuing the road from Sea Point the equestrian, or energetic walker,
may return by the Kloof,--anglice Cleft,--which brings him back to town
by a very picturesque route between the Lion and Table Mountains. This
is almost too steep for wheels, or it would claim to be called a third
road out of the town.
I was taken to see two schools, the high school at Rondebusch, and a
school in the town for coloured lads. At the high school the boys were
away for their holidays and therefore I could see nothing but the
outside material. I do not doubt but that lads are educated there quite
as well as at similar institutions in England. It is under the guidance
of a clergyman of the Church of England, and is thoroughly English in
all its habits. I found a perfect menagery of interesting animals
attached to it, which is an advantage which English schools seldom
possess. The animals, which, though wild by nature, were at this place
remarkably tame, had, fortunately for me, not gone home for their
holidays,--so that, wanting the boys, I could amuse myself with them. I
will not speak here of the coloured school, as I must, as I progress,
devote a short chapter to the question of Kafir education.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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