Yet this did not make them disdain household and farm work. They were all able to milk the cows, make butter and cheese, and do all the other duties expected from a Dutch housewife. They reserved their fancy accomplishments for the evenings, and were up to their daily work long before the sun rose. Although it was a remarkably enjoyable life which the boys led at Stellenbosch, they quickly wearied of it, and began to long for something more exciting. The riding lessons which they took with the sons, and the gun practice were all very useful, yet humiliating also, since they could never hope to compete with those born marksmen and centaurs. It is almost impossible for a true Africander to miss his mark or be unseated from his horse. As soon, therefore, as they had learnt something about the managing of cattle and Kaffirs, and had found their way about the country, they began to find the society of their puritanical burgher friends slightly irksome. The charming scenery became monotonous, and the tinkle of a piano almost as hard to endure as a barrel-organ is to some ears. The desire to trek had come upon them, and whenever men or boys get that desire, no fertile oasis, no earthly paradise, can hold them back from the desert. Stephanus, who was in their confidence, had a private conversation with his uncle Groblaar, and communicated the result one morning to them as they were moping amongst the ripening grapes. It was not easy for the young ladies or the stolid sons of Van Groblaar to understand how any human being could be melancholy as long as there was plenty to eat and drink. In their own placid minds three of the daughters had decided that Ned, Fred, and Clarence had the makings of very good farmers and husbands in them, and for this felt gratified to Cousin Stephanus for bringing them. They were considerably startled, therefore, and not a little distressed, when they saw how our heroes brightened up after they heard the result of that family confab. The old Dutchman, who took a long time to decide upon anything, had been persuaded to send up his yearly consignment of wines and brandy to Johannesburg without any further delay. It would go by road as usual, and the new comrades were to go with the waggons. By doing this they would see the country, while the journey would not cost them anything. This offer was gladly accepted by the young men--for they were now, in their own and the estimation of the young ladies, such. They no longer wondered how time was to be killed, but eagerly began to prepare for the long and slow overland journey. The Groblaar wines and brandy were greatly prized, and fetched big prices everywhere in the market. In the Transvaal particularly they were vastly appreciated. The age was to be depended upon, and the quality; while the grower considered that the contents of these matured hogsheads would be ruined if transported by any other mode than oxen.