South Africa -- Description and travel; South Africa -- History -- 1836-1909; South Africa -- History -- To 1836
In the middle of Pretoria is a square, round which are congregated the
public offices, the banks, hotels, and some of the chief stores, or
shops of the place, and in which are depastured the horses of such
travellers as choose to use the grass for the purpose. Ours, I hope,
were duly fed within their stables; but I used to see them wandering
about, trying to pick a bit of grass in the main square. And here stands
the Dutch Reformed Church,--in the centre,--a large building, and as
ugly as any building could possibly be made. Its clergyman, quite a
young man, called upon me while I was in Pretoria, and told me that his
congregation was spread over an area forty miles round. The people of
the town are regular attendants; for the Dutchman is almost always a
religious father of a family, thinking much of all such services as were
reverenced by his fathers before him. But the real congregation consists
of the people from the country who flock into the Nichtmaal, or Lord’s
Supper, once in three months, who encamp or live in their waggons in the
square round the Church, who take the occasion to make their town
purchases and to perform their religious services at the same time. The
number attending is much too large to enter the church at once, so that
on the appointed Sunday one service succeeds another. The sacrament is
given, and sermons are preached, and friends meet each other, amid the
throng of the waggons. The clergyman pressed me to stay and see it;--but
at this time my heart had begun to turn homewards very strongly. I had
come out to see Pretoria, and, having seen it, was intent upon seeing
London once again.
There are various other churches,--all of them small edifices,--in the
place, among which there is a place of worship for the Church of
England. And there is a resident English clergyman, a University man,
who if he live long enough and continue to exercise his functions at
Pretoria will probably become the “clergyman of the place.” For such is
the nature of Englishmen. Now that the Transvaal is an English Colony
there can be no doubt but that the English clergyman will become the
“clergyman of the place.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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