The White Chief of the Caffres

I knew my uncle must have already made up his mind, and so considered it desirable that I should tell him that I had not sufficient experience to make any selection, but would rather follow his advice.

“Then,” said my uncle, “what do you think of coming into my office, and learning the business which I have followed with tolerable success? The army is poor pay, and often great hardship. The Indian Civil Service is better, but I think you are too old for that, and I don’t know any other line that would suit you. You can live here with me as long as you find it comfortable, and perhaps in time you may take my place.”

During the whole of my residence with my uncle I had never been to his office, which I now learned was in Fenchurch Street; and in a few days I was taken by him and introduced to the head clerk, who, having received instructions from my uncle, took me into an outer office and made me acquainted with four young men who were clerks. These four young men were considerably older than I was, as far as years were concerned, but their manners and conversation soon caused me to look upon them as mere boys; they seemed to have but little powers of reflection, to avoid thinking deeply on any matter, and to endeavour to do as little work as was possible. They indulged greatly in chaff; but, I suppose, from the fact of my being the nephew of their chief, as they termed my uncle, they never chaffed me. I felt but slight inclination for their society, and before I had been a week in the office there was a sort of antagonism between these clerks and myself.

My uncle did not seem displeased that I had not become very intimate with these clerks. He asked me one day how I liked them. I replied that I found nothing really to dislike, but they seemed to me particularly foolish, and to be too fond of trifles.

My uncle smiled, and said, “The fact is, Julius, you are very old, though young in years. The scenes through which you have passed have aged you, and you look for realities in life. The clerks in my office are thoughtless and superficial.”

It would not interest the reader if I were to describe in detail the life I led during the next three years. It was passed without any important events. I learned the details of my father’s life in India from letters received nearly every month from him. I had become thoroughly acquainted with my uncle’s business, and obtained a knowledge of the largeness of his transactions. Considering what must have been his wealth, I should have been surprised at the quiet way in which he lived, had I not discovered that he had a great dislike to display. He had often expressed the opinion that a man should be more than he seemed, instead of seeming more than he was. This he carried out practically. He lived very comfortably, but even with me in the house could not have spent much more than a thousand pounds a year, whereas his annual income must have been seven or eight times that amount.

I had become acquainted with several people in London, all friends of my uncle. To the houses of these I was frequently asked, and great attention was shown me. It seemed to be understood that I should be my uncle’s heir; and I knew enough of the ways of the world, to be aware that this fact, had probably more to do with the attention paid me, than any special qualities in myself. I was not, therefore, carried away by such attentions, nor did I become vain in consequence, both dangers to which some young people are liable. I visited everything in London worth seeing, my uncle putting no restrictions on me. He was fond of the opera, and we often attended it together, as also some of the principal theatres. He allowed me an income for my work at the office, and told me that although he did not wish to restrict me as regards anything essential, yet he thought I ought to live within this income. After two years’ experience I found I could do so, and one day mentioned to my uncle that I had not only done so, but had saved fifty pounds.

But one event occurred during this period, which broke the monotony of civilised life.

It was on a Sunday afternoon, during the winter time, that my uncle accompanied me, to call on a family who lived on the borders of Hampstead Heath. Some of the members of this family were much interested in my adventures in Africa, and I had promised to bring over a knob-kerrie made of the horn of a rhinoceros, to show one of the daughters who was an invalid, and could not visit my uncle’s house to see the few African curiosities that I had there. We stayed at this house till it became dusk, and then set out on our walk home. At that date Hampstead Heath was a lonely place, and robberies were not unfrequent. It occurred to me, soon after we had commenced our walk, that if I were alone I might possibly have an adventure, which I believed would have been amusing. Armed as I was with this formidable knob-kerrie, I could have felled an ox; then I had not neglected my running, and I felt certain that not one Englishman in a thousand could catch me, in case I chose to run. I did not expect that two men walking across the Heath were likely to be stopped by highwaymen. As these ideas crossed my mind, my uncle said, “This heath is rather a dangerous locality to be in late at night: there have been several robberies here lately.”

“I was just thinking of that,” I replied, “but I suppose the robbers don’t use firearms.”

“Not if they can help it,” said my uncle, “as that would make too much noise.”

As we wended our way across the heath, I watched carefully the ground in advance. Although it was a darkish evening I could still see several yards in front of me. Everything was quiet, and we seemed the only people out at the hour. Suddenly, from some bushes near the path, three men jumped up, and were at once within a yard of us.

“Now then,” said one of these men, “just hand out what you’ve got, before we knock your brains out.”

He had scarcely spoken, before I had lunged at the lower part of his chest with my knob-kerrie, the point of which was sharp as a knife. Shifting my hand to the sharp end, I brought the heavy knob down on the head of the man next to me, who fell as though he had been shot. The third man had grappled with my uncle, and the two were struggling together; for my uncle, although old, was still powerful. Watching my chance, I dropped my knob-kerrie on the shoulder of the highwayman. His arm fell helplessly to his side; at the same time my uncle struck him with his fist and he fell to the ground.

We did not wait to see more, because these men were usually provided with pistols, and after the treatment they had received, we believed they would not be very particular about their use. We therefore moved off as rapidly as we could, and reached home in safety; my uncle little the worse for his struggle, except that his coat was torn. At that date the regular police did not exist, and our report of the affair produced no results. We, the next day, visited the scene of our encounter, and found unmistakable “spoor” of the highwaymen having suffered, as there was a great deal of blood on the ground where the man whom I had struck had fallen.

I was much complimented by all my friends, to whom my uncle related the adventure; but I explained to them that such scenes were not new to me, that the life I had formerly led had trained me specially so as not to be surprised or taken at an advantage, and it would be strange indeed if, now that I had come to civilisation, I should forget all my early education.

Whether it was this adventure, or merely the memory of the past that caused me to become unsettled, yet it was a fact that I had a growing desire to once more visit the country where I had passed such eventful years. In the solitude of my bedroom I used to carry on imaginary conversations in Caffre with my old companions, and retraced my career through the various adventures that had occurred. Weeks passed without my mentioning this feeling to my uncle; but one evening he was speaking about Mr Rossmar, when I said that I believed a very profitable trip might be made to Natal, where ivory, ostrich-feathers, and leopard-skins could be procured for a few beads or some cheap guns.

My uncle remarked that Mr Rossmar had, curiously enough, suggested the same thing, the difficulty being to find a trustworthy person who knew the country, and who would undertake the business.

I at once said, “I could do it myself. I know the country, can speak the language, and should be able to do away with ‘middle men,’” middle men being the intermediate traders who make their profit by buying cheap and selling dear.

“Would you like such a trip?” said my uncle.

“Most certainly I should,” I replied. “Lately I have thought how much I should like to visit the country again and see some of my old friends there. I am certain that there is a great quantity of ivory in many parts, and ostrich-feathers could be procured, as ostriches are plentiful.”

“We will think about it,” said my uncle, “and perhaps it may be managed.”

After this conversation I became unsettled. I was always thinking of the wild life I had led, of its freedom from all forms and conventionalities, and the beauty of the country.

My uncle said nothing more for some weeks, but again referred one morning to our previous conversation, and asked if I were still willing to pursue my adventures in South Africa. He said that I could sail to the Cape in one of the ordinary Indiamen, and charter at the Cape a small vessel which could cross the bar at Natal. When this ship was loaded I could return with her to Cape Town, transfer my goods to an Indiaman, and return home. The whole business, he thought, might occupy a year; and, if carefully carried out, ought to be profitable.

Chapter Eighteen

It was a bright fresh morning in April, that – I embarked at Gravesend in the full-rigged ship Condor, bound to the Cape and Calcutta. The most unpleasant and dangerous portion of the voyage in those days was from Gravesend through the Downs, and along the Channel. Sailing ships only then made these long voyages, and they were sometimes detained during many weeks in the Downs waiting for a fair wind. Then, when sailing in the Channel, they often had to beat against a contrary wind the whole way. In my case we were fortunate in having a fair wind nearly the whole way from the Downs, until we had entered the Bay of Biscay. Fine weather continued until we were within a few degrees of the Equator, when the usual calms stopped us, and we lay broiling on the calm sea during ten days.

I caught two rather large sharks, and had a narrow escape from one as I was bathing from a boat near the ship. We reached Table Bay in sixty-two days after leaving Gravesend, which period was considered by no means bad time for a sailing vessel. Having cleared my baggage from the ship and Custom House, I put up at an hotel at the corner of the parade in Cape Town, and sent word to my friend, Mr Rossmar, to say I had arrived.

Early on the following morning. Mr Rossmar came to see me, and was at once full of complaints on account of my not having immediately gone to his house, and made it my home. The few years that I had been in England had taught me much as regards the rules of so-called society. In England there was formality and etiquette which did not exist in the Colonies, particularly at the Cape. Friendship in England and at the Cape conveyed entirely different meanings. At the latter, a friend’s house was almost like your own: you did not think it necessary to wait for a special invitation to go to dinner and take a bed, but if you rode over in the afternoon it was considered unfriendly if you did not stop till the next morning. I had forgotten these conditions, and so had first stopped at an hotel. By noon, however, I had reached Mr Rossmar’s house, and was received as though I had been a long-lost brother.

I was surprised, when I saw the Miss Rossmars, to find that they were more pretty than any girls I had seen in London. They had, too, the great charm of being natural and unaffected, and to be less occupied in seeking admiration than English young ladies. In spite of what I had gone through in the Zulu country, I was in reality merely a boy when I formerly stayed at Wynberg. Now I was a man; and the experience I had gained in society in London had made me capable of judging of the relative merits of that great paradox, – a young lady.

A certain portion of the day was occupied in making arrangements for my voyage to Natal. I found that a small vessel would sail from Table Bay in a month’s time, and I had made arrangements with the owners to use this vessel almost as if she were my own. I had brought from England quantities of beads of various colours, looking glasses, blankets, and some hundreds of assagy blades that I had caused to be made at Birmingham. All these things were, I knew, highly esteemed by the Caffres, and would purchase nearly everything they possessed. I was not so busy with my preparations but that I had plenty of time to pass with the Miss Rossmars. We rode nearly every day, had climbing expeditions up the Table Mountain, musical afternoons at home when the weather was not suitable for going out, and in fact enjoyed ourselves as people in the Colonies alone seem to do.

The natural results followed. I became much attached to Nina Rossmar, but as this is not a love story, but merely an account of my adventures in the wild country of south-eastern Africa, I will not weary my readers with the old, old tale, but will merely state that I wrote to my father and uncle, asking their consent to my marriage with Nina. These letters I wrote before I started for Natal, as I hoped the answers would be awaiting me on my return.

The month passed very rapidly, and I embarked at Table Bay in the little brigantine which was to convey me to Natal. I have sailed since that time on many seas, but the roughest I ever experienced is off the Cape. Well was this Cape termed the Cape of Storms, for there seemed a storm always on hand, and no sooner had the wind been blowing hard in one direction and then stopped, than a gale sprung up from the opposite point of the compass. Many times, as the huge waves came rolling towards us and seemed to be about to break over us, I thought nothing could save us from being sent to the bottom, or turned over; but the little vessel, which drew only eight feet of water, was like a duck on the ocean, and though she bounded like a thing of life as the monstrous waves approached and moved under her, she was very dry, scarcely any seas washing over her. We were, however, thirty days on our voyage from Table Bay to the Bluff at Natal, and we had to anchor on our first arrival, as the wind was off shore. I scanned the well-known coast as we lay at our anchorage, and recalled the strange scenes through which I had passed. There were the high-wooded bluff on the west entrance to the harbour, the low sandy hillocks to the east, where I had run the gauntlet of the Zulus, the dense wood of the Berea bush, and the islands in the bay where I had outwitted the Zulus, when I was in the boat. Now that I was again in the vicinity of these scenes of my early days, I felt in doubt as to whether I was not more a Caffre than an Englishman. I found myself actually thinking in Caffre, and speaking sentences in that language to myself.

I noted that there were several houses near the entrance of the harbour and up the bay which did not exist when I left Natal. These, I afterwards found, were the houses of some Dutchmen who had settled there.

The wind having changed the day after our arrival, we entered the bay, having crossed the bar in safety.

It seemed strange, after my experiences of civilised life, to come to a place where there was not an hotel, or any house where one could put up. I had, however, made my plans from my knowledge of the country, and had provided myself with waterproof sheeting that I could turn into a small tent, and so was independent of a house. The Dutch Boer, when he travels, makes his waggon his house, and is thus as independent as an English gipsy. I took the first opportunity of landing, and making the acquaintance of the few Dutchmen who resided at Natal. My knowledge of the Dutch language, which I had acquired at Cape Town, was now of great use. I thought it prudent not to let the Dutchmen know of my experiences in the country, but to be quite independent of them in my future proceedings. I made arrangements for the hire of a pony during my stay in the country, and also two oxen, which had been trained to carry packages and were termed pack-oxen by the Boers. I believed that I had so altered that none of my old Caffre comrades would recognise me, and I intended to travel among them – at least at first – without letting them know who I was.

One of the Boers asked me to stay at his house, but I preferred remaining on the ship until I made my start up the country.

The first visit I paid was to the kraal of Umnini, near the Umlass river. I took one of the Caffre servants of the Boer with me; this Caffre could speak Dutch, and I wanted to conceal my knowledge of Caffre for some time, so I spoke to him in Dutch, and asked him to speak in Caffre to the Caffres.

On arriving at the kraal of Umnini, I was interested as to whether I should be recognised by these men. During the interval that had elapsed since I was last at the kraal of Umnini, I had increased in height, and had developed whiskers; the change in my appearance, therefore, was considerable, and I considered it unlikely that I should be remembered. The Caffre with me told the people of the kraal that I was one of the Boers, he knowing no better, and that I had come to trade, and wished for leopards’ skins and elephants’ tusks.

Several of the men who were present I remembered: these men had been with me often, but although they looked at me very hard they none of them seemed to remember me. Having ascertained from my Caffre that I could not speak their language, they made their remarks on me very freely. These remarks were complimentary. They said I did not look like a Boer, but must be a young chief. “He has the head of a chief,” said one man, and the others agreed with him. They also decided that I must be strong and a good runner. These and other similar remarks I listened to with much amusement, but without giving the slightest sign that I understood what they were saying. After a time Umnini came to me, and, after looking at me for some time, said, “It is the young White Chief of the Umzimvubu.” The men who had been speaking about me smiled at this remark, and said to Umnini, “No, chief, it is not him, it is a young Boer.” Umnini looked at me very attentively, but I gave no sign either of recognising him, or understanding what he said.

Speaking in Dutch to my Caffre, I told him to ask the chief if he had any ostrich-feathers, or elephants’ tusks, as I wished to buy them.

He replied that he had a few tusks, and wanted to know what I would give for them.

Having brought with me some beads as specimens and a few blades of assagies, I showed him these, but he said that what he wanted was guns. The talking continued for some time, and I at length asked that I might see the tusks. Umnini said I could go with him into his kraal where the tusks were kept. We alone entered his hut, and he then pointed to six fine tusks, but believing that I could not understand what he said, he made signs that they belonged to three elephants.

Having carried my joke far enough, I looked at Umnini and said in Caffre: —

“Chief, you alone were correct and you alone knew me. I am the White Chief of the Umzimvubus, and I have come back to see you again, and to bring you some things you will like. I am going also to see my own tribe to the west.”

Umnini scarcely seemed surprised, as I told him who I was, but said he had been certain about it when he saw me.

Our conversation, which had not been heard outside of the hut, had been carried on in a low tone; so no one besides Umnini knew who I was. I told him I did not wish to be known at present, and asked him to keep my secret. He agreed to this, and when we crept out of the hut he did his acting splendidly, and spoke to my Caffre, asking him to enquire of me what I thought of the tusks.

I replied in Dutch, saying I would buy them. Then bidding good-bye to the people, I returned to the ship.

Two days afterwards I started with two Caffres and a Hottentot for my old residence near the Umzimvubu. The pony I rode was a good shooting pony, and on the first day I shot two coran and a red bush-buck, which supplied the party with plenty of food. On the second day I reached my old kraal, and was again anxious to see if I should be recognised. I was not long in doubt. Inyoni, my old boy-companion, had now grown into a fine young man, and was standing near the entrance to the kraal, watching me and my companions as we advanced. When close to him he looked at me for an instant, and then shouted, “Inkosi” (chief), and seized my hand. His shout had brought out all the people who were in the kraal, each of whom recognised me. Those whom I had left as boys, and little girls, were now young men and women, and all were delighted to see me. The Hottentot and Caffres, who had accompanied me from Natal, looked on with astonishment, and when they heard me speaking Caffre as well as they themselves spoke, they seemed to think it was witchcraft.

I had a busy time of it answering all the questions that were put to me by my old friends, who were anxious to know what I had been doing, where I had been, and whether I intended to again live with them. When I told them how I had passed day after day in a room, in the midst of a large city (London), and had rarely seen the sun, and had shot no buck, had not even seen a wild elephant, and had enjoyed no sport, they were astonished how it was I had gone through all this, when I could have come back at any time, and enjoyed the free, happy, exciting life of a chief with them.

The arguments used by my old friends have often been considered since that time by me, and the problem is a curious one, whether civilisation, with all its advantages, has not so many drawbacks as to render the wild, free, healthy life of so-called savages preferable.