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YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

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THE LIBRARY OF THE
DIVINITY SCHOOL

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THE DAY MISSIONS LIBRARY

RAMBLES IN SOUTH AFRICA

THE CAPE NATAL

AND

TRANSVAAL
A RECORD OF HOLIDAY TRAVEL

JOHN KERR CAMPBELL, D.D., F.S.Sc,
AND FELLOW OF THE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTE OF SCOTLAND.
Author of
"Through Egypt, Palestine, and Syria,''
"Through the United States of America and Canada,"
" Through Classic and Bible Lands,"
"Pisgah Glimpses and Gospel Gleanings,"
"Life Problems," err.

LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO.
LIMITED.
GLASGOW: ROBERT L. HOLMES, Dunlop Street.
STIRLING: R. S. SHEARER & SON.

fale Divinity Library Conn.

STIRLING :
PRINTED BY DUNCAN & JAMIESOX,
26 UPPHR CRAIGS.

%0
SIR DONALD CURRIE, K.C.M.G. AND M.P.,
WHO, BY HIS SUCCESSFUL ENTERPRISE
IN OPENING UP CHANNELS OF COMMERCIAL INTERCOURSE,
AND BY HIS HIGH-SOULED PHILANTHROPY,
COMBINED WITH DEVOUT CHRISTIAN ZEAL,
HAS LARGELY ASSISTED IN
SPREADING THE LIGHT OF CIVILISATION AND CHRISTIANITY
OVER THE "DARK CONTINENT,"
<Wxis IBolume is fiesptctfttUg gebfaaieb
BY
<!he Author.

PREFACE.

This record of Rambles in South Africa may be said to be after
the Author's usual order and style of travel-writing.
Inasmuch as the record is not of the nature of a grave, scientific
expedition, but rather that of an excursion undertaken for needed
rest and recreation, the characteristics of a treatise on the exact
sciences need hardly be expected.
It has been written chiefly for the information of those who
may readily avow themselves comparative strangers to the common
or uncommon incidents of a sea voyage, as well as to the peculiari
ties of the countries and peoples of our South African Colonies.
The discourses embodied in the volume were written almost
currente calamo, either on board ship, where a few of them were
delivered, or in circumstances by no means favourable for such
compositions. If the reader should regard them as unattractive
or unreadable, he is entitled to ignore them, or to skip them as he
does Latin or Greek phrases in the course of his ordinary reading.
With respect to the character of the record itself, the reader
may safely homologate the sentiment expressed by the boy who
said to his mother : " Mother, be sure and get a copy of our
minister's new book, for I am sure that what he has written will
be true."
The character sketches and pen portraits have been added to
the record at the urgent request of subscribers, and in the belief
that they may at least draw attention to a subject of social and
scientific importance, or to a branch of education too long and
generally neglected. Perhaps one reason for this general neglect
may be found in the fact that the science of physiognomy, like a
faithful mirror, reveals to a considerable number too many
unpleasant facts. Many men may be ready to say of physiognomy
what a certain king said of Micaiah, " I hate him : for he never
prophesied good unto me, but always evil." Nevertheless,
" Truth is great, and shall prevail." Honest men love truth for
its own sake, and therefore should not be unwilling to see them
selves as others see them.
Stirling, October, iSgi.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
Previous travels and books — Health resorts — Shall we go to
Africa, North or South ? — Serious difficulties — Strange experience
¦ — Kingly men — Sources of information, - - 13-21
CHAPTER II.
THE LAND BEYOND THE "LINE," AND HOW TO
REACH IT.
"Where is Natal?" — "How long were ye on the sea?" —
— Difference between geographical or sea miles and British or
land miles — Modern spirit of enterprise — Possibilities — Sir Donald
Currie, M.P., and his valuable services — The Royal Castle Line
— The fleet and the officers — Room in Africa for men who are
neither lame nor lazy — What was and what is, 22-29
CHAPTER III.
OUR VOYAGE TO THE CAPE: INCIDENTS BY THE WAY.
Off and into a fog — Patmos in the Thames — What can modern
science avail in a fog ? — Men not constitutionally religious — Our
company — Divine service — "Out of the way" — Gravesend —
Something suggested— Flushing — A stroll to the town— The
" poor man's colony " — An exciting scene — Four second saloon
passengers left behind — A wild chase over the waves — Off to Las
Palmas — Reticent captains — Our experience in Bay of Biscay —
Rumbling crockery — What next? — Lively cabins — The captain
conducts divine service — God's time keeping — " God manifest in
the flesh" — Israel's faith — The Grand Canaries — Conversation
with a Spaniard — Off to St. Helena — In the tropics — The heat —
A Salvation Army company — Flying fish — Christmas and New
Year's day in the tropics — Two steamers exchanging compliments
— £9 f°r champagne in one night — A funeral at sea — Discussion
on different modes of burial — St. Helena — Napoleon's place of
exile — A wonderful ladder — The lord bishop and his curate —
Distinguished prisoners — The lord bishop preaches, 30-7 1

VIII. CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV.
CAPE TOWN AND SUBURBS.
Table Mountain — Cloth and south-easter — Stroll through the
town — Places of interest — " The Melrose " in which Carey was shot
— Scotch Presbyterian Church — Deep pews, and music at the
gallop — Capital sermon — One of the four promising youths — A
terrible Cape doctor — A short discourse on Hadad's request — A
visit to Stellingbosh — A grand place — Dutch kindness — A Dutch
patriarch — A visit to the college — Professors — Ostrich farms —
The Karoo — Cemetery — Transport wagons, 72-88
CHAPTER V.
THE VOYAGE TO NATAL: PORT ELIZABETH,
EAST LONDON, DURBAN.
Pilgrims bound for Mecca — Cape of Good Hope — When and
why so called — Port Elizabeth — A sun-scorched, but prosperous
place — Stroll through the town — Places of interest — Mr. Kemsley,
a kind citizen — East London — Zulu's and Kaffirs — The basket —
East London, a small town, but beautiful surroundings, 89-97
CHAPTER VI.
THE COLONY OF NATAL.
Natal, a hilly country, but all fertile and beautiful — When dis
covered, and by whom — The Dutch getting possession of land —
Boer exodus in 1837 — Sufferings of the Dutch — Taking vengeance
under Umpande — Zulus love war — Pietermaritzburg, 98-106
CHAPTER VII.
DURBAN TO PIETERMARITZBURG.
The seaport town of Natal — Places of interest — The Berea —
Some of the citizens — Mr. Hunter, a typical Scotsman — Off to
Maritzburg— A Campbell at Pinetown — Engineering skill for
rounding molehills — Arrival at the capital city— At church — A
school, 107-112
CHAPTER VIII.
PIETERMARITZBURG.
A Saul among the Zulus — A principle of nomenclature — Who
are the citizens ? — Streets well laid out, but too many men traps 

CONTENTS. IX.
The chief of police, a Scot — Kafir policemen — Post office arrange
ments — A conceited and careless fellow — Sir Charles Mitchell —
A foundation stone relaid — Presbyterians and other Protestants
go- second — Hieroglyphics of truth among savages, or man
essentially religious — A sermon delivered in Maritzburg, 1 13-1 28
CHAPTER IX.
NATIVE RACES IN NATAL: THEIR CHARACTER
AND CUSTOMS.
Are the Kafirs and Zulus natives? — The Dutchman a good
master — Sons of Ishmael — Superior to Bushmen and Hottentots
— -The Kafirs' religion — No atheists — Sacrifices and rites which
pertained to the Hebrews — Dutch doctors — Polygamy — Horror at
unchastity — Annual dances — Sense of sin and shame — Kafir dress
— Courtship and marriage — Labola — Washing away their sins —
The coolies, and their temple, 129-137
CHAPTER X.
CHURCHES AND MISSIONS IN SOUTH AFRICA.
Northern provinces — Eastern Africa, Central Africa — -The
South African Church — Bishop Blyth, Bishop Gray — A ritualist-^
— Court of final appeal — Bishop Macrorie — No respect for
evangelicals — Bishop Colenso — The opinion of the author of
" Ecce Homo " — Ritualism has neither moral nor spiritual power
— "Spoiling the natives" — -Dutch Missions — JVacht Maal—
Wesleyan Methodists and Missions — Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel — Bishop Webb guilty of proselytizing — Presbyterian
Churches and Missions — Practical suggestions — Godly men wanted
— Union needed — " Alexander the coppersmith '' unknown in any
of the Colonial Churches, 138-150
CHAPTER XL
EDUCATION IN NATAL.
My lords of education — Mr. Russell, Mr. Mudie — Children,
teaching and schools very like our own — Payment by results
practically unknown — Religious teaching might be improved —
What is education? — Highly-informed men may not be educated
— Religious instruction given, but not tested — -A syllabus
suggested, - 151-156
C

X. CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XII.
NATAL GOVERNMENT RAILWAYS, IS?-^1
CHAPTER XIII.
DUNIRA: RESTING AND RAMBLING.
The young laird of Dunira — -A well-trained family — a Kafir
Kraal — Different kinds of Kraals — Killing a snake — Killing
snakes all night — A sad case — Conversation with an aged Kafir
— Outraging the Kafir tongue — Snuff — "Putting the devil upon
the horse'' — "Cooking the kettle" — Newspapers and blunders —
An appeal to the Caesar of education — Strange advertisements —
Poor oxen, 162-174
CHAPTER XIV.
DUNIRA TO LADYSMITH.
An altered programme — Shall we go to Zululand, or to Mashona-
land, and see ruins of the Queen of Sheba's palace? — Lady-
smith — Government teacher and Government school — Strolling
round the town — Places of interest — People and churches — A
story, not for the Philistines — A short address — A school examina
tion, 175-186
CHAPTER XV.
LADYSMITH TO NEWCASTLE.
The path still up and over hills — A Stirling man a stationmaster
— Glencoe Junction — James acts as guide — Newcastle— Old
friends — Government school and Mr. M'B. — A handsome railway
station — A generous friend — "A grand turn-out," 1 87-1 91
CHAPTER XVI.
THE TRANSVAAL.
Where is that land of Boers? — Who are the Boers? — What
right have the Boers to the Transvaal ? — Is might right ? — Did the
land belong to the Kafirs or to the Zulus ? — If not, to whom ? —
What right have the British to the Transvaal? — Were Boer
complaints reasonable? — Mr. Froude's opinion, - 192-199

CONTENTS. XI.
CHAPTER XVII.
OUR JOURNEY TO THE TRANSVAAL.
A special train — No — " A carriage and four " — The horses run
off — Jehu career — A wonderful boat on the Buffalo river — A boat
of beer barrels — A comical, and yet rather costly business — The
scene of battle between the Boers and the British — Amajuba —
Cause of battle — Climbing the hill — A prayer meeting on Sabbath
morning at 4 o'clock — Did the British soldiers think of it ? — How
the battle began, and how it ended — Disastrous business — Poor
Sir George Colley did not live to tell how the battle began or
how it ended, 200-207
CHAPTER XVIII.
TRANSVAAL TO DURBAN.
Homewards — Character of the Boers — The Boers know their
Bible — Sir Donald Currie, M.P. — The Zulus and Zululand —
Parting with friends — " That day I wore my gloves no more " —
How some have succeeded — Farewell, 208-216
CHAPTER XIX.
DURBAN TO CAPE TOWN.
At sea — What a magnificent vessel — Captain Webster a king —
A Gospel chain of five links — A sermon — Lively conversations —
Men of different creeds — The Hon. Chief-Justice, Du Toit, Mr.
Von — A magistrate, a good minister, and a good elder — A stiff
breeze — Parting with friends at the Cape — Message to a mother —
Children and friends singing, and bidding " good bye," 217-234
CHAPTER XX.
HOMEWARD BOUND.
Sketches of character — Differences of human character —
Individual and natural — Different classes — -Mrs. Siddons and
Edinburgh — Causes of difference — Many and various — The
" mind's mirror," or marks of difference — Special typical marks —
General characteristics — A subject of vast importance, 235-252

XII. CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XXI.
PEN PORTRAITS.
Our company on board the Dunottar Castle — The typical
Englishman — The Irishman— The German — The Jew — The
Conversion of a Jew — A touching story — The Scandinavian —
The sceptic — The founder of the religion of humanity — The
Scotsman, - 253_264
CHAPTER XXII.
LIFE ON BOARD THE " DUNOTTAR CASTLE."
Falling through the ice of formality— Lost and not found — A
" Father " Priest preaches a Gospel sermon — The voyage of life-
Seafaring in ancient and modern times — Human life a stormy
voyage — Unity in variety — Lesson from contrary winds — Reaching
the deserved haven — Yonder side — " To yonder side " — Tenerife—
Excitement — Madeira — Men running too fast — Shunted — Diving
for silver pieces — Parting with friends, 265-282
CHAPTER XXIII.
GENERAL OBSERVATIONS.
"The grand object of travelling" — Sam Johnson's opinion — •
What may have been and what is — -Things contrary — Bushmen —
Hottentots — Zulus — Kafirs — What John Bull might have done
with advantage, and what he should do now — The future of South
Africa — Our hopes— A community that cannot truly thrive — Some
stories worth recording — The perversion of a message — An
effectual remedy for ghosts — Bishops without breeches ! 283-291
CHAPTER XXIV.
ARRIVAL AT PLYMOUTH.
Into a snowstorm — Custom house inquisitors — A novel
experiment — A dodge — An invalid lady — Days in London — St.
Columba Church — Dr. Fraser, Marylebone— Hearing Rev. Mr.
Boyd Carpenter — An estimate of Dr. Parker — Aping Episcopacy —
Caesar's representatives protecting a Dissenting congregation— An
estimate of Mr. Spurgeon — -A visit to Exeter Hall — Dr. Barnardo,
the right man in the right place, '- 292-300

RAMBLES IN SOUTH AFRICA.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY. HEN I completed the third volume
of my travels, "Through Classic
and Bible Lands," I entertained the
hope that my travelling in distant
parts of the world was over, and
consequently my writing of books.
I then felt that my physical powers
were no longer such as to warrant further excursions
into far-off countries, and that the mental strain
connected with the preparation of another book
might prove too much a weariness of the flesh, if not
a precursor of something more serious. But time
has proved that my hope was groundless and my
fears false.
When I first resolved to go to Palestine and
Syria, through the ancient land of the Pharaohs, I
began to fear that I might never reach it, but die in
Egypt, and have no one beside me to whom I could
say, in the words of Joseph, "Carry my bones out

14 PREVIOUS TRAVELS.
of Egypt." When, therefore, I was enabled to
carry my resolution into effect, I took my "better
half" with me. That holiday of three months in
Egypt and the Holy Land did me so much good,
especially the horse exercise in travelling, that after
three years, when my health broke down again, I
resolved to return to these ancient and interesting
lands, and then proceed to Asia Minor and Greece.
Records of our travels in these countries, as well
as of our visit to the United States of America and
Canada, were given to the public, and I have had no
reason to regret having done so. Indeed, I have
had every reason to be satisfied with the reception
given to my writings by the general public and the
press. Travelling long distances by land and sea has
never in itself been a source of pleasure to me,
and nothing but a sense of duty to myself, and the
work that demands my best energies, could have
induced me to travel as I have done. I have failed
to see how travelling, or wandering from place to
place doing nothing, can be a source of satisfaction
to any one who has anything like a sense of responsi
bility in relation to time and money and the forma
tion of that character which is largely the product of
daily conflict amidst the duties of life. There can
be no real pleasure to any one in merely seeing and
being seen, or in being whirled along an iron way at
the rate of so many hundred miles a day. I have
never met with any man or matron who would
willingly pay down two or three hundred pounds for
the sole purpose of having a long sea voyage.

SHU'S AS PRISONS. 1 5
Those who make a long sea voyage have usually
some higher object in view. Those who go to
America, or to Australia, or to Africa, may believe
that our modern Atlantic liners are not what
Dr. Johnson characterised the ships of his day,
" Prisons, in which one has the chance of being
drowned," that they afford many physical comforts,
and that voyagers may meet with suitable companions
or agreeable company on board, but they may also
believe that our best constructed vessels are not yet
absolute proof against the "perils of the deep," and
the instincts of self-preservation are too strong in
most men to venture on a long sea voyage without
some other object than mere pleasure.
For myself, a voyage to South Africa was the last
of my thoughts and the least of my desires. Even
will for such a voyage was at no time present with me.
Recuperative forces for some men may be found in
the hilarity of the social circle, or in the pleasantries
and banter and friendliness which predominate in
some of our modern health resorts. Other men may
be so constituted as to find the suitable conditions of
restoration in climbing the hills and breathing the
•clear, bracing air of the mountains ; while for others
nothing short of a kind of Patmos may be necessary,
where they can have no books, papers, or periodicals
to read, and where they may feel themselves free
from all cares and yet be without ennui. '
The physical constitution of some men may have
so deteriorated that nothing short of absolute rest
can be effectual in restoring them to sound health.
What rest ancl sleep do every night for the weary

I(i INTEREST IN SOUTH AFRICA.
sons of toil, a few weeks or months of rest and sound
sleep may do for those who suffer from nervous
prostration. Some men are too seriously inclined to be
enamoured with crowds of people in the market
place, or with sporting idlers on the lawns, or groups
of children upon the sands, or throngs of men and
women in the streets. While thousands of men, out
of sorts, may find the conditions of new health at a
hydropathic establishment, or musing quietly for a
few weeks by the sea shore, there may be as many
hundreds who can find these conditions, only by run
ning away from all business thoughts and domestic
cares to a place where no letters and no newspapers
can reach them. This was the kind of place pre
scribed for me, and I was glad to be able to find that
place in Eastern lands, and afterwards in the new
West world. South Africa had never any attractions
for me. I had often read of it in the histories of
such renowned missionaries as Drs. Moffat and
Livingstone, and in connection with the exploits of
Dr. Stanley. It had been forced upon our attention
in connection with the War in Zululand, and the
unfortunate hostilities which broke out between the
Boers and the British in the Transvaal. The
interest of many thousands of Europeans was evoked
in it when it became known as a land of gold and
diamonds,' but by none of these were we moved to go
and see it.
VVhen we thought on the possibility of taking a
voyage to this land beyond the line, this bourne of
gold and diamonds, this country of Kafirs and Zulus,

A SERIOUS POSSIBILITY. 1 7
Boers and Hottentots, we felt less elated than we
ever did in similar circumstances. The heat of the
tropics and the length of the voyage were serious
points in the prospect ; and there was besides a more
serious question, that of expense.
When we left the " City of the Rock " we might
be somewhat as Abraham, when he went out not
knowing whither he went.
Our chief concern at the time was how best to
escape from the gloomy winter and intense cold
which then set in. We had not, at that time, fixed
upon any definite course beyond London. We
might possibly go to Egypt once more, perhaps
further, and we might go to South Africa, but only
by such an arrangement as would enable us to go
together. The state of my health at the time was
such that I would not venture a sea voyage of seven
or eight thousand miles alone.
The idea of becoming helpless in the tropics was
not a pleasant one, much less the thought of dying
and being buried at sea. These possibilities some
what benumbed our spirits, and we felt for a time,
especially when our powers of locomotion gave way,
that we should return home and submit to the worst.
The weather in London was anything but agree
able, and immediate departure from it seemed to be
imperative. We called at the offices of the Castle
Line Company in the hope of seeing the Manager,
and to ascertain if any reduction on the price of two
first-class return tickets to Natal could be made.
Sir Donald Currie, M.P., was not present, had not
as yet reached his office, and after waiting for fully

1 8 A SURPRISE MEETING.
an hour, we left without seeing him. We now felt
as if we had reached the climax of the feelings which
depressed the men who had toiled all night and
caught nothing. Off we went, however, "faint, yet
pursuing," and seeking grace to be "careful for
nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplica
tion with thanksgiving." As we groped our way
through the crowded streets of the great metropolis,
who of all the millions of Modern Babylon, and the
thousands around us, should we meet, whom we
knew sufficiently to recognise, but Sir Donald
Currie, M.P. ! "That meeting," said our friends
who were with us, "was wonderful. We have often
walked these streets for days and weeks without
seeing a person we knew." "Yes," I replied, "it
was rather wonderful, but it may be taken as one
more illustration of an old saying —
' Thy way to God commit, Him trust,
It bring to pass shall He.' "
I was somewhat taken aback when I met Sir
Donald, but I introduced myself to him in such
respectful and apologetic terms as I could command
at the time. Sir Donald, as a man of practical
common sense, was frank and free ; he evinced no
stiffness or airs of superiority, but spoke as a true
Christian man might be expected to do to another.
I told him that I had been calling at his office and
what my object was. After a brief conversation on
two or three points of a general nature, he requested
me to call and see him at his office on the morrow,
and in the interval he would see what could be done

DR. JOHNSON AND LORD CHKSTERFIELD. 1 9
to meet my wishes. On the morrow- 1 called, and
found that he had personally arranged to make such
a reduction as would enable us both to go to Natal
with the Dunrobin Castle, which was to sail from the
East India Dock Basin the following Wednesday,
and return with any of the mail steamers.
This act of generosity on the part of Sir Donald
Currie, M.P., might be a small matter to him, even
less, perhaps, than a " cup of cold water," but to me
at the time it was an act of great kindness. I then
felt, and still feel, that he laid me under a deep debt
of obligation, and I can only pray that He whose I
am, and whom I desire to love and serve, may
reward him.
Two things at least we hate with a perfect hatred,
— meanness and ingratitude. That kind of meanness
described by Dr. Samuel Johnson in his letter to
Lord Chesterfield, it seems to me, can only be born of
a reprobate nature. "Is not a patron, my lord,"
said Johnson, "one who looks with unconcern on a
man struggling for life in the water, and when he has
reached ground encumbers him with help ? The
notice which you have been pleased to take of my
labours, had it been early, had been kind ; but
it has been delayed till I am indifferent, and
cannot enjoy it ; till I am solitary, and cannot impart
it ; till I am known, and do not want it. I hope it
is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations
when no benefit has been received, or to be un
willing that the public should consider me as owing
that to a patron which Providence has enabled me
to do for myself."

20 POST MORTEM CENEROS-ITY
This kind of post mortem generosity is far too
common. Unlike the woman of the Gospel who
came ajorehand to show kindness to our Lord, too
many come ajterhand and say a thousand and one
good things about men when they are of no use to
cheer, to comfort, or to help them. When you are
dead, these post mortem fellows will come and say
how good you were, and how laboriously you lived to
serve your generation by the will of God. Perhaps
they will contribute a pound or two to raise a
monument for you, or they may sound your praises
through the press. This was not the way in which
Sir Donald Currie acted towards us, and it is in our
heart to say so, and a great deal more than is here
recorded. We have taken the liberty of dedicating this record
of our rambles to Sir Donald, and we trust that he
may receive it as a token of our gratitude and as
worthy of his perusal.
Sir Donald Currie well deserves all the honours
which our beloved Queen has bestowed upon him.
No man in this nineteenth century has done more to
advance the best interests of our country and those
of our Colonies in South Africa than Sir Donald
Currie. If it be true, as we believe it is, that "com
ing events cast their shadows before," we, if we live,
will be among the first to rejoice at Sir Donald's
elevation to the House of Lords.
Our aim throughout the following pages has been
to give a plain statement of facts as they came before
us from day to day in the course of our travels. We
have endeavoured to give our impressions of both

SOMETHING PROMISED.

21

Colonies, of the people and of their institutions,
without anything like varnish. We trust that those
on the other side, to whom we promised this much,
may find, when they read our record, that we have
not failed to be accurate in our descriptions, and that
we have in no way misrepresented the character of
the people among whom they live.
The character sketches and pen portraits have
been added to our record of travels to meet the
wishes of subscribers.

CHAPTER II.

THE LAND BEYOND THE LINE, AND
HOW TO REACH IT.
H E information which we have from
modern travellers," says Dr. Johnson,
" is much more authentic than what
we had from ancient travellers ;
ancient travellers guessed, modern
travellers measure." We suppose
this may be regarded as one reason
why the following questions have been addressed to
us by different individuals since we returned home : — ¦
"Where is Natal?" "How far is Natal from the
Cape?" "How long were ye upon the sea till ye
reached Cape Town ?" "Is there any railway between
Natal and the Transvaal ?"
We will answer these questions at present in a
general way. South Africa, or the land beyond the
line, is as far south of the equator, or line, as
Alexandria or Cairo in Egypt is north of it. Natal
lies 30 deg. east from Greenwich or London, and 30
deg., or two thousand British miles, south of the
equator. The Cape, or the " Cape of Good Hope "
as the sailors from India love to call it, is about six

DISTANCES. 23
thousand miles from London, while Durban, the sea
port town of Natal, is about eight hundred miles
further on, round the coast.
These miles, however, are not ordinary imperial
miles of seventeen hundred and sixty yards, but
nautical or geographical miles, which represent a dis
tance considerably greater. As every 60 nautical
or geographical miles represents a distance of
about 69 imperial miles, it follows that were the
length of the sea voyage between London and the
Cape and between the Cape and Natal determined
by imperial miles, the distance would be considerably
greater. In other words, were the distance between
London and the Cape, by Lisbon and Madeira, and
the distance between the Cape and Natal, to be
given in British miles, the first distance, instead of
being 6242 geographical miles, as shown upon the
chart, would be considerably above 7000, while the
second distance would be about 1000.
It is comparatively easy to represent these dis
tances upon paper, or to understand them as shown
upon a map of the ocean, but to measure them by
the revolutions of the propeller, or by so many
days and nights of actual experience, is a very
different thing. And yet these distances, in this
wonderful age, are soon compassed. The seven
thousand miles between the metropolis of Great
Britain and the Cape are compassed in less time
than it took the fastest steamers to cross the Atlantic
from London to New York fifty years ago. In
1833 it to°k tne R°yal William twenty-five days to
cross the Atlantic from Quebec to London. In 1838

24 STRIDES. OF CIVILISATION.
it took the first British steamer that crossed the
Atlantic fully seventeen days to reach America.
The distance between Tory Island, on the Irish
coast, and Sandy Hook, near New York, is reckoned
to be about three thousand four hundred miles.
The majority of the Atlantic liners take now from
nine to eleven days to compass this distance. The
Royal Mail steamers of the Castle Line compass
their seven thousand miles to South Africa in about
sixteen days. These are wonderful strides in the
science and art of navigation, and yet the future may
reveal still greater strides.
Had any one at the beginning of this century pre
dicted that within sixty or seventy years a man
could sail from the Broomielaw, Glasgow, and be in
New York within ten days ; that a man could sail
from London and be at the Cape of Good Hope
within seventeen days ; that the news of the House
of Lords or of Commons to-day would be printed in
the newspapers of Natal or of Melbourne to-morrow ;
that two men, the one sitting in London and the
other in Paris, could converse with each other as
freely as if they sat at the same fireside ; that ships
could sail through the land of Egypt into the Red
Sea ; ancl that the darkness of night would be con
verted into all the brilliancy of daylight at railway
stations, on board ships, and in the people's houses,
by means of electricity, — had any man, I say, in the
beginning of this century, predicted these and similar
things, he would have been laughed at, or, like
Galileo, been cast into prison. But these things in
our day have actually come to pass. And who can

A MAN WORTHY OF HONOUR. 25
doubt that there are more such things to follow.
The spirit of enterprise and achievement is still at
work. Ere long men may learn how to annihilate
time and space by still more wonderful means. Ere
long men may take the wings of the morning and go
two or three thousand miles in so many days. No
one at the beginning of this century could have had
the slightest conception of things as they are now,
and the spirit of revolution is not yet perhaps in its
prime. No man in his day has done more to swell the
triumphs of mind over matter in the spheres of
navigation, trade, and commerce, than Sir Donald
Currie, K.C.M.G., M.P. He is the distinguished
founder of the now favourably known Castle Line of
Royal Mail steamers. Well may Greenock, his native
town, be proud of him.
By means of his unsurpassed fleet of steamers he
has laid the commercial world, in its relation to our
Colonies in South Africa, under a lasting debt of
obligation. Sir Donald, as a man, and as the mainspring of
the shipping business which he has so long and
successfully managed, is considerably above the
average in personal character, business principles,
and practical sagacity. The valuable services which
he rendered to the British Government in its relations
to the Colonies, the Cape and Natal, and especially
to the Orange Free State, and the Boers in the
Transvaal, as well as by means of his fleet of
steamers in connection with the wars in Zululand
and Transvaal, ' led Oueen Victoria to exalt him to

26 HONOURS CONFERRED.
the rank of a Knight Commander in the most
distinguished Order of S. Michael and S. George.
The Dutch people were so thoroughly well pleased
with the services which he had rendered to them,
that they awarded him the cordial thanks
of their Volksraad. Few men could have been
better fitted by natural character, statesmanship, or
practical sagacity than Sir Donald Currie in dealing
with the Boers, and in unravelling the political com
plications which arose between them and the British
Government. The Boers, as seemed to us from
what we saw of them, have a high regard for the
Scotch people, and especially for those of Celtic
extraction. They are wonderfully like the Scotch,
or the Highlanders, in their character and habits ;
and therefore Sir Donald, apart from his statecraft
and other qualities, was the man to deal with them.
Her Majesty, Queen Victoria, could hardly have
received from her loyal subjects in South Africa
more honour than Sir Donald everywhere received
from the colonists, and especially from the Dutch,
in Kimberley, Pretoria, and Johannesburg, and
throughout Natal.
With respect to Sir Donald's fleet of Royal Mail
Steamers, it may be safely asserted that it is as near
perfection as the science and art of the age can make
it. The Fothergill Gold Medal, which the Society
of Arts awarded Sir Donald ten years ago, signifies
this much. If South Africa, with its gold and
diamond fields, and other vast resources, is to become
the country of the future, as many believe it will,
and if large numbers of the so-called "submerged

SHIP WELL OFFICERED. 27
tenth " of this country are to be induced to go thither,
the excellent character of the Castle Line Steamers
for safety and speed, accommodation and physical
comfort, should be made known. There is a solidity of
construction and a thoroughness of British workman
ship in these steamers which can hardly be surpassed.
For the strong man and the timorous maiden, the plea
sure-seeking tourist and the health-seeking invalid,
these magnificent vessels afford everything that can be
desired or expected in the way of safety and comfort.
Moreover, they are ably officered by men of excellent
character and mental ability. What we saw of
Captain Winder of the Dunrobin Castle, and his
officers, as well as of Captain Webster of the Dun-
ottar Castle and his subordinates, leads us to speak
of them as very competent men, and men whose aim
seems ever to be how pleasant and comfortable they
can make the voyage to all their passengers. These
facts can be no minor consideration with those who
have resolved to take a trip to South Africa, and
especially with those who may go thither in quest of
better health.
There is room in South Africa for hundreds and
thousands of men and women who are able and willing
to work, for farmers and others who have a little
capital for the purchase of land and the stocking of
farms. There is no room for idlers or for those who
have yielded to indolent and drunken habits.
For all kinds of men with scheming heads and
skilful hands the African fields are as white to
harvest. When we reflect upon what has been realised in

28 BENEFICENT AND POSSIBLE CHANGES.
this and other countries during the last sixty or
seventy years, and when we consider our modern
facilities for emigration, and the cry there is at present
amongst our working classes for work and more
wages, we can hardly doubt that there is a great
future for South Africa at least.
Sir Donald Currie, with his magnificent fleet of
Royal Mail Steamers, may be regarded as the pioneer
not only of cheap and regular mail services to the
Islands of the Sea, Canary, Ascension, and St.
Helena, the Cape Colony, Natal, Madagascar, and
the Mauritius, but of those conditions which make for
true national greatness. If, as is well known, Australia
was an undiscovered country about ninety years
ago ; if the islands of the South Seas were occupied
wholly by naked savages, and the now great and
prosperous States of America were led at the apron-
strings of Great Britain ; if the great Empire of India
had her gates closed against all foreign traders and
Christian influence ; if slavery was a gigantic and fer
tile source of revenue to not a few of bur British legis
lators, — if all these things are now wholly changed,
how can we reasonably doubt the possibility, yea, the
probability, of as great and beneficent changes taking
place in South Africa and other parts of the world
within the next fifty or sixty years ? I for one cannot
doubt it. Many things at the present time seem to
point favourably in the direction of such changes.
The developments of our trade and commerce, the
enterprise and achievements of our science and art,
have already told upon individual character and social
life, as well as upon our political and national relation-

TRUTH SHALL PREVAIL. 29
ships, and will they not also tell upon our moral and
spiritual interests in relation to the Kingdom of
Christ ?
Some men may be too pessimistic in their views to
admit this, and so paint the future of the Church and
the world in gloomy colours. I am not prepared to
deny that the opinions of these men are wholly
groundless. But as truth is greater than error, truth
must win the day. Apart from anything of a
sentimental optimism, I believe that God's hand in
providence, as in grace, will so guide and overrule
everything of a hostile nature that in the future — in
the immediate future, let us hope — the wilderness
and solitary places of South Africa and elsewhere will
be made glad, and that our moral deserts everywhere
shall rejoice and blossom as the rose.

D

•f "V.

5r^S.5g.." tC^ft ^

CHAPTER III.

OUR VOYAGE TO THE CAPE:
INCIDENTS BY THE 'WAY.
N a Wednesday morning, in the
beginning of December last year,
four of us, my brother-in-law and
his wife, Mrs. C, and myself,
groped our way by various means
towards the East India Dock for
the purpose of getting on board the
Royal Mail Steamer, Dunrobin Castle. This
magnificent vessel, which has a history in connection
with the late King of Zululand, Cetywayo, and the
Zulu war, was to be our floating castle for the next
few weeks. It was a cold, frosty, foggy morning, I
remember, and all who had work to do were
evidently willing to do it, lest they might perish with
cold. For minutes now and then the fog became so
dense as to make it dangerous to walk about the
docks. One poor fellow, while pressing onwards
during one of these dark periods to reach his ship,
missed his footing, fell into the water, and was
drowned. By ten o'clock, the stevedores of the com
pany had accomplished their work on the wharf, the

LEAVING LONDON. 3 I
sailors had completed their duties on board ship, all
outward bound passengers had embarked, and every
thing was in readiness for the Dunrobin Castle to leave
the harbour with the next full tide at 12 o'clock
noon. Before that, all those who had come on board to
bid their friends farewell had returned to terra jirma.
At 12 o'clock precisely the order was given, "Let
go," and immediately there was a slow and silent
movement of our big ship out of the dock basin, and
in the direction of the river Thames. Fathers and
mothers, brothers and sisters, wives and children,
who had come to the harbour to bid us adieu,
followed the slow movement of the vessel round the
dock as far as they could, and then waved their
hands and handkerchiefs in token of their desire for
a prosperous voyage to us. By means of tug
steamers we got into the river, and down as far as
Charlton ; and there we stuck as in outer darkness !
There a dense fog enveloped us, and rendered
further progress for a time impracticable. Before
the darkness set in we observed that the Thames
was specially crowded with craft of all descriptions
moving upwards and downwards upon the full tide,
but when the fog became dense any movement was
dangerous. Sometimes there came a gust of wind,
, which modified the density of the fog, and then we
got glimpses of quite a forest of masts and rigging
all about us. .But most of the time, from Wednesday
afternoon till the Saturday at noon, the fog continued
so dense that we could scarcely see any object five
yards from our ship. It is needless to say that some

PRISONERS IN A FOG.

of our companions began to grumble, while others
began to see how necessary it was at times to have
a little of Job's patience. One of the passengers
who had got a book in London with the title,
"South Africa, and how to reach it by the Castle
Line," said that title should have been, " How not to
reach it, by the Dunrobin Castle at least."
"What a strange position to be in," said another
passenger. " Here we are within three miles or so
of the great metropolis of England, and we might as
well be in Patmos, or in the heart of Africa. We are
as ignorant of what is going on in the world as are
the savages of central Africa, and withal as helpless.
We have in our company the representatives of
modern science and art ; representatives of those
men who, by dint of scheming heads and skilful
hands, have offered fair to conquer the worlds both
of matter and of mind ; men who have taught the
sunbeam to engrave their image, yoked the vapour
to their chariot, and outstripped the swiftness of the
wind, and yet we are all as powerless as a company
of infants to modify or remove this fog ! Indeed, we
are as the dead in the graveyard, who are total
strangers to their immediate neighbours !"
On the Thursday and Friday afternoons, we ob
served, during short blinks of sunshine, the Dundee,
Leith, and Aberdeen steamers passing up the
river towards the docks, but we could not move
during any of these blinks for want of sufficient water.
It was Saturday afternoon before it was deemed safe
for us to leave our mooring and proceed towards
Gravesend. When we reached Gavesend we beheld

VARIOUS RELIGIOUS CHARACTERS. ^^
for a few minutes quite a multitude of vessels, ships,
and steamers of all sorts and sizes, from all parts of
the world, arrested as we had been by " king fog," and
were still afraid to move upwards because of the
limitations of the river. We had scarcely got beyond
Tilbury Fort or Docks when the fog enveloped us
again, and if possible more densely this time than
before, and so we were compelled to cast anchor and
remain at Gravesend as prisoners of hope till the
afternoon of the following day.
The following day being the Sabbath, or the
Lord's Day, as I prefer to call it, some of us, about i o
o'clock, began to wonder if there would be divine
service, as intimated by the card in the companion-
way. We had on board a goodly number of the
" John Bull " kind of religious men, that is, men, in
the opinion of a well-known author, " who are not
constitutionally religious. The spiritual element is
not the strong side of John Bull's nature ; not so
decidedly as with the other nationalities that make up
the United Kingdom. I have come into, close contact
with all, and I would say that the typical Irishman's
maxim is, 'religion before business,' albeit Patrick's
religion is considerably spiced with superstition ;
with the Welshman, it is ' religion and business ; '
with the Scotchman, 'business and religion;' but
with the Englishman, it is ' business before religion.'"
Our captain, if I mistake not, was an Irishman,
but for one day at least he had evidently resolved to
put business before religion. Possibly he might be
too mentally depressed that day, because of the fog
and the delay it had caused him, to put his heart and

34 A LAYMAN READS THE "LESSONS.
his hands to the wheel of the English prayer book,
or to have any regard for the company's order to
have divine service every Lord's Day at 10.30 a.m.
Mr. M., a worthy Scotchman, but a resident of
London, and a staunch supporter of the Episcopal
Church, and a few others of different nationalities,
resolved, with the captain's permission, to honour God
by having a meeting for prayer and the reading of
His Word. The worthy captain did not object to
this ; and as we found nothing in the English prayer
book that had anything but a tropical reference to the
fog or to our special circumstances during the past
few days, we resolved to pray extempore, as most
of the Presbyterians do in Scotland.
The following is an outline of an address which I
delivered from the words, "Who had compassion on
the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way "
(Hebrews v. 2). I selected the words,
"OUT OF THE WAY"
as my theme. The name " Gravesend " is somewhat
suggestive. It was so to me more than thirty years
ago, in the course of my first visit to London. It
was my first experience of a sea voyage, and every
thing was new and strange to me. The steamer in
which I sailed from Leith had not once stopped till
she came to Gravesend, and when she stopped I
naturally asked if this was London. " No," was the
immediate response, "it is Gravesend." Never hav
ing heard of such a place but in connection with a
necropolis or graveyard, I repeated the word to
myself, Gravesend ! As the name of a large

A SERMON AT GRAVESEND. 35
municipal town it sounded strange to my ears. On
being told by one of the officers that the captain had
here to surrender his command of the ship to a pilot,
a man who is thoroughly acquainted with all parts of
the river, and is responsible to the Board of Trade
for his navigation of vessels up and down the river,
I began mentally to form an illustration of the
Christian's relation to Christ, the "Captain of our
salvation," when the troubled voyage of life comes to
a close. At Gravesend our wisest and best earthly
friends must stand aside and allow Jesus to be the
Finisher, as well as the Author of the faith. At
Gravesend, when heart and flesh faint and fail us,
Jesus Christ comes, in a very emphatic sense, to
make His grace sufficient for us and to perfect His
strength in our weakness. He who found us at first
in a state of nature or " out of the way," and brought
us into a state of grace, or into the "new and living
way," then brings us into the city that hath founda
tions, whose builder and maker is God. (i) By
nature we are " out of the way ;" out of the way of
righteousness and eternal life. "All we like sheep
have gone astray, and every man has turned to his
own way." By nature we are in the broad way that
leadeth to destruction. Yesterday we passed two or
three steamers high and dry upon the banks of the
river. In the case of one of them only the funnel and
the masts were visible above water. These vessels
had evidently gone out of the way, owing to the fog.
Men are born into this world "out of the way."
The Psalmist says, " We are born in sin and shapen
in iniquity." The Apostle says, " There is none

36 MORAL RESPONSIBILITY.
righteous, no, not one." " There is none that under-
standeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They
are all gone out of the way." (2) By ignorance we
are all " out of the way." There are different kinds of
ignorance, as there are different kinds of knowledge.
There is a sinless ignorance, ignorance which neces
sarily belongs to us as finite creatures, and for which
we are not blamed. We do not condemn or blame
children because they have not the wisdom or know
ledge of their fathers. We do not condemn or blame
men because they do not know what the next day or
hour may bring to pass. Men are nowhere held as
guilty because they do not foresee the day and hour
of their death. But there is another kind of ignor
ance. It is the ignorance of those who prefer the
darkness to the light because their deeds are evil.
There are many men in this age exalted, like Caper
naum, to heaven because of their privileges and
means of enlightenment, but who may well fear lest
they be cast down to hell ! Too many men seem to
live as those of old who despised, and wondered, and
perished. They are so self-sufficient and self-con
ceited that Christ's compassion is despised and
rejected. "Grace," says the poet, "leads the right way;
If you choose the wrong, Take it and perish ;
But restrain your tongue ;
Charge not, with light sufficient and left free,
Your wilful suicide on God's decree.''
I once, after a holiday, used the words of the text
as a motto, and said : — It is sometimes pleasant to be

GOOD TO BE OUT OF THE WAY. 17

0/

"out of the way." Out of the way of books and
business, calls and questions, visits and visitors,
meetings and marriages, and a host of other things
which worry and wear us out before the time. It is
pleasant for ministers as well as for magistrates to
be occasionally out of the way of the world's worries.
If it be possible for men to die before their time, it is
because they unwisely prolong a struggle for which
their powers are inadequate or unequal. They may
not be able to say of any place on earth what our
Lord's disciples said of the Mount of Transfigura
tion, " Lord, it is good for us to be here ;" but surely
it is good for all men to rest awhile and drink of the
pleasures which come from peaceful reflections in
God's great temple of Nature.
Whatever may be thought or said of the theory of
those who advocate a life of absolute seclusion as
essential to man's highest interest, or of the practical
philosophy of the monks of the middle ages, it can
hardly be gainsaid that occasional periods of retire
ment have charms for the best and bravest of men.
Kings have been known to wish for the wings of a
dove that they might fly away and be at rest. The
calm of the desert, the sweet breezes of the mountain,
the music of the rippling waves of ocean, a place of
refuge from the cares and toils of life, "in the deep
umbrage of a green hill's shade," have imparted
pleasures to thousands, such as they could never find
in human-made palaces or temples made with hands.
Walking or meditating for a time among the ever
lasting hills, men have felt somewhat as Moses, the
man of God, when he dwelt in the secret place of the

38 THOUGHTS ON THINGS UNSEEN MAKE GREAT.
Most High and under the shadow of the Almighty ;
others musing by the sea-shore have caught the
spirit of the poet when he sang, —
" Summer ocean, how I'll miss thee,
Miss the thunder of thy roar,
Miss the music of thy ripple,
Miss thy sorrow-soothing shore, — •
Summer ocean, how I'll miss thee
When the sea shall be no more."
It is sometimes profitable to be "out of the way."
With the Bible in our hand and God's Spirit in our
hearts, we may easily find "sermons in stones, books
in the running brooks, and good in everything."
The way of the world is not God's way of light
and life. In the world we are almost forced to think
of the things which are seen and temporal, and in
soul become less by degrees. But "out of the way "
of the thoughtless crowd, the giddy and the gay,
"laughing wild amid severest woe," and into the
way of those who look to things that are unseen and
eternal, we grow unto the measure of the stature of
those who live for ever. We do not know all that
Moses learned in the desert of Midian, or all that
Isaac learned by his meditations in the field, or all
that Paul learned by his three years' sojourn in the
desert of Arabia, or all that John learned during his
exile in the island of Patmos, but we know that each
of these men, by mental exercise and moral discipline,
became great in soul, and thereby " meet for the
Master's use." For the soul as well as for the body
it is profitable to be "out of the way." Mind and

"MAN, KNOW THYSELF. 39
matter, body and spirit, are so intimately connected
that you cannot overwork the one without involving
a corresponding fatigue or injury to the other. The
body being the organ or instrument of the soul, it
should not be exhausted or enfeebled by intemperate
habits or excessive toil. At the best it is but an
earthen vessel, and it should be treated as such.
The soul is in the body, said Plato, in effect, as the
captain is in the ship, and if anything serious happens
to the ship it will fare ill with the soul, unless it has
got wings to fly or hands to swim.
" I must be measured by the soul. The mind's
the measure of the man." It is profitable, therefore,
to be "out of the way," that we may commune with
our own souls, and know what we are.
" Every man," says Gibbon, " who rises above the
common level must have two educations, one from
his teachers and books, and another, more personal
and important, from himself." "Anything," says
Stanford, " in the shape of a human creature may be
turned into a priest, or answer the purpose of a mere
machine for the reading of prayers and the perform
ance of ceremonies, but a Gospel minister in this
age must be every inch a man."* In order, therefore,
that we may become men, and men of God, let us
sometimes take the hillside, the mountain, or the
lonely moor for our closet, and commune with our
own heart, and hold fellowship with the Eternal.

OFF TO FLUSHING.
At 1 2 o'clock noon we were still at anchor at

40 DEPARTURE FROM GRAVESEND.
Gravesend. The captain and his officers were on
the " bridge " evidently consulting about the weather,
or whether they might not venture out to sea. At
12.30 we heard the sound of the donkey engine, and
inferred that the anchors were being lifted. Shortly
after a passenger came from the fore part of the ship
and said, "We are off, off to Flushing." By this
time we got a glimpse of the sun, and also of our
surroundings during the past fourteen hours.
Looking back in the direction of Gravesend, I felt
constrained to say, What a multitude of vessels !
These huge vessels, steamers as large as our own
Castle Liner and some considerably smaller, large
sailing ships and some small ones, the number almost
countless, might reasonably be regarded as repre
senting millions of money ; and there, all are arrested
in one of the principal marine highways of the world,
because of the fog !
Soon they were out of our sight. The fog had
almost disappeared, and we were fanned by a gentle
but cold breeze. The sun's rays began to sparkle
upon the surface of the ocean, and in less than an
hour old Sol himself appeared, as if to cheer us up
after our four days of gloom and darkness and cold
in the Thames. Under this condition of things we
all sat down to dinner, and enjoyed it with thankful
hearts. In the evening, divine service was con
ducted in the saloon. Mr. M. read the lessons, as he
called them, while I delivered a short address on
Hadad's answer to King Pharaoh, " Nothing : how-
beit let me go in any wise " (1 Kings xi. 22).
The following morning about 5 o'clock (December

DUTCHMEN. 4 1
15th) we got up, and found that we had entered the
Docks of Flushing, in Holland, about 4 a.m. It was
a bitterly cold morning ; the frost was so intense that
the steam water coming from the donkey engine on
the wharf was seen hanging in icicles from the wheels
in less than five minutes after. The Dutch work
men who came early in the morning to load our ship
with machinery and various kinds of merchandise
seemed to be quite benumbed with the cold. They
stood for more than an hour looking at their work,
as if they felt unable or unwilling to begin. They
wore heavy wooden clogs upon their feet, and had
their heads protected from the piercing wind by
woollen shawls, but they were otherwise scantily clad
for such a wintry morning. There was nothing
benumbed about their tongues, however, for we could
hear them jabbering among themselves a long way
off.

A STROLL TO THE TOWN OF FLUSHING.
After breakfast, some of our fellow-passengers
resolved to visit the Netherlands naval station, in
the immediate neighbourhood, while others went by
steam tramway car to Middelburg. We, after seeing
all that could be seen about the docks, walked at our
leisure to the town of Flushing. We had often
heard and read of Dutch thrift and husbandry, and
of their tidiness in person and habits. We were not
surprised, therefore, to see evidences of that " order
which is Heaven's first law," and of that cleanliness
which is said to be next to Godliness. The Dutch

42 DUTCH PEOPLE.
people seem to have a special regard for mathemati
cal exactness, squares and such like, in the formation
of their fields, roads, ancl streets. The people them
selves were remarkably tidy and clean in their
persons and houses. The women we met on our
way to the town, though evidently working men's
wives, and others on their way to factories, were
clean and tidy in their dress. They had all a
modest look, and a somewhat subdued bearing.
There was nothing in their gait, dress, or look, to
indicate pride or lack of intelligence. Their look
was not languid, and their stare was not vacant, but
rather intelligent, and withal modest. They looked
at us, being strangers, as we did at them, and passed
on. We were a little amused, however, at some of
their head-dresses and ornaments, for to us they
seemed antiquated. They reminded us of dresses
and ornaments worn by mothers and grandmothers
in the north of Ireland and in the Highlands of
Scotland in the early decades of this century.
In the town of Flushing, with its 14,000 inhabi
tants, we saw nothing to indicate great commercial
prosperity or an abundance of trade, but everywhere
there were evidences of a cleanly, orderly, industrious
and contented people. Their houses were not very
large, but they were clean and evidently well fur
nished.

THE POOR MAN'S COLONY.
There are several so-called pauper colonies in
Holland, and we were anxious, if possible, to see one

LET PAROCHIAL BOARDS LEARN. 43
of them, but the time at our disposal would not
permit of it, and so we had to be content with the
following bit of information regarding them : —
These colonies, we gleaned, were originated more
than sixty years ago, and have been a source of great
blessing to thousands of poor people in the Nether
lands. The Dutch people were among the first, if
not the very first, who tried to solve what has proved
one of the most difficult problems in the range of
political economy. They set down the principle that
strong, healthy men should be furnished with the
means of supporting themselves. At a time, there
fore, when large numbers of the working classes
throughout the Netherlands were threatened with
starvation, or of becoming a heavy burden upon their
more fortunate countrymen, the men of light and
leading in the State resolved to secure from the land
owners hundreds and thousands of acres which had
been condemned as waste or useless, and to have
these acres redeemed and rendered profitable by
means of the poor man's labours. When the land
was secured it was divided into so many plots, and
suitable houses were erected upon each plot for the
men and their families, who were appointed to work
it. Each family was furnished with all the materials
and means necessary for successful husbandry.
Moreover, schools and free education were provided
for the children of these poor people, and the children
were afterwards taught any particular trade or branch
of industry which their parents might prefer. These
poor people were thus saved from the degradation of
having their names on a pauper's roll, and having

44 PERTINENT QUESTIONS.
their children brought up within the walls of a poor-
house. They were thus supplied with the means of
honestly earning their bread by the sweat of their
brow. Many of them might be thus saved from
careers of vice, from becoming street mendicants,
pests in society, and a burden to the State. Those
who might object to go and work in one of these
colonies, or positively refused to do so, were im
mediately taken to one of the penal colonies and
compelled to do so.
Why have we not such colonies in our country ?
Are not such colonies necessary ? Is there not
sufficient spirit or British enterprise amongst us
to have such colonies established for our pauper
population ? Might not our wealthy land proprietors
turn their attention to this subject, and have those
portions of their estates which are lying waste or
useless redeemed and made profitable to themselves,
while at the same time they would be supplying
work to those who are without it ? Might not the
Government of our country do something in this
line, and so shut the mouths of such radical and, in
some respects, unreasonable reformers, as Mr. Henry
George ?
We could have wished, as I have said, to have
seen one of these colonies, but as we required to be
on board the Dunrobin Castle by 4 p.m., we had to
be content with the foregoing gleanings regarding
them.

AN EXCITING SCENE. 45
FOUR OF OUR SECOND SALOON PASSENGERS LEFT
BEHIND.
It had been duly announced that the ship would
leave the dock at 4 o'clock p.m., and by that hour all
the passengers who had gone on shore had re-
embarked, except four young men. As it was neces
sary for the vessel to be out of the docks as soon as
possible after 4 o'clock, she left her moorings a few
minutes after that hour, and proceeded towards her
track for the Canary Islands. For a time it was
thought by some that the young lads might be on
board, but as they could nowhere be seen or found,
we came to the conclusion that they were left behind.
" No matter," said one, "for they were a noisy lot.
Neither of them, so far as I could judge, would be
any real gain to the Colony." There seemed to be a
general concurrence in these remarks. But, for
tunately or unfortunately for the absentees and for the
Colony, we had not sailed many leagues beyond the
harbour when the fog once more returned, and en
veloped our pathway so densely that the pilot
deemed it the best part of valour to have the vessel
stopped, and to wait for clearer weather. In less than
an hour a steam tug was seen leaving the docks and
rushing over the waves at a furious rate. The eyes
of all our fellow-passengers were directed towards it,
and strained to get a glimpse, if possible, of the four
young men. All sorts and sizes of binocular glasses
were used for this purpose, but we failed to see the
" promising youths " until the tug came within a few
hundred yards of the steamer. They had been
E

46 " THE FOOL AND HIS MONEY SOON PARTED."
sheltering themselves from the spray that dashed
over the little tug in its wild chase over the waves.
When the tug came alongside of the steamer they
were allowed to come scrambling up her side like so
many monkeys, and when they came on board, they
speedily retired to their cabins. One of them at
least was seen to be tipsy, and the other three were
not quite sober. Their bit of fun with the tug cost
them thirty shillings, or seven and sixpence each.
But whether they could afford to pay this sum and be
honest men with their neighbours all round may be
disclosed in our record further on.

OFF TO LAS PALMAS.
On Monday evening, December 15th, about 7.30,
the fog had sufficiently yielded to a gentle breeze
that we steamed off towards the English Channel,
the Bay of Biscay, and the Canary Islands.
Our pilot left us at Dover about 3 o'clock in the
morning, and the same day at noon we got a glimpse
of the Isle of Wight on our right. Owing to the
hazy state of the atmosphere and clouds of mist
hanging heavily upon the summits of the hills, we
could not see the island very distinctly. The cap
tain volunteered to tell us that that was the Isle of
Wight. The captain we all regarded as an excellent
man, but rather reticent, or unwilling to answer
questions, which, if he did so, would in no way, as
we thought, compromise his dignity. The same may
be said, in passing, of the captain of the Dunottar

BE WILLING TO COMMUNICATE. 47
Castle. Though a typical Scotsman, and one of the
best of sea captains, he was not very approachable.
A gentleman of high social standing, and also a
Scotsman, who came on board at Madeira, declared
to me one day that he would on no account go and
ask the captain when we were likely to arrive at
Plymouth. No doubt many passengers may be
troublesome with frequent and frivolous questions,
and it may be necessary to keep all such at arm's
length, but all captains should be willing to communi
cate of their knowledge when it is asked for in a
becoming way. "It takes nothing from the light of
my candle," says Cicero, in effect, "to allow a poor
man to have his lit at its blaze."
While passing the Isle of Wight, we remembered
that it was the native place of the famous Dr. Arnold
of Rugby, and also of the no less famous Dr. Hooke,
the so-called experimental philosopher.

OUR EXPERIENCES IN THE BAY OF BISCAY.
As several persons have expressed a desire to be
informed about the Bay of Biscay, and whether it
really bears the terrible character given to it, we
must tell them that the bay is more a bugbear than
anything else. It was about as rough when we
crossed it as it usually is, and we were not sick,
neither were we prevented from reading and writing
when disposed to do so. The bay is said to be
about 400 miles broad, and from 400 to 500 miles in
length. The commotion of the water is caused by

48 NOISY CROCKERY.
strong north-west winds forcing great volumes of
the Atlantic to beat upon the coast line, from which
they are forced back towards the centre of the
bay. These winds, however, are not always preva
lent, and consequently the waters are not always
in a state of commotion. Some of our fellow-pas
sengers told us that they had crossed it several times,
and never once experienced a rough passage. We
entered the bay on Wednesday night (December
17th), and the vessel continued rolling more or less
till the Saturday evening following. During these
days and nights we all knew that we were sailing
over the waves of the Bay of Biscay. A few of the
less robust of the passengers grew sick, and declined
to be seen at the dinner table. Some of us began
to realise that our beds were little better than
shelves, too narrow for comfort in calm weather, and
a little too broad for stillness or sound sleep amid
the rolling billows of the bay. We lurched with the
vessel from side to side, and Somnus refused to come
near us. Occasionally we heard a little noise in the
steward's pantry, not far off; the pots and pans and
general crockery took liberty to dance at times.
But we were more amused than otherwise at the
whole thing ! Nor could we quite restrain ourselves
when we heard such remarks and questions as these
sounding from the cabins in our immediate neigh
bourhood : — "What is that, now?" "That is my
portmanteau down, I believe." " There's my books
down now." " I think I'll be down myself next."
"There's another smash in the pantry!" "I hope
the crockery is well insured." "What's that next?"

A LADY AT HOPELESS WORK. 49
These, and similar remarks, were heard during. the
night, when it was quite dark. The next day, as a
rule, we would talk together of our different experi
ences. "This morning," said a lady, "the steward
came as usual with our cups of coffee and could not
get in, and I could not rise to let him in, for my bed-
ladder had disappeared. All our bags, baskets, and
baggage were topsy-turvey on the floor, and the
ladder, by which I get in and out of bed, was lying
underneath the sofa. Pushing his way in, I told
him that ' we had had a lively time of it last night.'
'I see that,' he answered; 'but the liveliness has
been pretty general.' I got up during the night,"
continued the lady, "and began to try how I could
put things right. But no sooner had I a hold of a
bag, as I thought, than it slipped out of my hand and
slid away to the extreme end of the cabin. On reach
ing it there, it started on its way back to where I had
been, and I gave it up as hopeless." These remarks
may indicate how the passengers generally regarded
the crossing of the Bay of Biscay. The Dunrobin
Castle lurched and pitched a good deal, but, at the
worst, no one seemed to be afraid. On Saturday
evening the sea became calm, and every one retired
to bed with the assurance of enjoying a sound sleep.
On Sabbath morning we rose and beheld a glorious
sunrise, and the sea like a sheet of glass. Although
it was the middle of December, when everyone at
home would be shivering with cold, we were enjoying
the warmth of summer.
At half-past 10 o'clock that morning the captain,
his officers, and a goodly number of the passengers,

50 GODS TIME-KEEPING.
met in the saloon for Divine service. The captain
read the prayers, and read them very well ; the
young doctor, somewhat nervously, read the lessons,
and the whole service was over within an hour. At
the close the captain intimated that I would conduct
divine service in the evening.
In the evening I addressed a goodly number of
the passengers and officers from these words : " And
it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God ; we
have waited for Him, and He will save us " (Isaiah
xxv. 9). After a few introductory remarks on the
primary reference of the text to Sennacherib and his
army before the walls of Jerusalem, I tried to show
that the text had its real fulfilment in the " fulness of
the time " in the incarnation of Christ, and by the faith
of those who received Jesus Christ as their Saviour-
( 1 ) God's time-keeping. — At this season of the year,
when the thoughts of so many thousands of our
fellow-men all over the civilised world are directed to
Bethlehem, Ephratah, and that memorable night in
which the Wonderful, the Counsellor, the Mighty
God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace,
became an infant of days, was born in a stable and
cradled in a manger, I see no reason, notwithstand
ing the superstitious notions of some men with refer
ence to Christmas, why we should not meditate for a
little this evening on the time when the Word was
made flesh and dwelt among men. " That day " was
the day divinely appointed. It pertained to that
"order which is heaven's first law." There is nothing
of the nature of accident in the ways of God. There
is nothing of the nature of haphazard or chance in

TWO PARTS OF ONE WHOLE. 51
the working out of His plans. Among the laws and
forces of nature we see nothing of that kind : from the
revolutions of the planets to the germination of the
tiniest plant, immutable, unvarying law prevails.
Causes and effects precede and follow under
inflexible laws. We can reckon to a minute upon
the rising and setting of the sun, upon the waxing
and waning of the moon, and upon the ebbing and
flowing of the tides. Sailors know to a minute when
it will be full tide, and so do shipbuilders. Because
of this wonderful regularity among the forces of
Nature, eclipses of the sun and of the moon can be
predicted many years before they take place, and the
tides of ocean can be marked upon charts and in
almanacs ages in advance.
God's time-keeping in the outward or visible world
of Nature, or in the coming and going of summer
and winter, seed time and harvest, is symbolic of
what we observe in the kingdom of grace. Nature
and Revelation do not contradict each other, but are
as two parts of one whole. Nature and her forces,
like the hands moving round upon the face of a well-
regulated clock, are the outward symbols of the in
ward or invisible kingdoni of grace. All through the
Bible we see clear evidences of God's time-keeping,
or love of order. We see them in the book of
Genesis when He separated the day from the night,
the sea from the dry land, and gave the different
tribes of earth and air and sea their different spheres
of life and action. We see His love of order ex
emplified in the Ark, "where Noah dwelt and heard
the deluge roar;" in the construction of the Taber-

52 "THAT DAY "MY HOUR.
nacle ; in the division and marching of the tribes of
Israel through the wilderness ; and often in the
actions of our Lord in the fulness of the time. Before
feeding the hungry multitude in the wilderness He
commanded them to sit down upon the grass, not in
confusion but in the order of fifties. When He had
finished the work given Him to do He rose from the
dead, not as one taken by surprise or as one in haste,
but as one who would have all things done decently
and in order.
The grave clothes were neatly folded and laid to
gether in one place, and the napkin that was about
Hi's head in a place by itself. During the three
years of His ministry He often referred to the "hour
and power of darkness " as one who knew that
" hour," and would not be forced to act before it came.
Lawless mobs in Judea conspired to crucify Him, but
they were powerless to do so until His appointed
hour. " My hour," He said once and again, "is not
yet come." The time for His coming into the world,
and the time for His leaving it, were ordained of the
Father ; and in these times He would come and go,
and in no other. The time of His coming into the
world is designated by the prophet as " that day."
During four thousand years preparations had been
made for " that day." Promises and prophecies were
given concerning it ; types, ceremonies, and sacrifices
were instituted to keep it before the people's minds.
Prophets, priests, and kings, all Israel, were on tip
toe of expectation to behold it. Of many besides
Abraham it might be said that they saw it afar off
and were glad.

AN IMPRESSIVE SCENE. 53
At length "that day" came when the sceptre had
departed from Judah, and when Rome ruled the
world. Those whose faith had not failed, whose
patience had not been exhausted, went to Bethlehem
on "that day," and said, " Lo, this is our God ; we
have waited for Him, and He will save us."
(2) " God manifest in the Jlesh." — This is what the
father of the faithful saw afar off and was glad.
This is Jacob's Shiloh come, to whom "shall the
gathering of the people be." This is the " Hope
which gladdened David's heart " realised. This is
the " Consolation of Israel " in all ages. Let Us, in
thought, this evening go to the natal chamber, and
see with the shepherds this "great sight," the anti
type of the "great sight" which Moses turned aside
to see in the desert of Midian. Let us go with the
wise men of the East, or in the faith and spirit which
animated good old Simeon, and say, " Lo, this is our
God ; we have waited for Him, and He will save
us." It has been my privilege in God's good providence
to stand more than once upon the traditional spot
where God became manifest in the flesh. I have
stood there in the company of men who belonged to
different nations and religious sects, and I can never
forget what I have seen there. It was impressive to
see how these men — Russians, Armenians, Greeks,
Italians, Americans, Englishmen, Scotsmen, and
Irishmen — bowed their heads, and in most cases
their hearts, over the silver star that marks the spot
where Jesus was born. Not a few of these men
were in tears as they stooped to read the pregnant

54 TRYING TO DO THE IMPOSSIBLE !
inscription, " Hie de Virgine Maria Jesus Christus
Natus est."
No one, so far as I know or have read, has ever
questioned the tradition which gives to that humble
grotto the honour of being the place of our Lord's
nativity. The "Church of the Nativity" over the
grotto was erected by Helena in the year of our
Lord 327, and the grotto seems to have been well
known two hundred years before that. But what
does it matter though the place or spot of our Lord's
birth has not been properly identified ? the fact of
the incarnation remains. The fact that Jesus was
born in Bethlehem, nearly nineteen hundred years
ago ; the facts that He was "born of a woman, and
made under the law," that He lived in this world a
life of sorrow and suffering for three and thirty years,
and was at length nailed to the bitter cross for our
advantage, are the facts with which we are chiefly
concerned. Some men, proud in heart, have looked
at these facts as Naaman looked at the waters of the
Jordan, and turned away in a rage. Some men have
tried to measure the absolute with the foot-rule of
logic or with the standard of carnal reason, and have
reeled and staggered as drunken men. But others,
"meek and lowly in heart," have come to the con
sideration of these facts, and have been enabled to
say with Thomas, " My Lord and my God."
(3) Israels appropriating faith. — " Lo, this is our
God ; we have waited for Him, and He will save us."
For ages the peoples of the world had their gods
many, and lords many, but Jesus must ever be the
God of Israel.

GRAN CANARIA. 55
" To as many as received Him to them gave He
power to become the sons of God." Let us do so,
and so become wise unto salvation.

THE GRAND CANARY ISLANDS.
We reached these islands, on the north-west coast
of Africa, on Monday afternoon, 22nd December.
There are seven large islands and a few smaller ones,
of which Teneriffe and the Gran Canaria are said to
be the most important. They have the repute of
being good health resorts. Hundreds of English-
speaking people go to one or other of these islands
every winter, and stay till the winter is gone. The
air is found to be so salubrious all the year round,
and the hotel accommodation so good, that they are
every year growing in popularity. These islands are
said to have been discovered by the Carthaginians
250 years before the Christian era, and that they
were then without inhabitants. The ruins of large
temples and other buildings were then there, show
ing that they must have been occupied at one time
by a religious people. They came into the hands of
the Spaniards, after a prolonged struggle, in 1493,
and have been under Spanish rule ever since. The
area of all the islands is said to be about 3800 square
miles, and the population 240,000. There are a con
siderable number of caves and caverns, and one or
two extinct volcanoes, one 500 feet deep. In one
of these vast caves, called the " Cave Village," there

56 THE MINISTER AND THE SPANIARD.
are hundreds of Spanish families whose reputation
is not good. They are somewhat in disposition as
some of the Arabs in the East, who will steal your
teeth unless you sleep with compressed lips.
English-speaking people seldom visit them except in
large companies. They are regarded by the
Spaniards of Las Palmas as vile, and they regard
themselves as "outcasts," and live as barbarians.
The climate of the islands is said to be so equable
throughout the year, that the fruits of the temperate
and torrid zones grow equally well, and in abundance.
The people live very much on their garden fruits,
and also on fish, which are said to be plentiful.
They spend most of their time in cultivating plots
of garden ground and small fields, and in fishing,
in making clay ware, walking sticks, and in smoking
tobacco. The "sights" of Las Palmas, the capital
town of the islands, are not very many. The Palace
of Justice is a fine building, and the Cathedral is an
imposing structure, well finished, but beyond these
there is nothing to attract or interest a stranger.
The Cathedral is dedicated to Saint Anne, but who
she was no one could tell us. One of the men asked
me if I was a priest ? I said, " No, except in the
Scriptural sense." " Are you then a Protestan' ?''
" Yes," I answered, " I am a Christian, a minister of
the Gospel." "Ah! Protestan' no good, no good."
" Why not ? I love Jesus Christ ; do you ?" He
put his two hands upon his breast and said, " Me
love Maria, me love Jesus." Notwithstanding our
humble confession, he seemed to regard us with
some suspicion, and yet pleaded with us to buy his

UNEQUALLY YOKED. 57
goods, — chairs from Madeira, smoking materials,
&c, &c.
Several of our fellow-passengers left us at Las
Palmas. Mr. P. and his lady evidently belonged to
that class who can afford to go and stay where they
please. They had resolved to stay over the winter
months at this sanitorium. As man and wife they
were not not very equally yoked. Mr. P. had
evidently reached the ripe age of sixty-five, while
his wife could not be more than twenty-five. The
one seemed to be living as in the gloom of December,
and the other in "May. The one was sour and sulky,
the other sweet and happy. Mrs. P. had evidently
resolved, as she could not bring her circumstances to
her mind, to bring her mind to her circumstances.
Not a bad resolve this for any one.
We were sorry to part with Mr. M., for he was
above the average in intelligence, and had proved
himself, during the voyage, a good companion, a
genial kind-hearted man. Mr. M. was a representa
tive of a large and lucrative business firm in London.
Our coal bunkers having been replenished with
about 300 tons of coal, and our water tanks with so
many hundred gallons of fresh water, the Dunrobin
Castle steamed off towards the scorching heat of the
tropics, St. Helena and Cape Town.

ENTERING THE TROPICS.

On leaving the Canary Islands we felt the weather
to be very agreeable. There was a gentle breeze

58 ENTERING THE TROPICS.
agitating the surface of the sea, and this reaching us
under the ship's awning was very refreshing. But
soon the breeze came to an end, and the sun over
head became more and more intensely warm. The
surface of the ocean became as a sheet of glass, and
the air as the glow of a heated oven. Our winter gar
ments were exchanged for the whitest and lightest
clothes at our command. Having passed the line of
the tropic of Cancer, which is the limit of the sun's
northern deviation from the equator, some of us felt
quite languid, almost destitute of animation. Had it not
been for the rapid movement of the steamer, and the
awning affording us shelter from the sun's scorching
rays, our sense of oppression would have been some
what like suffocation. Fortunately we had two or
three heavy thunderstorms about this time, which
greatly modified the heat and closeness of the atmo
sphere. As we were within thirty miles of the coast
of Sierra Leone, we could not help sympathising
with the people who had to live and labour in such
heat. As we drew near the equator we were all anxious
to know when the "line" would be crossed. Every
day, as the captain and his officers took their solar
observations, we watched them, and one or other
of us would say, "When shall we cross the line?"
In this connection some one recalled the lines of
Dr. Alexander, —
" There is a line by us unseen
Which crosses every path,
The hidden boundary between
God's patience and His wrath."

CROSSING THE "LINE." 59
One day the captain came to me and said,
" Doctor, I wish you to come and see this." I went.
" Stand there, if you please," and I stood. Then he
said, " Dr. Campbell, may your shadow never grow
less!" The fact is, it .could hardly grow less, for 1
had no shadow at all. We were at that moment, it
may be said in a general way, crossing the "line."
Beyond that we were in the tropic of Capricorn, south
of the equinoctial line or equaton Into this southern
hemisphere we had to sail 23^ degrees before we
could be out of the tropics and into the temperate
zone. What we could not cure we resolved to
endure. As the worthy captain, his officers, and the
passengers chimed so well together, we did our best
to interest one another by various kinds of rational
or innocent amusements. In the day-time we had
various games, playing quoits being the most com
mon ; and in the evenings we had friendly discus
sions and concerts. Sometimes the concerts were
entirely of a secular order, and at other times as
entirely sacred. A company of the Salvation Army,
some of whom had embarked at Flushing and some
at Las Palmas, did their best to entertain us by means
of their musical instruments and their sweet singing
•of hymns. Captain Evans and his wife were very
agreeable companions. Mrs. E. was a sweet young
person, and her singing powers were very pleasing.
Captain Winder seemed to be specially happy at
these singing and preaching meetings.
Occasionally we were interested in watching flocks
of flying fish. Rising now and again in large num
bers from the crests of the waves, they would flutter

60 CHRISTMAS .IN THE TROPICS.
for a few moments above the surface, and then fly a
considerable distance, and at length return to their
natural element. We were told that they sometimes
rise so high above the water, as if pursued by an
enemy, that in their downward course they fall upon
the deck of a passing vessel. The captain showed
us one which had so fallen. It was still breathing
when we saw it. It had long, transparent, finny
wings, and a silvery back ; and hence the glittering
appearance of these creatures in the sunlight. Some
times birds of, beautiful plumage would come, as if
weary on the wing, and rest themselves about the
ship for days.

CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR'S DAY IN THE TROPICS.
Most of the passengers and crew of the Dunrobin
Castle were in a very happy mood on Christmas
day. Every countenance seemed to be beaming
with joy. As early as five o'clock in the morning
there was a general peripatetic movement on deck,
and those passengers who had hitherto been most
gloomy were ready to sing. The third-class pas
sengers seemed to be specially alive to the importance
of the day. A considerable number of them were
Roman Catholics and Mohammedans. They dressed
themselves in their best and most gaudy robes, and
made sure that all on board should see them.
The majority of the Mohammedans were on a
pilgrimage to Mecca, and they seemed to have as
much regard for Christmas as the Roman Catholics

FOUR "PROMISING YOUTHS." 6l
had. Although the day was warm, and the
atmosphere as the glow of a heated furnace, they
danced with vigour for more than an hour.
It was a day of rejoicing all round. The captain
and his officers were in their happiest mood. Captain
Winder had supplied himself before leaving London
with a number of beautiful cards, and these he
distributed to the ladies, his page-boy being the post.
The saloon tables were specially decorated for the
occasion, and were well laden by the stewards with
all kinds of the best food and sweetest fruits. The
food was good and well cooked, and plenty of it
every day, but the decorations made it specially
attractive that day.
We had not seen anything in the shape of a
steamer or sailing vessel for several days, but on
that day we saw two steamers belonging to the same
company. When we first saw them they were far
apart, but they recognised one another by signs, and
immediately drew near as if to salute one another
with the compliments of the season. We watched
the movements of these steamers with considerable
interest. In the evening the four "promising
youths," whose exploits at Flushing have been
recorded, crowned the occasion with all possible
kinds of merriment. They freely indulged in the
use of intoxicating drinks during the day, and at
night had recourse to the costliest liquors on board,
which they supplied to others ad libitum. Their bill
for champagne alone that evening amounted to nine
pounds ! Their charivari on deck was' continued till
about three o'clock the next morning. That evening's

62 A BANQUET.
proceedings put an end to our friendly intercourse
with these young lads.
On New Year's day we had all the outward
evidences of animal joy in the passengers which had
characterised the proceedings of Christmas day.
The captain had learned in some way, or from some
one, that the day was the anniversary of Mrs. C.'s
marriage, and he was willing that it should be
recognised by means of a banquet. In the morning
he sent her some gifts by means of his sea-post,
marking upon the envelopes the degrees of latitude
and longitude, and in the evening he ordered so
many bottles of his best champagne to be put upon
the table. The speeches on that occasion in con
nection with the toasts proposed were not inspired,
on the part of the captain or on our part, by the
contents of these bottles. We very soberly said
that the captain, while ever ready to " magnify his
office," could not be regarded by any one on board
as stiff or starchy in his manner. It had been a
pleasure to us to observe how a great man could be
humble and obliging. Throughout the voyage he
had given ample evidence of his kingly yet kindly
nature. The rich and the poor of his passengers
seemed to be alike to him, as the able commander
of the Dunrobin Castle. The young people, and
especially the sick on board, had been daily his
concern. Seldom, if ever, have we sailed with a
captain who took such a lively interest in his
passengers, or did so much to make them all com
fortable and happy.
The only thing that seemed to mar or modify our

A FUNERAL AT SEA. 63
exuberant feelings on New Year's day was the
reflection of what had taken place a few hours before.
One of the sailors had died and was buried on the
previous day, and the impressions then produced
upon our minds were more or less vividly present
with us on New Year's day.

A FUNERAL AT SEA.
One of the sad incidents connected with our voyage
was the death and burial of one of the ship's crew at
sea. For several days the heat of the tropics had
been intense. Even those of us who could freely
move about on deck and got the benefit of the sea
breeze, such as it was, and the cool shade of the
awning, felt it to be so. It must have been more
oppressive to the men in the engine-room, and
especially to those who attended to the furnaces.
We all readily sympathised with these men, and yet
those of them who were young and healthy did not
seem to feel it as much as we did on deck.
Two of the firemen, who were not very strong or
robust at their best, became unwell, and had to be
removed to the hospital. One of them gradually got
round to be able to resume work, but the other one
died. The news that he had died, and that he would
be buried without delay, soon became known to all
the passengers, and there was a general turn out to
witness the funeral ceremonies. He died at 5 o'clock
a.m., 30th December, and was buried the same
morning at 8.

64 FUNERAL SERVICE.
A funeral in any circumstances is naturally fitted
to awaken feelings of sadness, but specially so when
one dies and must be buried at sea.
So it seemed to be in this case. Every passenger
seemed to be greatly moved and deeply interested.
About ten minutes before eight o'clock the cap
tain, the chief mate, the doctor, and the chief engineer,
along with other officers, appeared on deck in full
uniform, and waited for two or three minutes till the
corpse was brought from the hospital. It was
covered in a strong piece of sacking, and the sacking
enclosed, we were told, heavy pieces of iron. At a
given signal all heads were uncovered. The body
was then lifted upon a board, and carried on the
shoulders of four sailors to the place at which it was
to be committed to -the deep. When the corpse was
laid down, near the engine-room, the engine was
stopped, and the captain began to read the service
from the prayer-book. When he had come to the
words, " Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God
of His great mercy to take unto Himself the soul of
our departed brother, here departed, we therefore
commit his body to the deep," the board on which
the corpse was laid was lifted up at one end, and the
corpse slid off into the sea. The captain still read
on, and when he finished the steamer proceeded on
her course. The company then dispersed. The
whole scene gave rise, in the case of some at least, to
serious meditation, and, in the course of the day, to a
somewhat animated discussion with respect to differ
ent modes of burial. One man expressed the hope
that he might never die at sea so as to necessitate a

DIFFERENT MODES OF BURIAL. 65
similar burial. " Why," said C. W., " what objection
could any one have to burial at sea? How much
cleaner, how much cheaper, and how much less
loathsome is the burial of a body at sea to that of
burial in the earth. I for one would like to be so
buried." "I am quite indifferent," said another, " as to where
I may die, and where my body may be buried.
When I am dead, they may bury me where they
please, or burn my body if my friends are so dis
posed." With this man's views there seemed to be
little or no sympathy. It was suggested to him that
perhaps he had as little regard for his soul as he had
now expressed regarding his body.
The leader of the discussion said, " I dislike the
idea of burial at sea. It seems to me quite un
natural. I am quite ready to admit that there can
be nothing lost to God. I can believe that the
whole terraqueous globe, with all its contents,
animate and inanimate, is infinitely less to God than
a small room with its contents is to its human
occupier. God can as easily summon the dead from
the depths of ocean as from the depths of earth
in ten thousand graveyards. Suppose you could
take and break the grandest marble statues of the
world into a million fragments, and again grind these
fragments into powder, you would not thereby
annihilate anything. Their forms, no doubt, would
be destroyed, but grant the existence of the sculptors,
who at first carved them into so many life-like images,
and every one of them could be re-made from similar
blocks of marble. The original images were still in

66 A DISCUSSION ON CREMATION.
the sculptors' minds. All the souls and all the
bodies which God ever formed are still in His mind.
They are never absent from His thoughts. No
human body can be lost to Him, no matter where it
may be buried, or into how many fragments it may
have been torn. The whole material universe is
but as a small vessel to Him, and when He wills
it the sea shall give up its dead. I am ready, I say,
to admit all this, but somehow I dislike the very
idea of burial in the depths of ocean."
The discussion then turned on the question of
cremation. " Cremation," said one, "is a still more
barbarous mode of burial. In ancient times it was
common only among the lowest classes in the
heathen world. It was part of the doom to which
tyrant princes condemned the worst criminals.
The living and the dead at the tyrant's command
were coupled face to face and hand to hand. In the
reign of Richard I. a law was passed that if a man
killed another at sea, the murderer was to be tied
in this way to the body of the dead man, and
cast together into the sea." I was appealed to
to corroborate this, or to give my opinions on the
subject. I willingly did so. "I believe," I said,
"that what Mr. D. has now said is quite correct.
Cremation was known to the Jews, but they held
it in contempt. The prophet Jeremiah referred to
it when speaking of the man who was doomed to be
' buried with the burial of an ass, drawn and cast
forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem.' The
Phoenicians, I believe, were the first who burned the
bodies of their dead and gathered their ashes into

"DUST TO DUST." 67
urns, which they deposited in tombs erected for the
purpose. There is something so unnatural about
cremation, that one shudders at the very thought of
it. I can scarcely believe that any man having the
ordinary measures of humanity can think of it with
anything like satisfaction, much less can I believe
that any Christian man or woman can adopt it,
even in thought. I cannot help supposing that
the desire for cremation proceeds from a materialistic
nature, or a low stoical disposition. Whatever real
or apparent necessity some men may see and urge
in favour of this mode of disposing of the dead, it
can never become popular with a Christian people.
These are my views on the subject. For myself, I
should prefer to be buried in the dust, and, if possible,
in the dust of my fathers. I strongly cherish the
sentiment expressed by Joseph when he said, ' Carry
my bones out of Egypt.'" At this point our dis
cussion came to an end, and we began to consider
certain possibilities with respect to the body of the
sailor which had been cast into the sea. The
opinion was expressed by some one that the body
would not sink to the bottom, but would float in
some one of its abysmal regions, till the " sea shall
be no more." On this subject we were "all at sea,"
and speculations were useless. A sailor reminded us
of the four lines in which seamen express their hope
in all such cases, —
" May'st thou, poor Tom, find pleasant weather
When He, who all commands,
Shall give, to all Life's Crew together,
The word to pipe all hands."

68 NAPOLEON'S PLACE OF EXILE.
ST. HELENA.
We reached this lonely island of the sea early on
the morning of the 3rd January. St. Helena is the
island to which Napoleon was banished shortly after
the battle of Waterloo, and where he died in 1821.
It is truly a lonely-looking place. Patmos, as we
passed it some years ago, did not appear half so
lonely. All round the coast, so far as we could see,
is one mass of unbroken rocks and overhanging cliffs.
Where there happens to be a ravine there is a fort.
The only apparent entrance to the island is at
Jamestown, and there the landing is somewhat
dangerous and difficult. The island is said to have
been called Helena, in honour of the mother of
Constantine the Great. It is about ten miles in
length, 7 in breadth, and has an area of 47 square
miles. The population of the island does not exceed
6000. Longwood, where Napoleon lived, and where
he was buried, is on the other side of the island,
about six miles from where we landed. The road
thither is steep and difficult, but some of our fellow-
passengers got horses and rode to it. We spent
most of the day in the village of Jamestown, looking
at the sights, conversing with the people, and
procuring a few of their art treasures and curiosities.
The people, generally, are not lacking in powers of
conversation, and their knowledge of things in general
is not very limited. We were surprised to find that
some of the shopkeepers could sell us goods cheaper
than we could buy them in either England or Scot
land. One of the military forts in the island, is on the
summit of the hill above Jamestown, and is reached

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SALVATION ARMY. 69
by a flight of 699 steps. The climbing of these steps
is said to be an excellent test of a man's heart and
lung powers, but we did not try to prove it. We
left our Salvation Army captain and his wife at St.
Helena, and we did so with feelings of regret, for
they had proved themselves very agreeable com
panions, and, so far as we could judge, devoted
Christians. We could heartily wish them God-speed.
The struggle for existence with some of these
Salvation people is considerable. Many of them
who have families can hardly "make the two ends
meet." General Booth makes them work hard, and
allows them very little for it. This is too bad.
Another Salvation Army captain and his family
came on board at St. Helena, and occupied the cabin
which our friends had left. Then came also the Lord
Bishop of St. Helena, a gentleman about 80 years of
age, and his curate, the Rev. Mr. Baker, both going
to the Synod of their Church at the Cape. These
gentlemen were alike frank and friendly, and we had
long conversations together. We learned from the
Lord Bishop that the full brother of the late King
Cetewayo, Undabuko, and his half-brother, Tshingana,
and the young Prince of Zululand, Dinizulu, were
still prisoners on the island under his tuition.
These Zulu gentlemen, he said, were specially
under the care of Messrs. Anderson and Daniels.
They were allowed to go about the island as they
felt disposed, but not to the towns except when, at
least, partially dressed. Four women and an old
nurse lived with them.
On being shown their portraits, taken in a group,

70 A PRINCE WHO WISHED TO BE PHOTOGRAPHED.
and as Adam-like in Eden in their costume as
possible, I asked why one of them had turned his
back towards the camera when photographed ? "I
asked that question myself," said Mr. Baker, "and
the answer I got was this : ' I knew quite well how I
looked frontways, but I had no idea how I looked
back ways, and I wanted to know.' "
" When you converse with these men, Mr. Baker,
do you find them fairly intelligent?" "Their intel
ligence," he replied, "is very limited, except when it
bears upon their own country and customs. After
they came to the island, one of them seemed to be
long absorbed in wonder, and the secret of his wonder
was, how the ship in which they were brought could
have sailed, and had no sails ! He had no idea or
knowledge of steam power. His sense of wonder
was intensified when I told him of the steam engine
inside of the ship. These men are kept on the
island at the expense. of the Colonial Government."
On the morrow after leaving St. Helena the Lord
Bishop asked permission to conduct divine service
and to preach to the people. As I had hitherto
preached, the captain kindly informed me of his lord
ship's wish, and I said, " Certainly." I was pleased
to listen to a short, but fairly good, evangelical dis
course. During that week we had evidence that we
were nearing the mainland. There flocked about us
a large number and variety of birds. Some of them
were called " Mother Carey's chickens," others alba
trosses, and a few Cape pigeons. As they increased
in number some of them waxed bold in noisy sounds,
as if to indicate their displeasure at our invasion of

NEARING CAPE TOWN. 7 I
their home territory. On Saturday morning we
beheld afar off Dassen Island, and shortly after
Robben Island, a place where lepers and lunatics are
confined, and then Table Mountain, with its "cloth"
partly on and partly off.
As yet we could see no harbour, no ships, and no
town that we could regard as Cape Town. Cape
Town lies around the bay at the base of Table
Mountain, and is almost invisible until the steamer
goes round into the bay. It did not appear then to
be a very large or extensive place. Perhaps that
huge mountain rising 3,800 feet behind it tends to
make it look less than it really is.
We entered the harbour and soon afterwards got
on shore. As the steamer was behind her time it
had been resolved to leave Cape Town the following
day (Sabbath), but there was a large number of pil
grims going with us on their way to Mecca, and
they positively refused, as I was informed, to begin
their journey on the Sabbath ! We therefore got all
Saturday and all Sabbath and part of Monday at
Cape Town. ' On the homeward journey we had
other three full days at the Cape. Our record, there
fore, at this point will embrace nearly all that we
heard and saw at Cape Town and suburbs.

CHAPTER IV.

CAPE TOWN AND SUBURBS.
LL day on Saturday the sun shone
intensely in a cloudless sky. The
"table cloth," which we had seen in
the morning partly on and partly
off Table Mountain, began in the
course of the afternoon to draw itself
together, and to lie thickly upon the
summit. This, we were assured, was an indication
of a coming " south-easter." We hurried, therefore,
here and there through the town in the hope of see
ing all its " sights," and be back to our refuge in the
ship before the storm came on. We first directed
our steps to the temporary home of D. C, but found
him not. Afterwards he appeared and accompanied
us to all the places which he thought would be of
interest to us. D. C. had left the " City of the
Rock" about two years ago more like a skeleton
than a man, but now, what a change! He looked
like a man in the best of health, and in every respect
a gentleman. In the distance I could scarcely
believe that he was the lad I had known for years.
" Verily," I said to him, " Cape work, Cape food,

STROLL THROUGH THE TOWN. y ^
and Cape air, whatever may be said of its ' south
easter,' have agreed with you." "Yes," he replied,
" this is a grand place."
He led us along several of the principal streets of
the town, and directed our attention to the formation
of the streets on parallel lines from Table Mountain
to the sea. These principal streets are crossed here
and there at right angles by streets less broad and
less imposing, in respect of buildings. The Dutch
people who founded the town, about 230 years ago,
seem to have had a special regard for this order of
squares in the formation of all the towns and villages
founded by them in Cape Colony and in Natal.
The principal street in Cape Town was wont to be
called " Hurengracht," but it is now named Adderly
Street. In this street we found the principal build
ings of the city, the Commercial Exchange, the
Public Library and Reading-Room, the Standard
Bank, and most of the Shipping Offices, those of the
" Castle Line " being not the least conspicuous. We
entered these offices, and were pleased to hear
among the clerks the sounds of our " mother tongue."
We met and conversed with some of our old
Greenock friends there, and were pleased to see
them well, and evidently in the way of doing well.
On our left, going up the street, stands the old
Dutch Reformed Church, with its somewhat quaint
vane-topped Flemish spire. On our right stand the
new Parliament Houses, the Public Library and
Museum. The Parliament Houses are of red brick,
relieved by pilasters and window sides of Portland
cement. In the immediate neighbourhood are the

74 PLACES OF INTEREST.
Government Gardens, to which the people have
daily access, and also the Botanic Gardens, beauti
fully laid out with grass and flower plots, shrubberies,
and conservatories. To the left stands the official
residence of the Governor. There is a very fine
avenue of grand oak trees in the neighbourhood of
the Gardens, which must be a pleasant place of
resort to the inhabitants on a hot summer day.
The municipal administration of the town is
carried on by the Mayor and the other officials in
the Town House, in Greenmarket Square. The
house is plain, but substantial-looking. The Com
mander of the Forces and his staff have their official
abodes in the Castle, the ancient citadel having all
the surroundings of an old fort, while the soldiers
are accommodated in the barracks, in Caledon
Square. In the neighbourhood of the Railway Station we
saw a large crowd of people in a kind of public park,
and on going thither we found "sales going on."
Some were selling old harness, old clothes, pieces of
furniture, fruits, wool, feathers, and other articles of
a miscellaneous character, while others were buying,
and there were crowds here and there looking on.
By this time we had become weary strolling, and
so we turned in the direction of our Dunrobin Castle.
Approaching the docks we saw a large number of
men at work, every man having some printed letters
and figures on his jacket, and all guarded by armed
soldiers or police. " These men," said D. C, "are
convicts, who have been sentenced to long terms of
imprisonment, and are employed for extending the

A SABBATH S EXPERIENCE IN CAPE TOWN. 75
docks. There are nearly a thousand of them." In
the graving dock we saw a number of vessels, and
D. C, pointing to one of them, said, "That is the
Melrose, the steamer in which Carey, the informer
in connection with the Phcenix Park murder, was
shot while on the voyage to Port Elizabeth."

A SABBATH'S EXPERIENCE IN CAPE TOWN.
The next day (Sabbath) our young friend came
down to the harbour at 10 a.m. for the purpose of
escorting us to the Scotch Presbyterian Church.
This place of worship is a plain, but very substantial
building, and well situated. The building belongs,
I believe, to the Church of Scotland. The present
minister of the congregation, however, is a Free
Churchman, and was brought up in connection with
the congregation of his father, a worthy Free Church
minister in Argyllshire. The minister's wife is a
daughter of the Rev. Dr. Elder of Rothesay, and a
niece of the late Rev. Dr. Beith, of the Free North
Church, Stirling. The Rev. Mr. Russell, B.D., to
whom I refer, was not present to conduct the service
on the morning of our visit. On entering the church
we were shown into the minister's pew. And what
a pew ! It was one of those deep, narrow, uncom
fortable seats, which reminded us of the days when
people were compelled to attend church to do
penance! All the pews in the church were alike.
Looking over the building, and seeing only the
heads of the people when sitting, we could not help

76 JACK IN THE BOX.
thinking that the man who had made the seats must
have borrowed his ideal of church pews from a real
" Jack in the box !" The service was conducted that
forenoon by a young man, whose name, we after
wards learned, was the Rev. Mr. Taylor. He con
ducted the service in such a, way as to rivet our
attention, and make us quite forget all our physical
discomforts. He gave out a portion of the 139th Psalm to be
sung — " Behind, before, Thou hast beset,
And laid on me Thine hand," &c,
and the choir went off with the singing of it at a
galloping pace, that we almost felt inclined to be
angry. There was a lack of that " reverence and
godly fear " which should characterise all leaders of
God's praise, as well as all Christian worshippers.
The young minister gave out as his text, Romans
vii. 13, "That sin by the commandment might
become exceeding sinful." From these words the
young preacher delivered a most admirable discourse,
a sermon that would have done credit to the most
renowned theologian and the most gifted scholar.
In delivering it he seemed to be quite natural and
original. While in Natal we felt constrained to recommend
this young man to the people of a vacant charge, but
we afterwards learned that he did not feel inclined to
leave Cape Town. Moreover, we were glad to learn
that the people of his present charge appreciated his
services so highly that they would on no account
hear of his removal.

A "PROMISING YOUTH IN DIFFICULTY. J J
After the service was over we were introduced to
the Rev. Mr. Russell and his wife. He had just
returned from Mr. Taylor's church, and would have
me to take his place in the evening. To this I
could not consent, for I was not in a physical state
to do so, and I had not a sermon that I could deliver
with freedom. On our way back to the harbour one
of the Cape's "south-easter" storms came on, and
it continued the whole afternoon and evening.
About 4 o'clock in the afternoon a deputation of
the office-bearers of the church came down to urge
upon me to preach in the evening.
We were then on board engaged in a work of
necessity and mercy. Three of the Dutchmen,
who had left us the day before on their way to
Kimberley, came back and told us that one of the four
young men who had been a little troublesome at
Flushing and by the way, had been left on their
hands without a single penny, and they could not
keep him nor take him with them.
After hearing their story Mrs. C. went round the
passengers and succeeded in raising a sum sufficient
to keep him from starving for two weeks. One of
the deputation, Mr. P., became interested in the
case, and promised to secure him lodgings until he
had time to look out for something to do. This
done, and the storm still continuing, the deputation
kindly agreed to send a conveyance to take us to
the church and back to the harbour, if I would
only agree to preach. At length I consented, but
declined the offer of a conveyance. I somewhat
regretted this afterwards, for the storm we experi-
G

78 " CAPE DOCTOR."
enced was terrific. The wind came dashing round
the cloud-capped mountain and down its slopes as if
in a state of mad ecstacy ! In its course it raised
heaps of sand and all sorts of small stones and
rubbish, and dashed them furiously in our faces. It
rattled with its forces upon the roofs and against
the windows of the houses ; made a clearance
of so many scores of hats, bonnets, and umbrellas,
and threatened to blow several persons into
the sea! D. C, a strong young man, took the
lead, I followed, and Mrs. C. held on as well as she
could by my coat tails. It was, we thought, a
terrible experience, and this is what the people call
the "Cape doctor." "Cape doctor!" said I; "he
might be less furious, towards strangers at least."
" We need it all," said one, " for the vapours that
gather about this place are pregnant with diseases,
and only the 'Cape doctor' can disperse them."
When we reached the church our physical condi
tion was anything but pleasant. The hot atmo
sphere, along with the fierce wind and sand, had
made us, as we thought, utterly unfit to be seen
among decent people. How to preach, or what to
preach, or whether I should attempt to preach at all
in the circumstances, were among the questions that
troubled me even in the vestry.
As the worthy brother and the managers would
take no denial, I resolved to make the best of it. I
selected these words in 1 Kings xi. 22, "Nothing,:
howbeit let me go in any wise," as the theme of my
address. After a brief reference to Hadad's early
years, and how he came to be in Egypt, I spoke, first,

SUPERFICIAL THINKERS. 79
of Hadad's request as implying a. mysterious pressure.
Hadad could not explain to Pharaoh or to any one
else why he wished to leave Egypt and go home to
the land of Edom. Notwithstanding Pharaoh's
kindness to him, and that he had lacked nothing, he
wished to go to his own country.
Men are often under a mysterious pressure ; and
under that pressure they say and do strange things.
They are impelled to do something or to go some
where, and afterwards for years they may live to
regret it. After so many years, however, they may
get a glimpse of the secret cause. A Joseph, it may
be, turns up in Egypt, and is in a position to send
corn to Canaan and wagons to take the old man
out of his poverty.
The vast majority of men go out and come in, sit
down and rise up, as if they had absolute control of
all their movements. They say in their heart "there
is no God." They can see nothing higher or more
intelligent than the force of natural law. They are
as those who hear the thunder peal and see the
lightning flash, and think nothing of gravitation.
They believe in the existence and force of the wind
when it blows a hurricane, as it is doing now upon
this church, but the existence of the atmosphere is
never thought of. Hadad might be as one of these.
Even Eli could not believe for a time that any
one had spoken to the lad Samuel. When Samson
expressed his determination to take a wife of the
daughters of the Philistines, his father and mother
were greatly displeased with him, and they were so
because " they knew not that the thing was of the

80 SECRET OF HADAD'S PRESSURE.
Lord." Had any one said to Hadad that his longing
for home was of the Lord God of the Hebrews, he
would very likely have laughed at him, and so also
would Pharaoh. But was it not of the Lord ?
(2) Let me in a few sentences show you that it was.
Solomon, we are told, was beloved of the Lord ; but
the day that he allowed his heart to be turned away
from Him by his regard for strange women, that day
he fell under the shadow of His righteous displea
sure (verse 9). One of the results of that displeasure
was Hadad's desire to go to his own country. We
find it stated in the fourteenth verse that the " Lord
stirred up an adversary unto Solomon, Hadad the
Edomite." We have in that fact the secret of
Hadad's mysterious pressure. Under Solomon the
land of Canaan had become as a wilderness, the people
had become as slaves to idolatry, and everything by
which a nation is exalted turned upside down. The
stirring up of Hadad as an adversary to Solomon
was intended to waken him to a sense of his evil
ways, and to bring the people back to a state of
righteousness. Hadad, with his army advancing
upon his kingdom from the land of Edom, and
Rezon, with his forces (verse 23) marching south
wards from the hills of Syria, would put Solomon in
a state of distress, and lead him to cry unto the
Lord for deliverance.
In no age can a king act the part of a fool without
imperilling the stability and safety of the nation. In
no age can a nation or a colony be exalted except by
righteousness. Woe unto the king who dares to
trample upon the law of God, and woe unto the

GREATNESS THROUGH RIGHTEOUSNESS. 8 1
people when they can afford to smile at sin. Then
may the king see his doom written upon his palace
walls, and the people realise the weakness which
follows wickedness. Then may God stir up a
Hadad or a Benhadad, a Napoleon or a Wellington,
to wield the sword of His anger. The British
nation, and especially the Irish people, who for
years have been planning and pleading for Home
Rule, have been compelled at the present time, out
of regard to the moral law, to sacrifice the man who
had so ably championed their cause. True pro
sperity, to an individual, to a nation, and to a colony,
is possible only through righteousness.
(3) The typical cliaracter of Hadad's home-sick
ness. — Under this head we referred to the case of
Abraham when he left Ur of the Chaldees, and to
the case of Moses when he refused to be called the
son of Pharaoh's daughter. Under " the expulsive
force of a new affection," Christians often " desire to
depart and be with Christ, which is far better."
They feel at times "unspeakably obliged" to arise
and seek the way home as " doves to their windows."
At the close of the service we were pleased to
meet and converse with a considerable number of
our countrymen, who asked us to carry tidings of
their welfare to friends at home.

A VISIT TO STELLENBOSH.
There are several towns and villages in the neigh
bourhood of Cape Town which are beautiful for

82 AN ACADEMIC GROVE.
situation. In these verdant and shady spots of
nature many of the wealthy merchants of the city
have built large and elegant mansions, and to these
they retire for rest and refuge after their work or
business is over for the day.
Sea Point is one of these quiet places. In Mow
bray, Rondebosh, Claremount, Wynberg, and several
smaller villages round the base of the mountains,
the people are comparatively free from the heat and
dust which prevail in the city, and especially from
the violence of the " south -easters."
But of all the places which we visited in the Cape
we saw none so shady and beautiful as Stellenbosh.
Governor Van der Stell, in founding that suburb
in 1684, must have had an eye for the beautiful in
nature and a heart for the order that is " heaven's
first law." There he planted trees which have since
grown to be giants of the forest ; there he made
ducts for streams of clear, sparkling water to flow
down both sides of the streets, and otherwise laid
out the place, that Stellenbosh to-day is one of the
loveliest little towns in the Colony. It is an academic
grove furnished with all that is pleasing to the eye,
gives health to the body, and light to the mind.
There we found a considerable number of schools and
colleges, each attended by a large number of children
and of young men, preparing for the different pro
fessions and various spheres of life. The schools
and colleges are each supplied with an excellent staff
of teachers or professors, all apparently animated
with the best motives.
We were urged to go and see this place of beauty

AN IDEAL LADY AND TYPICAL DUTCHMAN. 83
and learning by the Rev. Mr. Russell, who very
kindly offered to supply us with a note of introduction
to Professor Marais of the Theological Seminary.
The distance between Cape Town and Stellenbosh
by rail is about 40 miles, and the fare, second-class
return, is about 1 2s. Ministers of religion, I may say,
are allowed to travel by all railways in the Cape and
Natal at a reduced rate. The directors of our
British railways might take note of this and do like
wise, and be no poorer at the end of their financial
year. Having reached our destination, we presented
our note of introduction to Mrs. Marais, who received
and entertained us in the most friendly fashion.
Had we been sent in search of a lady to whom should
be awarded the palm as our ideal of a Christian
woman, a good wife, and a mother in Israel, we
should name Mrs. Marais as the first in order.
Nowhere else in the Colonies did we meet with so
much kindness from strangers as under the roof of
Professor Marais. Before the Professor had finished
the work of his class, his lady took us to the house of
the venerable patriarch of the place, the Rev. Mr.
Neethling. When this gentleman came in from his
garden at the call of his wife, we felt constrained to
say to ourselves, This is a man, no ordinary man.
His grey locks, stately appearance, firm step, and
compressed lips led us to form the opinion, Here we
have a typical Dutchman. His force of character
was revealed to us in his every word and action.
We had not long conversed with him, when
Professor Marais came in. In him we saw a gentle
man, a man not so much of physical bulk as of

84 SCOTCH PROFESSORS.
mental power and scholarly attainments. He kindly
offered, as the note of introduction suggested, to
take us to the college where the arts classes were
carried on. At the gate of the Victoria College we
met Professor Macdonald, whom we ventured to
salute in our mother tongue. He did not respond,
but said, " I know what you have said."
We next called at the class-room of Professor
Walker. In him we recognised an old fellow-student.
We were pleased to meet with these two Scotch
brothers, and find them so highly exalted. The
professor of mathematics, Mr. Thomson, we did not
see, but we believe that he also is one of our
countrymen. There are several other Scotch
teachers in the schools and colleges. In one of the
girls' schools we met a Miss Weatt from Kelso, a
smart young lady, and an excellent teacher.
The Bloemhof Public School for girls is under the
management of a Miss Bleby, B.A., of London.
The boarding department connected with this school
is attended by 55 boarders and a large number of
day scholars. The cost for board and lodging, and
general superintendence, is ,£36 per annum. The
Theological College was founded by the Dutch
Church in 1858, and is attended by from 30 to 40
students every session. These students are trained
to be pastors of the Dutch Church in the Colony and
in the neighbouring states. The professors are
Hofmeyr, Marais, and De Vas. A high moral and
spiritual tone seemed to pervade all the teachers and
scholars of this academic grove. Every Lord's day
all the children of the different schools meet in a

A LAND OF GOSHEN. 85
large hall connected with the college, and are taught
and drilled in Scripture knowledge by one of the
professors. This good work is sure to bear fruit,
and tell with power upon the darkness of the people
around. After dinner in the old residence of the governor,
Van der Stell, now the home of Professor and Mrs.
Marais, we prepared to return to Cape Town,
greatly pleased with our visit to Stellenbosh.
Professor Walker, having finished his work for the
day, came to bid us good-bye. Outside the ancient
mansion house we observed that we were under the
shade of some of the finest oaks we had ever seen.
Their seeds, it is said, were sown by the early
Huguenots, or first settlers in the Colony. Above
the doorway are words in Latin, which mean, " Sun
of Righteousness, shine upon us." As we were
departing, Mrs. Marais, whose kindness we had
already experienced, came out and presented us with
a basket filled with the best fruits in her garden, and
sent a young gentleman tq carry it for us to the
railway station. Surely we had every reason for
cherishing grateful recollections of Professor Marais
and his wife, and of our visit to the Goshen of the
Cape karoo.

OSTRICH FARMS.

On our way to Cape Town we observed one or
two ostrich farms. Those creatures, whose feathers
are a means of decoration to many of the ladies of
Europe and elsewhere, and a source of considerable

86 OSTRICHES.
income to the farmers of the Cape, seemed to be
wonderfully tame in the fields. Twenty or thirty
years ago the ostrich was a creature of the desert, as
described by the poet, —
" The fleet-footed ostrich over the waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste ;
Hieing away to the home of her rest,
Where she and her mate have scooped their nest —
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view,
In the pathless desert or parched karoo."
Now it is comparatively tame. It is bought and
sold in the markets of the Colony the same as sheep
and oxen. In the far interior, hunters of the ostrich
still carry on their barbarous work. To the north
and north-west of the Free State and the Transvaal,
a system of trapping, chasing, and slaughter still
goes on ; but, within Cape Colony, it is bred, reared,
herded, fed, plucked, and sorted, very much in the
way as other birds are. The laws of labour which
are applicable to sheep and cattle, or which regulate
human work on agricultural farms, are in force with
respect to ostrich farms in the karoo.
Ostrich feathers, which enter so largely into the
regions of modern human pride, pomp, and ceremony,
are taken from the birds in humane and scientific
ways. They are sorted and sent to the markets in
baskets and bundles, the same as wool, mohair, and
other articles are sent. The ostrich eggs are not
sent to the markets, for they are reckoned too
precious for consumption : neither are they left in
the karoo to be hatched by the instincts of the bird,

TRANSPORT WAGONS. 87
but they are submitted in proper time to the more
certain process and powers of the mechanical
incubator.

CEMETERIES.

We were pleased to see large plots of the karoo
between the sea and the railway laid out and fenced
in as burial places. Different peoples and religious
sects have each their own plot of ground, and these
are made known to strangers by large lettered sign
boards. At each there is a railway " lie " to accom
modate the funeral carriages. Cape Town people
have thus taken the precaution to have their dead
buried at a reasonable distance from the living.

TRANSPORT WAGONS.
We saw a number of transport wagons here and
there by the way. They were drawn by six and
eight and twelve yokes of oxen. Such wagons
were the only means of conveyance of goods and
passengers from the towns to the interior of the
Colony before the railways were made, and they are
still required in many parts. They are much more
numerous in Natal than they are now in the Cape.
These wagons in most cases are strongly built, and
they require to be so, for the jolting caused by the
state of the roads here and there is terrible. The
roads in many places are in a deplorable state. The
wagons are upon four wheels without springs, and

88 TRANSPORT MEN.
can be fitted up as tents during the night. Part of
the wagon is nearly always in the form of a tent, in
side of which there are boxes and chests of various
sizes, containing provisions. The wheels behind are
furnished with a pair of heavy wooden drags, which
are used when descending steep places. The oxen
are driven by a man, who now and then shouts to
them as if in a paroxysm of despair, at the same time
cracking his tremendous whip over their heads.
The poor brutes know too well the possibilities of
these cracks. We could see the marks of the whip
on the hides of some of them, as if they had been
cut by it. A coloured boy invariably leads the first
pair of oxen, and helps the driver to yoke and un
yoke them, or what the people call " inspanning and
outspanning." Oxen are used in preference to
horses, because they are more enduring and are more
easily fed. Oxen do not require corn, or get any
other kind of food than the grass which they crop by
the way. As most of the travelling is done during
the night and in the early morning, they are out-
spanned at the end of a journey or stage, and have
their liberty in the common till they are inspanned
again for another stage. Thus the journey is con
tinued for days or weeks at a stretch. These re
marks specially apply to transport traffic in the
Colony of Natal, where we saw it more fully.

CHAPTER V.

THE VOYAGE TO NATAL:
PORT ELIZABETH, EAST LONDON, AND DURBAN.
T was announced that our ship was
to leave the Cape for Natal early on
Monday morning, 12th January, but
owing to a strong "south-easter,"
we had to remain in the harbour till
the afternoon. Early in the morning
| a large number of Malays came on
board, all bound for Mecca. These Malays and
those who accompanied them created a very gay and
animated scene for some time. Negroes, Hindoos,
Hottentots, Kafirs, and Zulus, seemed to be there ;
some bareheaded, and others with bright-coloured
handkerchiefs about their heads ; some dressed in
drab jackets and curious conical-shaped hats, others
in tweed trousers and coats of many colours. With
these different tribes there mixed for a time, on
board and on shore, the English, the Irish, and the
Scotch, the Dutch, the Germans, Swedes and
Danes, Portuguese and Americans. At length,

90 STORMY CAPE.
12.30 p.m., the storm ceased, and the tide being
favourable for our departure, we moved away from
Table Bay towards the Indian Ocean. We had on
board a number of Colonists, and from them we
learned a good deal regarding our course round the
coast, and also regarding the Colonies generally.
At half-past 5 o'clock in the afternoon we were
directly opposite the far-famed or well-known Cape
of Good Hope. It is a great projecting hill or rock,
crowned with a lighthouse towering 820 feet high,
and having a revolving light which is seen in fairly
clear nights 40 miles away. The discovery of this
bold headland was made at the close of the fifteenth
century, and called by the Portuguese navigator,
Cabo Tormentoso, or stormy cape, but the king,
John II. of Portugal, thought that that name was
calculated to inspire too much fear, and he changed
it into Cabo de Bona Esperanza, the Cape of Good
Hope, and by this name it has ever since been
known. Mr. B., a merchant in Cape Town, and
a worthy representative of a well-known merchant
company in Glasgow, pointed out to us several bays
in the neighbourhood of this hopeful object. There,
he said, is Simon's Bay, behind which lies Simon's
Town. There, again, is Sandown Bay, Walker
Bay, and Danger Point. It was at Danger Point
that H.M.S. Birkenhead was wrecked some years
ago, and in which nearly 500 soldiers on their way to
" the front " lost their lives.
It took us till Wednesday forenoon (that is, 46
hours) to reach Port Elizabeth, which is distant from
Cape Town 460 miles. Our steamer pitched and

A PROSPEROUS CITY.

91

rolled a good deal round the coast, and in the large
bay of the so-called "Liverpool of South Africa"
we were glad to be at rest for a time.

PORT ELIZABETH.
We spent fully three days at this port, and did our
best to see all that was of interest. Looking at the
town from the deck of the steamer in the bay, I feel
bound to say that it seemed to me one of the most
parched, sun-scorched places I had ever seen. I
could see nothing either in the size of the town, or
in its situation, much less in its shipping traffic, to
bear out the name which has been claimed for it.
But when we went on shore, and walked up and
down its streets for a few hours, we had reason for
changing or modifying our opinion. The main
street along the shore reminded us of some principal
streets in our own large cities. Many of the build
ings are handsome and substantial. A large portion
of the town is upon the hill, and the houses of the
wealthier inhabitants are away back from the view
of one in the bay. The houses in most cases are
substantial and elegant. The situation upon the hill
table-land affords the citizen not only a good pros
pect, but the full benefit of cooling sea breezes,
which are few and far between in the lower parts of
the town. Having seen all that could be seen in the
upper parts of the city, we descended to commercial
streets, and explored several of the large buildings in
Market Square. The Town Hall is a very fine

92 HIGH CHARGES.
building, stately and commodious, and is adorned
towards the Square with a handsome portico of
Corinthian pillars. The Produce Market is also
a large and substantial building. The Museum, at the
end of the Public Market, contains a large collection
of specimens of wild animals once in the Colony,
but it is only in its infancy. We explored the Public
Reading- Rooms and Library which are connected
with the Town Hall, also the Chamber of Commerce
and some of the churches.
We entered the new Post Office and posted a
book to a friend in Grahamstown, a town about a
hundred miles distant, and were charged one shilling
for the postage ! "My word!" we ejaculated, "we
might have posted it in Scotland." The cost might
have been less ; surely it could hardly have been
more. It seemed to us from this and other experi
ences that the postal arrangements in both Colonies
were defective.
We next entered a large drapery establishment in
the main thoroughfare, and held a conversation with
an elderly, but smart gentleman, who turned out, as
we afterwards learned, to be one of the principal men
of the City Corporation.
Mr. Kemsley kindly offered to show us every
place of interest in the town, so far as our time would
permit, and we gladly availed ourselves of his kind
services, but our time was too limited to see much
more than we had seen.
He took us through the Public Library and Read
ing- Rooms, and we feel bound to say that these are
at least equal to any places of the kind we have ever

HIGH FARES. 93
seen in a town of similar proportions. The library
is large and well-stocked with books in almost every
department of literature. The department of fiction
is perhaps too well stocked, which is not, in our
opinion, the best sign of a people's mental and moral
calibre. Novel readers can never be a people of
character, on the principle that " coarse feeding
makes coarse flesh."
Mr. Kemsley, pointing to a magnificent monument
in the Market Square, said, " That commemorates
one of the best men we ever had in this Colony, and
one of your countrymen. It commemorates the late
Mr. John Paterson, M.L.A. Mr. Paterson came
to this Colony as a teacher of youth in 1841, and
became one of the founders of its present system of
education. He subsequently turned his attention to
law, and became a journalist. In each of these de
partments he succeeded, and at length became one of
the principal men of the town. As a teacher of the
young, as a notary public, as a journalist, as a mer
chant, as a member of the Municipal Board, and
specially as a member of the Legislative Assembly,
Mr. Paterson was the greatest public benefactor the
town has known." We were naturally well pleased
to learn all this regarding one of our countrymen.
"Have you seen our public park?" said Mr. K.
" No," I replied ; " Mrs. C. one day in my absence
resolved to go and see it, and on asking one of the
cabmen what the fare was, she was told it was 6s.
This she declined to pay." " O the rascal ! the fare
is only is. 6d."
I was sorry to be unable to go and see some of the
H

,94 EAST LONDON.
towns and villages in the neighbourhood of Port
Elizabeth. Various lines of railway are very con
venient for such places as Cuyler Manor, about 17
miles distant; and Uitenhage, 21 miles distant; and
especially Grahamstown, about 100 miles distant.
Grahamstown is said to be one of the most pleasant
places of residence in the Colony. It ranks as the
metropolis of the eastern and frontier districts. We
were all the more anxious to visit Grahamstown,
as some of Mrs. C.'s relatives were among its first
settlers, and their descendants are there still.
Most of our time on board ship while in the bay
was spent fishing. The fish were in thousands, and
quite visible. When bits of bread were thrown to
them from the ship they flocked about them as if
starving, and speedily devoured them. The larger
fish kept to the depths, but we got several of them
by means of hooks.

EAST LONDON.
On leaving Algoa Bay we proceeded round the
coast to East London. On the way we passed St.
Croix Island, where Diaz, the discoverer of the Cape
of Good Hope, planted a cross ; also, the Bird
Islands, which have a lighthouse ; Cape Padrone,
Bushmen river, and Port Alfred.
East London, about 80 miles further on, stands on
both sides of the Buffalo river, and is altogether as
pretty a coast town as we had yet seen. The town
had not that scorched look that Port Elizabeth
presented. It stands on a stretch of table-land, and

KAFIR WORKMEN. 95
is a favourite sea-bathing place. The appearance of
the houses, the beautiful green grass parks in their
immediate neighbourhood, the scenery on the banks
of the river, and the salubrity of the atmosphere, led
us to regard East London as a desirable place of
residence, and, if we mistake not, one of the
healthiest towns in South Africa. Here we gazed
mentally over five or six hundred miles, and thought
of Miss Crawford, sister of Councillor Andrew
Crawford, Stirling, at Christian work among the
Kafirs in Tembuland. Willingly would we have gone
a hundred or even two hundred miles to see her and
have told her the story of her dear mother's last
illness and death, but a few hundred miles across
the desert in such hot weather, and in a slow-going
wagon, rendered it utterly impossible.
Here, more than at the Cape and Port Elizabeth,
the Kafir and Zulu workmen appeared in their natural
state. Several of them had their bodies painted
with red ochre, some of them had pieces of blanket
about their loins, and a few strong, tall and broad-
shouldered men were in puris nahiralibus. Almost
every one of them had his head and throat covered
as if under medical treatment for a bad cold. But
these dirty cloths about their heads were intended as
a protection against scratches from the rugged edges
of the casks and cases they had to carry. We were
informed that hundreds of these Kafir men come
every year to the coast from their kraals in the wil
derness in hope of making as much money as would
enable each of them to return and purchase a gun,
so many oxen, and, it may be, so many wives.

96 NATIVES DISLIKE THE BASKET.
When the Kafir gets, so many wives, he commands
them to go and work, attend to the mealies and
milk the cows, while he in all time coming acts the
life of an idle gentleman !

THE BASKET APPARATUS.
Here, also, for the first time, we saw the basket
apparatus by which passengers are enabled to
embark and disembark without any fear of danger.
The basket, somewhat like an overgrown hogshead,
only a little longer, is hoisted and lowered, and
swung from one boat into another, by means of
block and tackle or the donkey-engine. The basket
may contain three or more grown-up persons, and
once in, they are shut in until the door is opened
from the outside, either on board the steamer or in
the surf boat. There they escape, some of them
quaking as from a dungeon of despair, and others
laughing at the whole process as a huge joke.
Sometimes the natives, it is said, manifest a great
dislike to the basket, and have to be pushed into it
in a somewhat unceremonious way. We naturally
looked very earnestly at the whole thing, and began
to anticipate how it would be with ourselves when
we reached the stormy cost of Durban.
Some one was kind enough to say to me, "I'll
not go into any such basket with you, doctor, for I
am sure we would both go through the bottom of it."
This basket business, however comical it may seem

ARRIVAL AT DURBAN.

97

to a stranger, is really necessary, and is an excellent
contrivance for the safety of the passengers.
After a stay of six hours at East London, we
resumed our course towards Durban, the seaport
town of Natal. The sea coast, which was in full
view all the way, 280 miles, seemed to us to be in
striking contrast to that of the Cape. The green
fields, stretches of rich pasture lands, flowing rivers,
and mansions surrounded with beautiful gardens, re
minded us of what we have often seen in many
parts along our own coasts.
Some persons here and there by the sea-shore
seemed to be amusing themselves with mirrors, or
trying to measure the distance between us and them
by means of heliotropes. Some of the passengers
on board were old Colonists, and they favoured us
with very interesting historical and geographical
descriptions of Natal, and thus our interest was well
sustained. On reaching the natural gateway to the
" Christmas Land," we got into the basket without
any fear, and by means of a steam tender were soon
and safely landed at Durban.

SSI

Ippfl

¦^•JfFWTEfP

Sll

"i^wiiddB
CHAPTER VI.
THE COLONY OF NATAL.
OOKING at the physical configura
tion of Natal from the sea, we were
reminded of our first impressions of
the hilly country of Judea. Both
countries are alike mountainous,
although not alike fertile and ver
dant. The mountains of Natal
seemed to be fertile and fruit-producing to their very
summits. This we afterwards found to be the case
at least seventy miles inland. Like Judea, Natal is
a land of hills and valleys, extensive plains, and here
and there, fields of rich pastures.
From Durban to Pietermaritzburg we could see
everywhere abundant evidence of the fertility of
the soil. There were fields and gardens, groves
and orchards, laden with almost all kinds of rich
produce and delicious fruits. We saw fields of
maize or Indian corn, wheat, oats, barley, and
sweet potatoes, orchards and gardens full of
orange and apple trees. Every homestead seemed
to be in the midst of a forest of all kinds of
DISCOVERY OF NATAL. 99
fruit-bearing trees. Peaches, pine apples, pears,
pomegranates, lemons, bananas, arrowroot, tea and
coffee plants, pumpkins, tobacco, sugar-cane, all the
fruits which belong to the semi-tropical climates of
the world, seemed to be growing between the sea
coast and the capital city of the Colony.
Strange, it may be said, that such a country
should have been so long unknown or undiscovered.
It is only about 400 years since it was discovered.
It was first seen by the renowned Portuguese navi
gator, Vasco da Gama, in 1497 ; and it being
Christmas day, he called it Natal, in honour of our
Lord's birth. Nothing seems to have been done as
the result of this discovery till the year 1686. Dur
ing that year and subsequent years it was visited and
explored by representatives of the Portuguese,
Dutch, and British Governments, and every year
after it became an object of increasing interest to these
nations. Navigators from these countries touched at
the port in the hope of securing a footing in the land,
and not a few of their ships, owing to the stormy
nature of the coast, were wrecked.
The first European settlers in the country
were the sailors who had escaped from these
wrecks. Some of them, years after, were found
living in the native kraals far up country and
here and there along the coast. The early Dutch
settlers did not make much progress either in this
Colony or at the Cape until the British Government
took possession and afforded the people the means of
sufficient protection.
The chief traces or marks of Dutch intelligence

IOO A SPRAG NOT A BAD THING.
and workmanship are. to be seen in the formation of
the streets and squares of such large towns in both
Colonies as Cape Town, Durban, and Pietermaritz-
burg. The Dutch are said to be somewhat slow and
conservative in their nature, and this trait in their
character is said to be a sprag in the wheels of pro
gress in Cape Colony. Those of them who are mem
bers of the Legislative Assembly, the Cape Colonial
Parliament, readily veto anything of a go-ahead
policy. This does not greatly affect our good
opinion of the Dutch people; a drag for a fiery steed
is not a bad thing.
A deputation of Dutchmen was sent by their
Government in 1688 to the then reigning King of
Natal to ascertain if he would be willing to sell them
portions of the land. He refused to sell them land
chiefly because of the difficulties that might arise in
connection with the religious beliefs and customs of
his people, but he granted them liberty of traffic
in the common articles of merchandise.
Years after a number of Boers, or Dutch farmers,
from Cape Colony went to Natal, and urged the reign
ing chief to sell them the land concerning which his
father and their fathers had negotiated in 1688. This
king also stiffly and sternly refused to sell them land.
" My father," he said, "is now dead ; his skins were
buried with him, and his house was burned over him,
and I can have nothing to do with these so-called,
and to me unknown, negotiations." The Dutch
then established a trading station at Cape Colony
Bay, but they found it to be unprofitable, and so
abandoned it.

ORIGIN OF COLONY. IOI
The next step of advance was taken by the
British Government in 1795. That year they
took possession of the Cape and its dependencies,
and their action was confirmed at the General Peace
Conference which was held on the Continent of
Europe after the Battle of Waterloo, 1815. From
this date onwards both Colonies, especially that of
the Cape, began to prosper.
In 1823 a number of the merchants of Cape
Town resolved to have a trading expedition to
the East Coast, and, having secured the willing
co-operation of a number of British officers,
they sailed round the coast till they reached
the Bay of Natal. There they lost two of their
small boats, and being short of provisions they
ran into the harbour for additional supplies. They
were so kindly received and entertained by the
people of the place that they prolonged their visit,
and saw what greatly cheered them. Immediately
on returning home they resolved to petition the
British Government to have the port opened for
trade, and to have a Colony formed. This the
British Government declined officially to do, but they
offered as much as lay in their power otherwise to
encourage and foster friendly relationship with the
natives. This indirect liberty was practically the
beginning of the Colony of Natal.
We met with some men in the Colony old enough
to remember the exodus of the Boers from Cape
Colony in 1837 because of their dislike to the restric
tions placed upon them by the British Government
in relation to the coloured people ; how these Boers

102 NATIVE PROVERBS FULFILLED.
or Dutch farmers went to Dingaan, the reigning
chief, asking him to issue a decree in their favour for
the purchase of land ; how he kindly received them
and granted their request, and how on the morrow
he changed his mind and ordered every one of them
to be killed. They could remember the intense ex
citement caused by the news that one hundred of
these Dutchmen had been slain. Their fathers and
mothers, brothers and sisters, wives and children,
had been waiting patiently and looking for their
return, when suddenly they heard the mad shrieks of
the Zulu warriors, who had got orders from Dingaan
to kill every one of them. These savage warriors
killed six hundred men, women, and children.
The places where the people were encamped and
killed were pointed out to us. One of them is
named "Weenen," or the "place of weeping," and
the other " Moord Spruit," or "murder brook."
The Boers had their revenge upon Dingaan for
this. After recruiting their energies and collecting
their men of war from different parts of both Colonies,
they attacked the king at his head kraal. Dingaan,
however, being apprised of their coming, fled to
what is called the Bush Country, and was soon
followed by his chief men and a host of his soldiers.
He was safe there, but only for a short period. His
own proverbs, "The climber at last falls with the
tree," and " The swimmer at last goes with the
stream," were fulfilled in his experience.
The last, and worst, of Dingaan's foes sprang up in
his own household. This foe was his half-brother,
Umpande.

THE BOERS AS THE CAMP FOLLOWERS. 103
Dingaan, like the man who was guilty of the
" Massacre of Glencoe," was never happy after the
slaughter of the Boers, and seeing that Umpande
had risen up against him, he sought to make a treaty
of peace with the Boers. He offered to give 40,000
head of oxen as an evidence of his sincerity and
goodwill towards them. But the Boers absolutely
refused this offer, and declared that Umpande would
now be made king. This was carried out with
every possible demonstration on the part of the
Boers, and with no end of promises of eternal love
and loyalty to the settlers on the part of Umpande.
This, however, required to be ratified, not by pen
and ink on paper, but by a fierce contest between the
respective forces of Dingaan and Umpande. The
Boers had no visible hand in this contest. Visibly
they stood afar off. They did not arm themselves
with guns, swords, or assegais, and yet they might
be all the while as the camp followers at the Battle
of Bannockburn. With those who knew, it was not
a matter of doubt that the Boers had much to do in
deciding the battle in favour of their newly-elected
king, Umpande.
When the battle was over Dingaan acknowledged
his defeat, and at once set off to live in the jungles
of Umfolosis. There he lived in secret only for a
short time. After deliberation with those who had
escaped, and who still adhered to him, he resolved
to seek for a permanent residence on the borders of
Swaziland. While there he built a royal kraal, and made such
demonstrations that he roused the suspicions of the

104 REASONING WITH THE NATIVES.
Swazies. Not knowing what his intentions might
be, they resolved to make sure that he would not
trouble them. One morning early a host of Swazies
gathered round the royal kraal, and assegaied the
king before any of his men were awake or could
come to his rescue.
Umpande having ascended his throne, gave orders
to have all the favourites of Dingaan put to death.
Then he called his own chief men together, and
told them that he had resolved, in all time coming,
to live in peace with his neighbours, and to rule the
country for the good of all its inhabitants.
The Zulu people, however, take pleasure in war,
and it was with the greatest difficulty that he could
restrain them from attacking the Europeans.
On one occasion he is reported, by one who knew
him intimately, to have pleaded with them thus : " I
am old, and am almost inclined to feel that in speak
ing to you young warriors, I bemean myself. You
are but children in many ways. You speak of battles
to come ; I speak of those already fought, into which
we went a host, and returned few in numbers. You
ask to be led against the English. Why ? Are
they enemies ? You cannot fight with friends, so
they must be enemies ; and will I tell you wherein
their hostility consisted ? You were cold, and they
gave you blankets ; you wanted ornaments, and they
gave you beads and other things, for which in fair
trade you gave your cattle. Did they steal the
cattle ? Tell me one instance in which an English
man has stolen a Zulu beast, and I will join you in
your raid ; but if you cannot, then tell me when you

CETEWAYO ASCENDS THE THRONE. 105
start, and I, together with my family, will cross over
to the English." This speech, in the opinion of Mr.
Fynney, saved the Colony of Natal. This, however,
did not end the troubles of Umpande. Two of his
sons, Cetewayo and Umbulazi, half-brothers, were
constantly at loggerheads between themselves, and
troubling him as to who should succeed him.
The Boers, hearing of his troubles and their cause,
asked him to express his opinion in favour of one or
other of them, and he expressed his will in favour of
Cetewayo. This greatly displeased Umbulazi's
mother, and she at once set herself to get the king
to change his mind in favour of her son. She
succeeded in this, but at a terrible cost. As the old
king could not settle the matter sufficiently by word
or deed, he suggested that the two half-brothers
might try themselves and their forces on the field of
battle. This they agreed to do, and Umbulazi's
forces were defeated. Umbulazi himself ran off, but
was overtaken and killed. When Umpande heard
of Umbulazi's death, and of the terrible slaughter
which his suggestion had led to, he was overwhelmed
with grief, and was ready to lie down and die.
Shortly after this Cetewayo ascended the throne of
the royal kraal. How he reigned and how long are
matters too well-known to require any statement
from me in this brief historical summary.
When the Dutchmen, whose noble sires had been
so treacherously treated and killed by order of
Dingaan, felt warranted by the peace of the country
to visit the place where the bodies of their friends
were thrown into a heap, they did so, and had the

io6

A TRIBUTE TO WORTHY MEN.

melancholy satisfaction of recognising several of
them by their clothes and the contents of their
pockets. In the pocket of the leader of the deputa
tion, Pieter Retief, they found the deed of cession,
having the signatures of all the parties concerned
upon it. In the pocket of another brave leader,
Gerhardus Maritz, they found another document,
and they resolved to have the names of these heroic
men woven as into a wreath of perpetual honour to
them. That wreath is found in the name of the
capital city of the Colony, Pietermaritzburg.

CHAPTER VII.

DURBAN TO PIETERMARITZBURG.
!E spent fully two days in Durban,
and fully three weeks in Maritzburg
and neighbourhood.
The seaport town of Natal was
named D' Urban, in honour of Sir
Benjamin D' Urban, 55 years ago,
and the first thing he did in acknow-
edging this compliment was to send the settlers ^50
for the erection of a church. Surely a happy omen.
Durban is one of the prettiest laid out towns in South
Africa, and also one of the most prosperous. The
streets of the city are broad and clean, while both
sides are well paved and sheltered by trees, which
are said to be survivals of the primeval forest. Dur
ing our stay in the city we felt the heat to be intense.
Some of the citizens told us that was the hottest
summer they had had for years. Away from the
shelter of the trees and shadow of the houses the
heat and closeness of the atmosphere was very op
pressive. We felt inclined at times to envy those

108 A STROLL IN DURBAN.
whose raiment was thin and scanty, and especially
those who had grown up in such heat as to become
comparatively indifferent to it.
There are no cab stands or cabs in Durban, for
the tramway cars have become so popular and suit
able for the requirements of the citizens that cabs are
only used in special circumstances. Several of the
public buildings are handsome and substantial struc
tures. The Town Hall, with its grand tower, clock
and bells, is one of the best and most conspicuous
buildings in the city. The public gardens have also
their attractions, and are well sheltered. The hotels
— the Royal, Belgrave, and the Alexandria — judging
specially from their exteriors, are fine places, no
doubt with correspondingly fine prices. The same
may be said in a general way of the boarding-houses.
The Berea, or Braeface, as some would call it, is a
beautiful place of residence, behind and overlooking
the town and Indian Ocean. Tramway cars run
from the Point near the harbour to the Berea about
every fifteen minutes. The town of Durban covers
an area of about 6,000 acres, and has a population of
24,000, half of whom are Europeans, the other half
being Kafirs, Zulus, and Indians. There are a con
siderable number of Scotch people in Durban, some
of them in good positions, and not a few on the
railway. Mr. Andrew, a smart, intelligent Scot,
represents the Castle Line Company, in room of
the late and highly -respected Mr. M'Lean. Mr.
Jamieson, long resident in the " City of the Rock,"
and well-known in military circles, is a merchant, and
one of the leading citizens. Mr. J., while "diligent

SCOTSMEN.

109

in business," is also "fervent in spirit, serving the
Lord." He conducts a Christian mission among the
native races, and has been wonderfully successful.
We called and introduced ourselves to one of the
greatest, and, in some respects, one of the most suc
cessful Scots in the Colony, Mr. David Hunter,
general manager of the Natal Government Railways,
We had heard of Mr. Hunter as one of the best
living Scotsmen in Natal, and so we were anxious to
see him. We were not disappointed. He received
us very kindly, and conversed freely with us for some
time on subjects old and new. He gave us con
siderable information with respect to the railways in
Natal, which we intend to embody in a subsequent
chapter. Mr. Hunter has been a true friend to our
countrymen who have gone to the Colony in search
of employment. Many of them are now in good
positions on the railway and elsewhere through his
kindly and powerful influence. We were sorry to
learn from him, as well as from several others, that
many of our countrymen have become wrecks in the
Colony through their love of strong drink. We are
slow of heart to believe that as many as 90 per cent.
of Scotsmen utterly fail in the Colony because of
their love for the intoxicating cup. ¦ ' There is room
in this Colony," said a gentleman to me one day,
"for hundreds and thousands of honest, hard-work
ing Scotsmen ; but we have no room, and no
sympathy, with the victims of intemperance. For
any sake, keep all such in the old country, for here
they will be allowed to starve to death !"
Had the sun been less scorching we intended,

IIO A MEETING OF CAMPBELLS.
while at Durban, to have gone to Verulam to see
the coolies at work in the sugar, coffee, tea, and
cotton plantations, and thence into Zululand.
We were cordially invited by a gentleman in
Verulam to go and stay with him for a day or two,
but owing to the intense heat we resolved to climb
the hills with the train towards Maritzburg. Up the
hills, therefore, we went, sometimes fast and furious,
and sometimes slow and cautious. That journey to
Maritzburg was about the strangest experience of
railway travelling we ever had. The curves here
and there are so sharp that the carriage swung from
side to side as if preparing for one great effort to
throw us out. Both sides of the railway track were
dotted with villas in the midst of beautiful gardens
having all sorts of fruit. At Pinetown Station we
looked out of the carriage in the hope of seeing
something of the town, but saw nothing. The train
stopped here for some time, suggesting the idea that
the iron horse had lost power with its twelve miles'
run uphill. No doubt it had, and water in the tank
seemed to be scanty. While waiting, a young
gentleman, evidently a railway official, came to our
carriage window and said, " How are you, Dr.
Campbell ? " "I have not the pleasure of knowing
who is addressing me," I replied. " I belong to the
City of the Rock," he said. " Indeed," I said, " I do
not remember you. What is your name ?" " My
name is Campbell." "Campbell," said I, "that
makes matters more perplexing, for I should know
all the Campbells in Stirling." "My father," he
continued, " was the late Chief-Constable of Stirling-

GOING ROUND MOLEHILLS. I I I
shire." "Oh! I know something of you now. I
knew your father very well."
At this point our engine began to puff away, and
our conversation ended. This meeting was a glad
surprise to us. We were pleased to meet with our
namesake, and afterwards to learn that he was getting
on well
The journey to Maritzburg, about 70 miles by the
railway and 54 by the road, was nearly all the way a
series of ascents and descents. The gradients and
curves came often together. For every thirty yards
or so of progress the train would rise about one.
The stations are numerous, and the stoppages are
equally so. At one of the stations I ventured to
say to a gentleman that the " curves on this railway
were numerous and some of them quite unnecessary."
"Not a few persons, I believe," he replied, "have
thought and said the same thing. It seems to
have been the aim of the contractor to show how
well he could make the train go round so many
molehills." We were pleased to observe evidences of a kindly
spirit among the railway servants. At every other
station they met and had a ' ' crack " together, sometimes
a smoke, and perhaps also a snuff before they parted.
No doubt they might possibly be running before
time, and in that case long halts occasionally might
be necessary. But when we reached Maritzburg on
the Saturday evening, the train was only twenty
minutes late.
On entering the station we got a cordial welcome
from my youngest sister and her youngest daughter,

112 ARRIVAL AT CAPITAL CITY.
who had come to meet us and take us to their home.
We were reminded by their mourning attire that
they had recently suffered loss. Some years ago
Janet had gone out to the Colony with her husband,
a man well-known in the medical profession in
Perthshire, and now she was a widow in a strange
land. Perhaps she might be inclined to say, in the
spirit of Naomi, " I went out full, but now my name
is Mara."
We speedily got into her bespoken carriage, and
drove off to her home, where we remained for
several days.
The next day we went, though somewhat weary,
to what is called the First Presbyterian Church, and
heard an earnest evangelical sermon from a Wesleyan
minister. In the afternoon I was pressed to go and
address a large school of coloured children. I was
greatly pleased with the intelligence evinced by
these children, as well as with the Christian earnest
ness which characterised the teachers.

CHAPTER VIII.

PIETERMARITZBURG. HE place of the plain and slopes
upon which the capital city of the
Colony is built was originally called
after one of the old savage -kings,
Umgungundhlovu. Chaka seems to
have been among the native tribes
|J what Saul, the king, was among the
ancient Hebrews, head and shoulders above them,
and, besides, he was of the Falstaff order in bulk.
The name has been transferred to Maritzburg, the
"great white man's seat of government." The
natives were much given to name places, plains,
mountains, and rivers from their resemblance to
something else, shape or form. The Dutch people
did the same thing. Hence such names as " Blauw
Krans," " blue cliffs ; " "Doom Kop," " hill of thorns ; "
" Umko-maas," "water gatherer;" Mooi River,"
"beautiful river;" " Mahwaqu," "frowning moun
tain ;" " Bushman's Rand," "place of congregation,"
now Pietermaritzburg.
The city of Maritzburg is said to cover an area of
44 square miles, and to have a population of 16,000,

I 1 4 MAN-TRAPS.
9, 500 of whom are Europeans, English, Irish, Scotch,
Germans, Dutch, French, &c, and the rest Hotten
tots, descendants of the Cape aboriginal native tribes,
and coolies, imported labourers from India. The
town, like all the other towns of South Africa which
were originally formed by the Dutch, is well laid out
in squares, and with long and broad streets. The
streets are fairly good for traffic in dry weather,,
although dusty, but when it rains it does so in
earnest, and makes the streets very muddy and dis
agreeable. The side paths are not yet paved, and
are often very dirty. Pedestrians would not require
to be blind, for man-traps in the shape of holes, slots,
or ditches, are common. Besides, the gutters on
each side of the streets to carry off the floods of rain
which frequently fall during summer are deep and
rather dangerous. However, the city is only 50
years old, and it is wonderful to see it as it is.
It has a fine-looking Town Hall and an equally
substantial-looking Senate House. In front of the
Senate House we noticed a very fine marble statue
of our beloved Queen. It much resembles the
one which we saw in front of the Parliament House
in Cape Town.
The Police Buildings and Court Hall are sub
stantial structures. Captain Fraser, an Edinburgh
Scot, is chief of the police, and rules the city in the
interests of honesty and peace with such airs of
superiority as belong to one who knows his place and
how to exercise his authority. We had not the
pleasure of speaking to the Captain, but from other
Scots we heard nothing but good concerning him.

KAFIR POLICEMEN. I I 5
Our friend, Mr. Evans, whose duty it is to write
down the charges against those who are brought to
the office by the men, told us many interesting facts
regarding the force. Most of the responsible
policemen are Europeans. Each of them while on
duty has one or two Kafirs at his command, and they
do most of the work. Each Kafir policeman is
armed with a knob-kerrie — that is, a short, hard
wooden stick, with a large round knob at one end —
and a common walking-stick, and with these in his
hands he parades the streets like a mighty man of
war. Nothing, it seems, gives him greater pleasure
than to find a half-drunk Kafir, that he may lead
him away to the office.
We had occasion to call at the Post Office several
times during our stay at Maritzburg. The building
is spacious, and well adapted for all the postal re
quirements of the Colony. We cannot speak, how
ever, in terms of admiration of some of the postal
arrangements, nor of one or two of the officials.
We posted a letter in Cape Town which should
have reached Maritzburg in the course of three days.
We took nearly a week to go round the coast, and
we ourselves lifted the letter at the General Post
Office fully a week after our arrival. The explana
tion we got of this very unsatisfactory arrangement
was, that the letter had been sent round by
Bloemfontein as an experiment ! The "experiment "
was the cause of a little annoyance to us.
As it was the custom of the place for all persons
expecting letters or newspapers to call at the office
to receive them, we did so, and were told more than

Il6 A CARELESS OFFICIAL.
once that there were none for us. We thought this
strange, as we knew otherwise that there should
have been letters. We said nothing, however. One
day after calling we met a friend, who said, " Did
you get a letter addressed to you at the Post Office ? "
I replied, " I have just been calling there, and was
told there were none." " But I saw a letter addressed
to you, and had it in my hand not ten minutes
since." I asked my friend to go with me, and we
would see.
I said to the young man, " I understand that you
have a letter addressed to me ; why did you not
give it to me?" "There is no letter here for you,
sir," said the young man. My friend now stepped
forward and said, " You have a letter for him, for I
saw it and handled it about fifteen minutes ago."
He then looked over a bundle of letters, and found
the one wanted. The reader will admit that I had
good reason to be displeased with this kind of treat
ment. I mentioned the matter to several persons,
and was told that my experience was no uncommon
occurrence. This could scarcely be expected to
happen in any Post Office in Great Britain. Why
should such a state of things exist or continue in
Natal ? Situations of great responsibility in the
Post Office of Maritzburg are said to be occupied by
lads whose moral sense is no better than it should
be, and who are there, in some cases, not because of
their fitness for the posts, but because their fathers
were somebodies, or had influence with the "powers
that be." I have recorded my experience as above
at the request of several persons in Maritzburg and

SOMETHING WRUNG. II7
neighbourhood, who evidently have not had the
courage of complaining for themselves of similar
grievances. Under Sir Charles Mitchell, the government of
the Colony is sustained with ability and dignity.
We had the honour of being invited to the platform
on the occasion of his laying the foundation-stone of
the new Municipal Buildings, and of hearing him
addressing the large assembly within the enclosure,
and the still larger crowd in the main street. He
spoke with more than ordinary powers of eloquence.
We were somewhat grieved to find that on that
auspicious occasion all the ecclesiastical honours were
given to the ritualistic clergyman of the South
African Church, who read his little prayer as a
schoolboy might be expected to do. It would seem
that the Presbyterian Church is of secondary con
sideration in Maritzburg, as well as elsewhere in the
Colony. I believe it will not be gainsaid that our Scotch
Presbyterians, along with other Protestant denomina
tions, are doing as much, at least, for the cause of
Christ, and the best interests of the nation, as
other branches of the Church catholic ; and why
should they be thus ignored ? These Protestants
might do far worse than unite to put an end to this
somewhat anomalous state of things before the eyes
of the heathen world around them. We called at
the manse of the First Presbyterian Church to see the
minister, the Rev. Mr. Gould Smith, who, because
of an accident, had been unable to preach on the
previous Sabbath. We found him in his study, and

Il8 THE CHARACTER OF THE JEWS.
still unable to do anything by way of preparation for
his pulpit. In the circumstances, I could not refuse
to take his place on the following Lord's day.

HIEROGLYPHICS OF TRUTH, OR MAN
ESSENTIALLY RELIGIOUS.
A SERMON
Delivered in the First Presbyterian Church, Pietermaritsburg,
and a second time by special request in the Congregational
Church, Ladysmith, South Africa.
"Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan; thy father was an
Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite. " — Ezekiei. xvi. 3.
The Jews, of all ancient nations, were a proud,
self-sufficient and self-righteous people. Pride and
self-righteousness were their besetting sins ; by these
they were "a stiff, rebellious race, a race not right
in heart with God." They regarded themselves as
the special favourites of Heaven, and so they despised
others. They claimed Abraham as their father, and
Sarah as their mother, and became vainglorious
because of their pedigree. The Jews were thus the
fathers or founders of a religious caste that has in all
ages been a curse to the Church and to the world.
They were too proud in heart to go back in thought
and contemplate their connection with the first Adam
when he was expelled from the Garden of Eden.
They were too high-minded to reflect upon the
bondage of their fathers in the land of Egypt, or
when they mourned as captives by the streams of
Babel, or on the causes by which the sceptre had

THE CHARACTER OF THE JEWS. I 19
departed from Judah when Shiloh came. At no
time were they strong in faith or lowly in heart as
Abraham was. Abraham, even as a natural man,
was too great in soul to be proud, to care much for
accidental relationships, or to allow the love of his
heart to rest upon any one but the Infinite and the
Eternal. The Jews, like the Amorites and Hittites,
had the spirit of Lucifer, the ambition by which the
angels fell, the pride that goeth before destruction,
and the haughty spirit that precedes a fall-. Ani
mated by these they despised and crucified the Son
of God. But let him who is now without sin, with
out pride and prejudice, be the first to throw a stone
at the Jews.
We yield to none in our respect for the Jews ;
they have laid the Christian Church in the providence
of God under deep and lasting obligations, but we
do not conceal their besetting sins, because in too
many cases their sins are our own.
Concealment is often a serious infirmity, and has
led in many cases to sad consequences. Nothing is to
be gained by concealment before God. He who
covereth his sin shall not prosper. Our first duty in
relation to God, or in hearing the Gospel, is to learn
that we are sinners. No man will go to the physician
unless he is sick, and no medical practitioner will go
and prescribe for a patient without first knowing
what the ailment is. Men must know and realise in
some measure that they are lost by nature before
they can be saved by grace. Christ tells us that
He " came not to call the righteous but sinners to
repentance," and that the "whole have no need of

120 WHAT MAN IS, NOT WHAT MAN HAS.
a physician, but they that are sick." Pedigree may
be something, personal beauty may be something,
mental ability may be something, but man is more
than his ability, woman is more than her beauty, and
the soul is more than pedigree. Man as God made
him, or man as we now find him, is more than all
that he has, more than his natural connections and
externals. Three root doctrines of Holy Scripture, or three
lines of thought, are suggested by our text and
context. The text, in the light of the context,
suggests —
( i ) That man is essentially religious. — The Church,
whether at home or abroad, should have clear views
and strong convictions on this point. Religion is
not a thing invented by man ; it is not created in the
soul by science or culture ; it is not a product of
education and civilisation. Religion in the human
soul is as old as the creation of the world. Man, as
created by God, was created for a religious life, or for
union and fellowship with God Himself. Religion is
part of man's nature more truly than the rain-drop is
part of the cloud from which it comes, or the river is
part of the sea to and from which it flows. It is in the
soul as fire is in the flint, or as the day is in the dawn.
Man can no more help being religious than he can
help being hungry and thirsty. The relationship
and resemblance between children and their parents
are not more intimate and real than they were at the
beginning between God and man. This was the
doctrine and belief of the Apostle Paul as he preached
to the Athenians on Mars Hill. There he avowed

MAN NOT ATHEISTIC BY NATURE. 121
that man was not merely a creature of God in
common with the lower animals, but that he was in a
high or special sense the "offspring" of God.
Man's religious character, therefore, springs from his
creation in the image of God. As no man requires
secular education to make him hungry, or knowledge
of things in general to make him thirsty, neither does
it require the refinements and blessings of civilisation
to make him religious. Religion belongs to the soul
as hunger and thirst belong to the body. Hunger
and thirst may not create bread, any more than the
organ of vision creates light "or the organ of hearing
creates sound, but bread and light and sound would
be useless without these organs. Were it not that
man is essentially religious all our preaching of the
Gospel and all our missionary labours at home and
abroad would be in vain.
You may have atheism and infidelity in the world,
but you cannot trace atheism or infidelity to man's
nativity. Man by nature is not an atheist. In all
his sorrows and sufferings, the language of his heart
and soul is : If there is no God, there ought to be.
In his heart of hearts he longs for the Infinite and
the Eternal. In soul he is somewhat as the flow
ing river, that cannot rest until it reaches the sea.
It was not anything of the nature of atheism or
infidelity that created the glory of ancient Greece and
Rome. It was not atheism that reared the mounds
of Nineveh, and gave existence to the religious
records of Assyria. It was man's religious nature
that devised and erected the gigantic temples of
Luxor and Thebes on the banks of the Nile, and

122 JESUS THE HEARTS HOME.
those of Heliopolis on the borders of Arabia, and
many others, whose ruins are to the traveller to-day
among the greatest wonders of the world. It may
be said that these temples were largely the products
of superstitious beliefs and natural fear. I do not
deny this. But I would demand an explanation as
to the existence of these superstitious beliefs and
fears. What was their root cause ? Their root
cause was man's religious nature. Superstitious
beliefs and fears are not yet dead. I can see them
here and there at work in these Colonies.
Those of you who are working for Jesus Christ in
this Colony must often meet with their fruits, and
feel the poverty of your powers in dealing with them.
But surely better the infant than the idiot, better
deal with a people of natural fears and superstitious
beliefs than with those who have no beliefs at all, or
who have no mental capacity to form them.
Brethren, in those strange religious rites and
ceremonies of the coloured'-' tribes around you, in
their natural fears and superstitious beliefs, there
may be implied many sad thoughts of loss, many
imploring desires, many an upward glance of the
soul, and many strange efforts seeking the way back
— homewards to God. Be it yours then, as the
"salt of the earth and light of the world," to guide
them to Jesus.
(2) The second line of thought suggested by the
text is, that man by nature is morally corrupt. — "Thy
father was an Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite."
Both these tribes, though born in the land of Canaan,
were aliens to the commonwealth of Israel, and

THE GOSPEL NO MEANING WITHOUT SIN. 1 23
strangers to the covenants with promise. They
were without God, and without hope in the world.
They lived, like the Egyptians, to fulfil the desires
of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature
children of wrath. All the world's tribes in Asia,
Africa, India, China, while essentially religious, are so
religious that if they fail to find the only living and
true God, they will make a god. They did so in
ancient Greece and Rome. They did so in Egypt,
and they do so still in India and Africa. It is well
that those who preach the Gospel, whether at home
or abroad, should have clear views and strong con
victions on this point also. Men, because of their
natural depravity and pride, are prone to worship what
is fashionable. It may not be fashionable in these days
to believe in the total depravity of the human race.
But the Church of Christ must not bow at the shrine
of fashion, or sacrifice the truth for mere worldly gain.
Apart from sin, I know not the meaning of salvation,
even in theory. Apart from the doctrine of man's
alienation from God, I know not the meaning of
Christ's mission to the world. What would be the
meaning of physicians were there no human ailments,
or of drugs were there no human diseases, or of bread
and water were there no human hunger and thirst ?
Without sin in the soul, the Gospel could have no
meaning, and the Cross could have no power. There
is no doctrine more clearly stated in the Bible than
the doctrine implied in this text.
In every book, chapter, and verse of the Bible it
is either distinctly stated or clearly implied. All
human groans and griefs and fears spring from it.

I24 AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION.
"All men have sinned, and come short of the glory of
God," and "there is none righteous, no, not one." The
Church of Christ may be instrumental in doing much
good in the world. She may preach and teach the
Zulu, the Kafir, the coolie, the Hindoo, or the
Hottentot, but unless she find the way to the heart
and conscience of the people with Scriptural and
clear views of this doctrine, Christ will profit them
nothing. What else did Jesus Christ reveal by His
conversation with Nicodemus? Why should He
have said so emphatically, " Ye must be born again ?"
" Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born
again !" "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and
that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." The Amorite
and Hittite nature must be changed. You may
cover moral corruption with costly raiment, with the
best broadcloth or the finest silk, but God looketh
not upon the outward appearance, and He is never
mocked. You may clip the wings of a bird, or con
fine it in a cage so that it cannot fly, but clipping or
confinement does not change the bird's disposition,
or its desire to fly. The Church may dress
the savage, the cannibal, or the pagan in the robes
of civilisation, and say that he is converted, but
unless by the Gospel his heart is changed, he is a
pagan still, whose father was an Amorite and whose
mother was an Hittite.
(3) Our third line of thought suggested by the
context is, that Christianity is God's remedy for
maris moral malady. — He who at the beginning said,
" Let there be light, and there was light," now says,
" Live." The description given in the context of

CHRISTIANITY CONTRASTED. I 25
man's state by nature, speaks of death, moral and
spiritual, of orphanage and great feebleness.
There is a great amount of natural life in this
world, but it does not last. Human life, at the best,
is as the grass, and the glory of man is as the flower.
For want of life men are everywhere subject to bond
age. For want of life the world is but a vast
hospital, thousands of our fellow-creatures are pining
upon sick-beds, thousands are groaning in hospitals,
and millions go to the narrow house appointed for all
living. The keynote of Christianity is life, life that
cannot die. " I am come that ye might have life,"
said Christ, "and that ye might have it more abun
dantly." To all who hear and believe the Gospel
God says, Live !
Is there any other religion in the world that can be
compared with Christianity in this respect ? What
have Buddhism and Mohammedanism done for their
millions of votaries ? What have Confucianism and
Braminism done for their millions in Asia, in India
and China ? What has Zoroaster or his teachings
done for the great masses of Persia ?
What, I ask, have these religions done for man
kind ? Have they changed man's nature ? Have
they made him a better man, or a more useful
denizen of earth ? Thousands of the votaries or
victims of these religions have never known the
blessings of a father's hand, or experienced the love
of a mother's heart.
Between Christianity and the natural religions of
Asia, of Africa, of Persia, of China, India, and Europe,
there is as great a distance or difference as there
K

126 "WHO MADE THEE TO DIFFER?"
is between Christian culture and savage canni
balism. Christianity, as a system of truth, is in har
mony with the soundest deductions of reason ;
Christianity, as exhibited in the Person and work of
Jesus Christ, is the complement of the deepest desires
and wants of humanity : it alone makes men and
nations truly great. In India at this moment you
have nearly three hundred millions of men and women
who, in mind and moral nature, are no better than
infants. Years long ago their fathers and ours were
as brothers, on the banks of the Tiber and the
Thames, the Tay, the Tummel, the Clyde and the
Forth. There they lived and laboured under the
same. skies, looked up to the same stars, and ate the
same raw products of the soil. These millions to
day are ruled by a handful of men from the British
Isles. How comes it that we differ so widely ?
How comes it that the few who rule are men, and the
millions ruled are only as infants of the night ? How
comes it that Great Britain, as a nation, has been ever
prosperous and progressive, and that Asia and Africa,
India and China, have been ever comparatively poor
and stationary ?
Circumstances, no doubt, have had something to
do in causing the difference. But the chief factor or
cause of the contrast has been the Briton's con
ception of God, his conception of God as a Father
and a Friend in Christ ; His conception of the original
dignity and potential worth of man. These views,
along with his early training in the Christian home,
his love of the Bible, and his regard for the Sabbath
as a day of rest for man and beast : under the plastic

GOOD WORK CARRIED ON. 1 27
power or influence of these conceptions, God hath
made Great Britain to differ. By these same beliefs
and means can you, as Christian men and women,
hope to raise the fallen in this vast territory of the
world ; by these, —
"Arabia's desert-ranger
To Him shall bow the knee,
The Ethiopian stranger
His glory come to see ;
With offerings of devotion
Ships from the isles shall meet,
To pour the wealth of ocean
In tribute at His feet."
At the close of the service I baptized a child
named " Elizabeth Sutherland."
Afterwards, at the door of the church, we had the
pleasure of meeting and shaking hands with a goodly
number of our countrymen, among whom was the
Principal of the College, an Edinburgh man. A
considerable number of the members of this church,
and most regular attenders, live in the country,
among whom may be mentioned a sister of the
venerable Dr. W. G. Blaikie, of Edinburgh.
In the afternoon we heard an excellent discourse
from the other Presbyterian minister, the Rev. Mr.
Smith, on the subject of idolatry, Exodus xx. 4. On
another Sabbath evening we went to the Congrega
tional Church and heard the Rev. Mr. Russell, a
true Scot, and a very able preacher. He discoursed
with considerable powers of argument on the words,
"No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall
die with you!" (Job xii. 2.) Mr. Russell preaches

128 SOLDIERS CAN PRAY.
with considerable energy, and is very popular with
the people.
When the services of the church were over the
people flocked to the Young Men's Institute, where
they were again addressed by the Rev. Mr. Russell
and others. The singing was admirable, and the
prayers of the young men were fervent. There
was a large number of soldiers present, who took
part in the devotional exercises in a most creditable
way. On being asked to address the meeting, I felt
constrained^to refer to the presence of the soldiers,
and to express how pleased I was to find so many of
them in the ranks of the Lord Jesus Christ.

CHAPTER IX.

NATIYE RACES IN NATAL:
THEIR CHARACTER,
SOME OF THEIR RELIGIOUS CUSTOMS AND
MARRIAGE CEREMONIES.
jF the 530,000 of a population in the
Colony of Natal, there are, it is
alleged, 460,000 natives — that is,
Kafirs and Zulus ; 34,000 Indians ;
and 38,000 white people. The
Europeans will" not readily admit
that the Kafirs and Zulus are natives
of their Colony. Many of them have declared to us
that the Kafirs belong to Kafirland, as the Zulus be
long to Zululand, or as the coolies belong to India and
China. The Zulus and Kafirs cannot claim any more
right to Natal than the Europeans do. These native
tribes, so called, have a different opinion, and would
not be unwilling to go to war with the Europeans
to make it good. This is one reason at least why
a number of Europeans in Natal are not in favour of
a responsible government. They fear that if Britain's
home forces were withdrawn from residence in the

I 30 WHENCE CAME THEY ?
Colony, the Kafirs and Zulus would combine in war
against them. I am inclined to sympathise with
this party.
The Colonial Government, it seemed to us, is
not dealing with the native tribes as they ought to
be dealt with, and they are becoming more and more
insolent, defiant, and warlike. They ought to be dealt
with firmly, yet kindly. They ought to be taught
that if they are to have social, civil, and religious
liberty, they ought to give evidence that they
deserve it. They ought not to be treated the one
day as if they were barbarians or babies, and the
next day as if they were sages and bosom friends.
There may be apparent severity in the Dutchman's
manner and methods towards them, but he is more
their master than the Englishman.
If the Zulus and Kafirs are not natives of Natal,
whence come they ? It is generally admitted that
they belong to the ancient land of Ham. They
resemble the people of Egypt in their features and
character, and they have some of their customs.
The pictures of warlike men which we saw here and
there in the land of Egypt have a striking resem
blance to the Kafirs of Natal. The Kafir is physi
cally well-built and muscular. His form and features,
under the influences of education, religion, and civilisa
tion, would soon make him equal to most Europeans.
It is a mistake to suppose that he is destitute of mental
capacity, or that he is lacking in practical sagacity.
Those who can speak to him in his own language
cannot doubt as to his mental ability, and there is as
little doubt as to his natural powers of eloquence.

ZULUS AND KAFIRS. 131
He is not as the Bushman, a man of the desert,
hunting wild beasts and living on the raw products
of the soil ; nor is he as the Hottentot, a hewer of
wood and drawer of water. The Kafir, though
naturally indolent, can work, can cultivate the land,
grow corn, and attend to all the processes of
husbandry, as well almost as any European, but his
laziness leads him to form plans by which he can
best indulge it. He is a polygamist. He works
only as long as will enable him to get money to pur
chase oxen, and with these oxen so many wives.
The oxen given for the wives is labola. Having got
wives, he makes them his slaves, compels them to
dig and plant, sow and reap. He then becomes a
chief, or the head of so many Kafirs less fortunate.
He marks himself as chief by a circle of plaited hair
round his head. The Kafirs are thus divided into
tribes or clans, somewhat as the Highland clans in
this country were two or three hundred years ago.
The Zulus are not unlike the Kafirs in physical form
and character. They are less mixed, perhaps, and
more muscular. They are tall, well-built, and rather
handsome men. They have fewer of the physical
features which characterise the negro races than the
Kafirs have.
But the fact is that both Kafirs and Zulus belong
originally to the same Bantu family in the north-east
of Africa, and who sought refuge in various parts of
South Africa from tyrannical chiefs and other evils.
The word Kafir is Arabic, and is a nickname or
term of reproach, which Mohammedans apply to all
who do not believe what they believe, viz., that God

132 NO ATHEISTS AMONG THE ZULUS OR KAFIRS.
is great, and that Mohamet is His prophet. The
word Zulu, if we remember rightly, signifies high or
lofty, but originally it was compounded with Ama ;
and the Amazulu, with Amaxosa tribes, were the
representatives of the eastern Bantu races.
We were specially curious to know all about the
religion of the Kafirs, and we set ourselves to ascer
tain this from those who were most intimate with
them. We had several conversations with mission
aries and with other gentlemen who had long been
acquainted with both Zulus and Kafirs. They
assured us that there were no atheists among the
native tribes. They all believe in the existence of
a Supreme Being, whom they call Umdaliwezwe, a
term derived from data, to create, and izwe, the
earth. The word ukulu, repeated twice, signifies the
Great Great, or the Most High. They believe that
when they die their souls live in certain snakes, and
these snakes act as mediators between men upon the
earth and the spirit world. These snakes they would
not injure or kill for anything. They do not worship
the snakes, they say, but simply show their reverence
for them because of the spirits they represent. This
was what was interpreted to us by a gentleman who
questioned his Kafir servant on the subject in our
hearing. Many of them seem to have little or no sense of
sin, nevertheless they offer sacrifices under the full
conviction that " without the shedding of blood there
is no remission of sin." They have certain feasts and
rites, which they are careful to observe at the new
moons. They also observe the rite of circumcision.

PAGAN DISPLAYS! 1 33
When threatened with drought or famine, the rain
doctors are applied to, and if they fail to get rain, the
king or chief orders a pilgrimage to be made to the
graves of his ancestors, and there he offers sacrifices
to their spirits. The witch doctors are strange-look
ing fellows. They go about decorated with all sorts
of strange things, called charms. Round the neck of
the witch doctor are hung a large number and
variety of teeth, and the bones of sheep and goats ;
on his shoulders are pieces of skin, and from these
are suspended the eyes of different animals, while on
his arms and feet are bracelets and anklets. These
men are looked upon with feelings of awe and terror.
The people are very much at their mercy, and their
mercy sometimes leads to cruelty.
There is said to be very little unchastity among
the native races. Although polygamy prevails, the
sin of adultery is not so common as one might readily
suppose. The sin, when discovered, is almost
invariably punished. Among the Zulus unchastity
is regarded with horror, and has more than once been
punished with death.
At certain seasons of the year men and women
abandon themselves in connection with their feasts
to various forms of licentiousness. They meet in
large numbers in one of the parks or open squares
in Maritzburg, where the markets are usually held,
and display themselves in ways which are said to be
abominable. Large numbers of the citizens of
Maritzburg turn out to witness their dances and
strange gestures. These citizens are thus like the
Greeks who went to Corinth at certain times of the

134 MARRIAGE CEREMONIES.
year to admire the women who had been consecrated
or set apart for the worship of Venus.
The Kafirs and Zulus, at their feasts, act on the
principle of the Midianites when they accomplished
the seduction and downfall of the Hebrews. In
matters of detail the ceremonies may vary, but the
principle is the same in modern as in ancient
paganism. The sense of shame, like the sense of sin,
among the native races of Natal, is as near as may
be at zero. This was more evident in the country
districts, and among those who live at the kraals,
than in the towns and villages.
We saw numbers of men and women, young lads
and girls, working in the fields and walking along the
country roads, with nothing on their bodies but their
" mouchies." They are forbidden to enter any town
or village in this state of nudeness, and so when they
approach one they more fully cover their bodies with
pieces of blanket.
The law and ceremonies with respect to marriage
among the natives are somewhat curious. One day,
seeing a flag stuck out above one of the kraals, I
asked what it signified, and was told that it announced
to the people of the other kraals a change in the
family, a death or a marriage. It turned out to be a
marriage. When what is called the ukuxona, or
courtship, is ended, the bridegroom goes to the father
of the bride, and tries to settle with him regarding the
labola, or the number of oxen he must give for his
daughter. The number may be five, or ten, or
fifteen. This settled, preparations are made for the
marriage. The bride cuts off her hair, leaving only

MARRIAGE PRESENTS. I 35
as much as will support a feather in the midst of
red clay and grease. The tuft of hair thus adorned
marks her as engaged. It is her marriage ring.
The father then gives his daughter a blanket, so
many beads, and a number of ornaments. He next
kills a goat, and offers it as a sacrifice to the spirits.
of his ancestors. A marriage procession is then
formed, and they march off to the kraal of the bride
groom. The bridegroom and his friends, seeing the
bride and her friends coming, go away to meet them,
dancing and singing as they go. After some
skirmishing with their tongues, and sometimes
seriously with knob-kerries, both parties go to the
bridegroom's kraal, where feasting, dancing, and
singing, are indulged in. When the dancing is over
the bride steps out and kneels before the bridegoom,
saying, " JVigitole," "take me," or, "receive me."
He then rises and looks round the company, and
says, "Do you adopt us?" The company having
given their assent, the bride tries to run away to the
nearest flowing stream or river, and if she succeed,
the bridegroom must pay some fine to her father or
brother. The ceremony ends with the slaying of a
goat as a sacrifice, and prayer by the father that his
daughter may be happy and fruitful. The gall of the
animal is sprinkled over the bride. Shortly after,
she gives all her beads and other ornaments to the
young women in her husband's kraal.

136 A VISIT TO THE PAGODA.

WASHING AWAY THEIR SINS.
One evening, while sitting in the house of my
•sister conversing with some friends, I heard a noise,
a jumble of strange musical sounds, and the beating
of drums. I asked what it meant, and was told that
it came from the coolie camp near the river. The
Indian coolies had been that day in the river wash
ing away their sins. Now and again they get one of
their " gods " dressed up in a most fantastic style, and
after certain manoeuvres proceed with it to the river.
There, after singing and dancing, and wailing, and
beating upon their breasts, the god is cast into the
river. They then one by one plunge in after it, and
come out, having left their sins to sink or swim with
the little dressed doll.
From what we saw of the coolies and their dirty
habitations in that part of the city, we could not help
congratulating them on getting rid of something else,
if not of their sins. We thought that the Zulus and
Kafirs might be none the worse if they had, even
once a year, a similar religious ceremony. The
Indian coolies have a pagoda, or temple, in a some
what secluded spot near the river, to which we paid
a visit, but we saw nothing worthy of note, or
what might be expected in such a place. The little
priest who had charge of the place very graciously
received us, and showed us, so far as he could, all the
mysteries of his religion. He told us the names of
several of his gods, but our hearing powers were
baffled to note exactly what he said, and we utterly
failed to pronounce them. Looking at one of the

"och! mo thruaighe!'

137"

figures, we asked his daughter what was the name,
and she said " Maria." " Dear me !" said one of our
party, "is Mary among the Hindoos also?" The
whole furniture of the three places into which the
pagoda is divided seemed to us to be simple, poor,
and childish in the extreme. Having seen all that
was to be seen, one of the company exclaimed,.
''Och ! mo thruaighe /" " let us go," and off we went,
feeling grateful that the lines had fallen to us in more
pleasant places.

CHAPTER X.

CHURCHES AND MISSIONS IN SOUTH
AFRICA.
N this subject we intend to limit our
remarks as far as possible to what
we saw and heard. But a few
thoughts on the subjectof missions in
Africa generally may not be out of
place. Mission work in Africa may
be said to have begun with the ser
mon that Peter preached on the day of Pentecost.
Many of those who listened to that sermon were
natives of Africa. It is said that Mark, who wrote
the Gospel that bears his name, was the first Chris
tian presbyter or pastor of the Church in Alexandria,
and that the Copts of Cairo are the only living repre
sentatives of that early Church. It is said that
Athanasius was for some time patriarch of the Church
of Alexandria, and that he sent the knowledge of
Jesus Christ to the people of Abyssinia. It is more
than possible, however, that as Abyssinia was the
part of Africa over which Queen Candace ruled,
whose chamberlain had embraced the Gospel, the

THE GREATEST OF THE LATIN FATHERS. 1 39
Gospel had been there, before the days of Athanasius,
although no reference is made to its fruits in the
history of the first three centuries. It was specially
in the Northern provinces of Africa that Christianity
at first sprang forth as with all the splendours of an
African sun. In Carthage, Tertullian unfurled the
banner of the Cross of Christ with no ordinary
power. In the town of Hippo, not far from the
city of Carthage, one greater even than Tertullian
lived, and did more than any one else to proclaim the
unsearchable riches of Christ. I refer to Augustine,
the greatest of all the Latin fathers. Eusebius and
others declare that in the fifth century there were in
the city and neighbourhood of Carthage from six to
seven hundred churches and mission stations. These
churches, like those of Asia Minor, have long since
disappeared, and the vast . majority of the people in
that part of Africa are now under the teaching and
power of the false prophet.
In Western Africa the Moravians began to
evangelise the people in the year 1736, and have
continued the work with zeal and fortitude until this
day, and their labours have been crowned with con
siderable success. The Church of England Mission
ary Society began work in this part of the field in
1804. At that time Sierra Leone became a colony
under the British Crown, specially for the purpose
of affording protection to emancipated slaves. In
sailing towards the Cape of Good Hope, the coast of
Sierra Leone is within 30 or 40 miles from the course
of the steamer. The Niger Mission, under Bishop
Crowther, sprang from the Church of Sierra Leone,

140 MORAL AND CIVIL MACHINERY.
and has been very successful. The bishop being a
native of Western Africa, this has helped him to secure
to a large extent the goodwill of the native chiefs,
and of hundreds of the people, who now largely con
tribute to the support of the mission.
In Eastern Africa comparatively little has yet
been done by any of the Churches. But now that
Mashonaland has become famous in connection with
the recent discovery of the ruins of the palace of the
Queen of Sheba, and the mines from which the King
of Tyre and King Solomon got much of their wealth,
it may be hoped that the Churches will go and evan
gelise the people.
Central Africa of late years has absorbed a good
deal of public attention. The various Governments
of Europe have parcelled it out for trade, commerce,
and civil government. Mr. Stanley, in a recent lecture
delivered in Edinburgh, told his audience that Great
Britain had absorbed two and a half millions of square
miles ; Italy, one million ; Germany, one and a half
millions ; France, one million ; and whining little
Portugal, three quarters of a million. A thousand
military and civil officers represent civilised govern
ment, and guarantee law and order. Over fifty
missionary stations already dot the surface of the late
dark heart of Africa.
Let me now bespeak your attention to what we
saw and heard respecting churches and missions in
South Africa. While visiting the churches and
conversing with the missionaries of that part of
Africa that came within the area of our rambles,
our aim was to find out what was true, and our duty

SALT AND SUGAR CHRISTIANS. 14I
is to publish it. Some of our facts may be more
plain than pleasant, but good medicines for the mind,
no less than for the body, are somewhat as the bitter
herbs which the Hebrews used at their first passover
feast. Our Lord likened His faithful servants to
salt, not to sugar ; but unfortunately we live in an age
when the salt in too many cases has lost its savour.
In this somewhat sensuous age, the truth, in the
opinion of many men, must be sugared for the
" carnal mind," otherwise it will be rejected. Modern
Christian confectionery, in the shape of goody-goody
teaching, or what is pleasing to the "natural man,"
has begotten a very unwholesome state of things in
all our Churches. Some of our Churches at home
and abroad seem to have lost genuine faith and vital
energy, if ever they had them, and to be dying of a
moral distemper called "supreme gentility," or the
"caste "that cursed the Jews. But we mean to be
as those who proclaimed the truth, whether men will
hear, or whether they will forbear.
The South African Church, instead of unfurling
the banner of the Cross of Christ, and teaching the
natives such doctrines as Christ revealed in His con
versation with Nicodemus, is doing its utmost in
favour of ritualism. Recently, Bishop Blyth, late of
Rangoon, was chosen to be bishop of Jerusalem,
with the result that at a recent meeting of the Church
Missionary Society a number of influential gentlehien
declared that they and their friends by hundreds in
every district of England would withdraw their
support. A similar result has taken place in South
Africa. Bishop Gray was a laborious servant of the

142 DIFFERENT BISHOPS.
Church in many ways in South Africa, but he was a
ritualist. As a ritualist he set himself up as the
chief of a court of final appeal, requiring all clergy
men of the Metropolitan See to take their law and
order and interpretation of doctrine from him as the
head of that court. This, as the Chief-Justice of the
Cape declared, had the effect of separating the South
African Church, root and branch, from the mother
Church in England. The people generally had no
love for ritualism, and would not surrender their
freedom and privileges as loyal subjects of the
Queen and as members of the Church of England,
and thus there came to be two parties in the Church
of South Africa.
When Bishop Macrorie went to the people of
Natal with his credentials from Bishop Gray, they
refused to have him. Objections to Bishop Macrorie,
they said, had been raised in the Lambeth Confer
ence, and also by the Secretary of State, as well as
by the late Archbishop Tait, and so in spirit they
said, "We will not have this man to reign over us."
But Bishop Macrorie had the support of several of
the bishops at home, and there he continues.
Bishop Gray, it seems, had no respect for the
Evangelicals either at home or abroad. He is re
ported to have said that "the Evangelicals were
rapidly losing their moral sense, and were coming
more and more under the influence of an evil spirit."
The South African Church at this moment is very
much in spirit, doctrine, and forms of worship what
the Church of Rome is. Some of her members are
not strangers to the confessional box. A respectable

MORE PLAIN THAN PLEASANT. 1 43
merchant had heard that his wife had been prevailed
upon to go to this box, and on meeting the clergyman
he said to him, " Mr.  , hitherto you and I have
been on friendly terms, and I have no desire to be
unfriendly towards you, but to-day I give you to
know that if ever again you have my wife at your
confessional box, I will take the first opportunity
that presents itself and give you as good a thrashing
as you ever got ! "
When Bishop. Colenso went to Natal he was
strongly in favour of ritualism, but when he saw that
the people disliked it he had the good sense to give
it up. He then began to devote his leisure hours to
the working out of some strange arithmetical problems
bearing upon the Pentateuch, the exodus of the
Hebrews, and other matters, and when he published
the results they were declared to be heresies, and
efforts were made to have him deposed from his
ministerial office, but in vain. The people had no
sympathy with his heretical veiws ; in fact they knew
little or nothing about them, and many of them cared
less. Ritualism, however, did not die with Bishop
Gray or with Bishop Colenso. It is still a thing of
power in the South African Church, and is, in the
opinion of many, seriously retarding the progress of
Christianity. "Christianity," says the author of Ecce Homo,
"would sacrifice its divinity if it abandoned its mis
sionary character, and became a mere educational
institution. When the power of reclaiming the lost
dies out of the Church, it ceases to be the Church.
It may remain a useful institution, though it is most

144 SPOILING THE NATIVES.
likely to become an immoral and mischievous one."
How far the meaning of these words is applicable to
the South African Church, or how far she fails to fulfil
her mission because of her love of ritualism, I will
not venture to say. Ritualism has no moral power
to awaken the conscience to a sense of sin, and with
out that there can be no salvation ; and neither has
it power to build up saints in the faith of the Gospel.
Among the first things we heard regarding the
South African Church and her missions was, that they
were "spoiling the natives." " How so?" we asked,
and the answer was, " They are taught to believe that
once they profess Christianity and put on European
clothes, they are quite as good as Europeans. If you
can get domestic or Kafir servants in their raw state
from the Kraals, you can train them to be good,
honest, and trustworthy servants, but if you get them
from any of the mission stations, they will be a pest
to you." This is not the opinion of one person, but of
many persons in Natal. We failed, however, to see
the proof of it.
The strange thing in connection with the ritualistic
Churches of South Africa is, that the ministers in
most cases are wonderfully evangelical in their
preaching. The sermons we heard from the Rev.
Dr. Welby, the Lord Bishop of St. Helena, and by
the Rev. Father Pullar, of Zululand, were most evan
gelical in doctrine. It was to us a mystery how such
ministers could indulge in anything superstitious.

THE DUTCH " NACHT MAAL." 145
THE DUTCH CHURCH MISSIONS.
The Dutch Church has been in the South African
field from the earliest days of the Colonies. The cele
brated Van der Kemp was the first, or among the
first, of her missionaries. He largely paved the way
for such renowned men as Kircherer, Edwards,
Moffat, Livingstone, and Campbell. While to popish
Portugal belongs the honour of having discovered the
Colony, to the Reformed Protestant Church of Hol
land belongs the honour of being the first to claim
the people for Christ, Her missions all along have
been very successful. The missionaries have had
regard to sound evangelical preaching, and their
labours have not been in vain. Some of their prayer
meetings and church services reminded us of what
was common in the churches of Scotland fifty years
ago. The earnest devotion of the people and their
psalm singing, as well as their arrangements in con
nection with what they call the " Nacht Maal," or
Lord's Supper, are wonderfully like what may be
found in many parts of the Highlands of Scotland to
this day.

THE WESLETAN METHODISTS.
This body of Christians are as peculiarly earnest
and active abroad as they are at home. Their
churches and missions are almost everywhere in both
Colonies. They leave no one to doubt that their aim
is to —

146 SHEEP-STEALING BY BISHOPS.
" Rescue the perishing, care for the dying —
Snatch them .in pity from sin and the grave ;
Weep o'er the erring one, lift up the fallen —
Tell them of Jesus, the mighty to save."
Like the Dutch missionaries, the Wesleyans despise
ritualism, and aim only at the conversion of the
heathen to Christ.
They make a judicious selection of their converts
for mission work, and in this, we think, much of the
secret of their success lies. The Rev. Mr. Metcalf,
superintendent, and other gentlemen connected with
the Wesleyan body, furnished us with a number of
reports and papers bearing upon their work, but our
space, we regret to say, is too limited for even an
abstract of them.

THE SOCIETY FOR THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL.
This society has planted a large number of mission
stations both in Cape Colony and in Natal, and to
these have been gathered considerable numbers of
both Colonists and natives. It seems to be specially
under the care and management of the South African
Church, some of whose agents, it was alleged, were
at no time unwilling to build upon other men's
foundations. They think it no sin, much less shame,
to be charged, and found guilty, of what some have
characterised as "sheep -stealing." Missionaries
connected with the Dutch Church, and with the
Berlin and French Basuto Missions, have been
compelled to complain to the superiors of these

A BISHOPS PRESUMPTION. 1 47
agents, because of their aggressive and proselyti
sing work. Bishop Webb, of Bloemfontein, some
time ago entered the territory which had been
occupied by the French Basuto missionaries for more
than forty years, and induced a number of the con
verts to leave them and become members of the
South African Church. The Bishop, on being
remonstrated with on this subject, is reported to have
said, "The teaching of your missionaries is incomplete ;
you do not hold the doctrine of the Apostolical
succession, and in your hands the Sacraments have
lost their virtue." These words from a bishop of
the Church of England in this enlightened age imply
a sad state of ignorance, not to speak of pretence or
presumption, but they are specially sad as coming
from one engaged to preach the Gospel of Christ
among the heathen.

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCHES AND MISSIONS.
These Churches and missions are not on the whole
so numerous nor so well sustained, in a few cases, as
they might be. , The Presbyterian Churches in Cape
Colony and in Natal are almost wholly devoted to
Christian work among the Colonists or Europeans.
Most of the mission stations were beyond our reach.
The Free Church has a very prosperous mission at
Lovedale, and we were strongly inclined to go and
see it, but on learning that the Rev. Dr. Stewart was
in the old country at the time, we refrained. The
Lovedale Mission, it is said, is a great educational

148 THE MEN WANTED.
establishment, where English, mathematics, natural
philosophy, history, physical and descriptive geogra
phy, music, vocal and instrumental, and other branches
of education, are taught, and also such branches of
industry as printing, book-binding, wagon-making,
and farming. The Free Church has another mission
Church in Maritzburg. The American Presbyterian
missionaries are among the most zealous and devoted
men we met with. The Church of Scotland Missions,
as well as those of the United Presbyterian Church,
were far beyond the scope of our rambles, and there
fore we must refrain from saying anything about
them. Almost all the Protestant Churches of
Christendom are more or less fully represented by
the missions in South and Central Africa.
But as yet, with respect to the whole field, north,
west, east, and south, it may be said, "The harvest
is plenteous, and the labourers are few."

ONE OR TWO PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS.
Owe first suggestion is this, that the very best men,
in body, soul, and spirit, should be selected by the
Churches for the mission field. This suggestion, let
us say, is not given because of anything we saw
defective in the missionaries of South Africa, but
simply because of an inborn conviction that the
Churches at home should have special regard to those
men whose hearts and souls are fired with Christian
enthusiasm for mission work. Hitherto, it seems to

PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS. 1 49
us, the Churches have judged of the fitness of men for
the mission field more by their educational attain
ments than by their earnest devotion to Jesus Christ
and zeal for the salvation of perishing souls. We
yield to none in our regard for the highest possible
standard of education, in its own place, but it seems
to be unknown, ignored, or too often forgotten, that
high education has a tendency to contract the soul
and lame or limit a man's heart powers for mission
work. Our second suggestion is this, that all the Presby
terian Churches of both Colonies should be under the
control of presbyteries. In one of the churches of
the Cape there is practically no kirk session, and
serious matters of discipline are apt to be ignored.
One of the so-called elders of that church, instead of
worshipping in his own church as he ought to do,
worships with members of his family in one of the
Episcopal churches, and only appears in the Presby
terian church when the sacrament of the Lord's Sup
per is to be dispensed. Office-bearers and members
of that church have reason to be grieved at this state
of things. Were the churches under the control of
presbyteries, these and such like irregularities would
take end.
Our third suggestion is this, that all the evangeli
cal Churches of both Colonies should agree to such a
union or federation as would prove an antidote to all
the inroads of ritualism. The Dutch, the French
Basuto, the Americans, the Wesleyans, the Congre-
gationalists, and the Baptists, should agree to differ
only on minor points, and should unite with the

I5Q

ALEXANDER THE COPPERSMITH.

Scotch and English Presbyterians, not only for the
purpose of stemming the tide of Anglican ritualism,
but for aggressive warfare in the territory of the
common foe.

SOMETHING WORTH KNOWING.
"Alexander the coppersmith" seems to. be
unknown in connection with any of the Colonial
Churches. If any one of the deacons or managers
who lift the people's offerings by means of small
plates discovers a penny or halfpenny in his plate, he
looks to the giver, and is ready to exclaim, " Behold,
here is a poor stranger from Scotland, England, or
Ireland ! "

CHAPTER XI.

EDUCATION IN NATAL
HILE in Pietermaritzburg we had
the honour of being introduced to
Mr. Russell, General Superintendent
of Schools in the Colony, and to his
chief assistant, Mr. Mudie. These
two gentlemen may not be " My
Lords" of the Education Department
de jure, but they are so practically, or de facto. Both
are Scotsmen, and that means more than we care to
state. It is needless to say that both are eminent
scholars. They are men of sound judgment and
practical common sense ; and these are qualities not
always found in conjunction with high literary and
scholastic attainments.
Mr. Russell is a fine-looking man ; he has all the
appearance and airs of a military general. A pass
ing stranger might possibly regard him as belonging
to a certain city which has been characterised as "East
windy, west endy;" but Mr. Russell is not proud.
Nevertheless, to see him walking on the street or to
hear him talking in his office, or to see him sitting in
his arm chair, might be regarded by ordinary mortals

152 ENGLAND NOT GREAT BRITAIN.
as a kind of high school education in itself! He may
have a good deal of the nature of law and letters in
his mental constitution, but he is not a stranger to
the higher laws of the heart. Mr. Mudie is a genial
gentleman, one who has the power of concealing his
¦superiority. Both these gentlemen were perfectly frank, and
most willing to give us all the information possible
with respect to the schools under their charge. Mr.
Russell has recently published a book, entitled,
" Natal, the Land and its Story," and he very kindly
presented us with a copy. The volume is packed with
a large variety of interesting facts, and is to be used
as a text-book in all the schools. The book through
out is excellent, but we take exception to the author's
use of the term "England" when "Great Britain " is
evidently intended and required by facts. " Eng
land " can never be taken by true Scotsmen as
synonymous with the phrase " Great Britain."
The education imparted to the children in the
Government and other schools of Natal is very much
the same as our own in Scotland. The pioneers of
education in the Colony were largely, if not wholly,
of Scottish training. Many of the teaching staff,
perhaps the majority of the teachers at present under
Mr. Russell, were trained in the seminaries and
universities of the mother country. The different
branches of education, reading, writing, arithmetic,
geography, grammar, history, &c, &c, are taught in
class standards up to the seventh standard. We
visited several of the schools, and were gratified to
find them well filled, and the teachers enthusiastic in

BASIS OF NATIONAL GREATNESS. 1 53:
their work. " Payment by results," with its con
comitant evils, seems to have been abandoned in
Natal. The teachers are paid with fixed salaries,
and grants are made by way of encouraging merit,.
and discountenancing laziness and inefficiency.
Children living more than five miles from any of
the regular schools are provided with education at
what are called "farm centres," and these are annu
ally inspected in the usual way, and grants made.. .
It has been estimated that about 2,600 children
receive private education, or at schools not in receipt
of Government grants. The " compulsory clause," if
it exists, does not seem to be anywhere enforced,
and yet we heard no grumbling on account of non- or
irregular attendance. The only thing that grieved
us in connection with the education of the children
was the absence of a thorough and systematic training
in religious knowledge. It will not be gainsaid that
a people's character and a nation's greatness largely
depend upon or spring from their religion. If Great
Britain is in any way greater than its neighbours, or
if the Scottish people are greater than the ancient
Spartans, or the ancient .Athenians with all their
culture and superiority of refinement, they owe it
chiefly to the fact that the training of their moral
and spiritual nature was not left to accidental, agencies,
but that parents and teachers for generations im
planted in the hearts of the children the principles
of godly fear and of sound morality.
The " Soul of man, Jehovah's breath," is a thing
of life, growth, and development. It gradually takes
in what is brought to it, somewhat as the living

154 INFORMATION V. EDUCATION.
flower appropriates or drinks in the shower and the
sunshine. The great cry of the age is education,
but what is education ? Education is not a cramming
of the mind and memory of a child with a list of words
and names, days and dates, as if the soul were a
potter's vessel. It is not so much instruction as it is
the development of the child's mental and mOral
nature. The soul in youth is as the fertile soil in
spring, a vital upheaving force, and therefore to load
it with the facts of mere secular knowledge is apt to
paralyse its energies and stint its growth.
Were the husbandman to select a square yard of
his farm and scatter upon it all the manure and seed
which should be scattered upon a whole acre, there
would be no future seed to the sower and bread to
the eater ; or, were he to plough the soil and sow the
precious grain as he ought, and then cover the seed
under a load of earth, the seed would not spring up,
but rot as in a grave. The souls of children should
be free to grow in knowledge, and should not be
cramped or crushed by mere learning. There are
thousands of learned men and women in the world,
but comparatively few who know. Many regard
themselves as scholars who are utter strangers to
education. Some of the greatest critics of English
grammar and composition may be utter strangers to
themselves and to the first principles of human life and
action. We have well-informed men as physicians,
as lawyers, as schoolmasters and as ministers of
religion, who cannot be said to be educated. They
have the seeing eye, and can extend their vision by
means of a telescope, but how few have considered

SOMETHING OF PRIMARY IMPORTANCE. 1 55
the nature of the eye itself or of the mind that looks
through the eye. They are school and college-bred
and book-made scholars, but they are not in the true
sense of the word educated men. Education means
the renovation and moral culture of the whole inner
man, and mere secular instruction falls short of this.
The soul, like the seed in the soil in spring, seeks to
rise, — not merely to rest on the surface of things, but to
grasp things which are unseen and eternal. In these
days of mere secular education, soul potentialities are
in danger of being crushed or limited in their growth
to the region of things seen and temporal. There is a
selfishness in our modern systems of education which
is essentially suicidal. Greatness of thought and
soul powers are largely sacrificed for things puerile
and fictitious. Where men confound their life with
their limbs, and their souls with their senses, they
may inscribe the words of the poet upon their
banner, " All hopes of future bliss — farewell."
No greater infatuation could affect the rulers of a
country, and no greater calamity could befall a nation,
than the withholding of a sound religious training
from the young. The children of Natal are not
without religious training. The teachers are allowed
to give them Bible knowledge, and they do so
consistently and well.
But what we plead for in all schools at home and
abroad is, that the Christian religion shall be held- as
of primary importance, and shall be imparted in a
thorough and systematic way, and that the work done
shall be annually inspected by competent examiners.
The Council of Education in Natal could easily

156 SOMETHING THAT MIGHT BE DONE.
improve upon their present system in this respect.
The Government of Natal seems to have no difficulty
and no scruple in making grants in respect of
education imparted in denominational schools, that is,
schools in which different religious tenets are taught.
Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, and others obtain
Government grants, and why should not all the
other Churches get them for their children ? In
point of fact they do get them, but the teaching of
religion is not the primary object for which they are
given. It seemed to us that Mr Russell could, with
the full consent of his " My Lords," have a suitable
syllabus of religious instruction prepared for all his
schools, and we feel sure that it would be adopted
with satisfaction by parents, teachers, and scholars
alike. Secondary education is not forgotten in the Colony.
The High School of Durban and the Maritzburg
College, each of whose pupils costs the Government
,£13 4s. iod., carry on secondary education so. as to
enable the pupils to compete, many of them success
fully, at the University of Cambridge Local Examina
tions, and also at the Cape University Examinations.
At some of the other Government schools the head
masters give instruction in Latin and Greek, mathe
matics, and modern languages.

ss@^@s^3

CHAPTER XIL

NATAL GOVERNMENT RAILWAYS.
OTWITHSTANDING the many
difficulties that Natal as a Colony
has had to contend with during the
last forty years, it has overcome
them, and been wonderfully suc
cessful in its career upwards and on
wards. Its material prosperity has
been largely owing to its railways. There are above
three hundred miles of railway now open for public
traffic, and worked by the Colonial Government. The
main trunk line is from Durban to Maritzburg, from
Maritzburg to Newcastle, 271 miles, and 30 miles
more from Newcastle to Charlestown, on the borders
of the South African Republic, and under the
shadows of the Amajuba mountain, where General
Sir George Colley, Governor of Natal, was killed in
action with the Boers in 1881. The Orange Free
State Line is about 60 miles in length. It connects
with the main trunk line near Ladysmith, and runs
across the Drakensburg mountains to the town of
Harrismith. The Dundee branch is seven miles in
length. It connects with the main line at Glencoe
junction, and runs into the coal fields and town of
Dundee. The North Coast Line extends from the
M

I58 RAILWAY ALTITUDES.
seaport town to Verulam, 19 miles, and serves
the sugar-growing interests. The South Coast Line
is about 7 miles in length, and meets the requirements
of the sugar-growing plantations in that district.
The gauge of the railways in Natal is 3 feet 6 inches,
instead of 4 feet 8 inches as in our country, and that
gauge has" been universally adopted in South Africa.
The physical formation of the country has necessi
tated gradients and curves on the railway of a very
severe kind. Out of the present total mileage not
less than 30 miles are upon grades of 1 in 30 and 1
in 35, and curves of 300 to 350 feet radius, while on
over 40 miles more, there are grades under 1 in 60,
and curves of less than 450 feet radius.
The Main Trunk Line reaches an altitude of 3054
feet above the level of the sea, at a point 58 miles
distant from Durban ; after falling 1000 feet in its
further progress to Pietermaritzburg, it again rises,
12 miles after leaving that city, to a height of 3700
feet above the sea ; at a point 1 34 miles from Dur
ban it has reached an altitude of 5152 feet, but on
reaching Ladysmith, 191 miles from Port Natal, the
altitude has decreased to 3284 feet. The summit of
the " Biggarsberg " chain is crossed at a point 233
miles from the Port at a height of 4600 feet, and
when the terminus of Charlestown is reached, after
crossing the western slope of the Drakensberg
Mountains, the train will have again gained a higher
eminence than ever, the altitude being about 5500
feet. The Orange Free State Line, after leaving Lady-
smith, will ascend by steep gradients the whole of its

A STRIKING FACT. 1 59
own course in Natal territory, and when it gains the
border of the Free State on the summit of the more
easterly point of the Drakensberg range, it will be
about 5500 feet above the sea.
As illustrating the extraordinary conditions of
railway construction in Natal, every ton of goods
conveyed over the main line from Durban to Charles-
town has to be lifted vertically by engine power 2^
miles into the air — that mileage representing the
actual ascents to be made on the journey.
The railways have played an important part in the
stirring events of South African history. During
1878-79 the small portion of the line then constructed
(about 50 miles) was largely used in the conveyance
of the military during the Zulu War. In 1881 the
whole of the troops, stores and munitions of war
were conveyed to Pietermaritzburg over the railway,
then still incomplete. But services much more im
portant and satisfactory have been rendered by the
railway in the development of the South African
gold fields during more recent year,s, some indication
of which may be gathered from the revenue earned
by the railways : —
In 1885, 116 miles were open for traffic, realising ^135,542 as
revenue.
In 1886, 195 miles were open for traffic, realising ^148,994 as
revenue.
In 1887, 217^ miles were open for traffic, realising ^257,877
as revenue.
In 1888, zzoy2 miles were open for traffic, realising ,£347,982
as revenue.

l6o TRANSPORT WAGONS.
In 1889, 242 miles were open for traffic, realising £535,260 as
revenue.
In 1890, 282 miles were open for traffic, realising £606,713 as
revenue.
The ox-wagon is the supplement to the railway,
carrying away into the interior over many hundreds
of miles the goods brought by the railway. As an
illustration of the wagon power employed in this way,
it may be mentioned that 73,000 tons of goods left
the railway terminus in 1889, and 82,512 tons in
1 890, by ox- wagon for the gold fields and all parts of
the interior. As each wagon is drawn by a team of
16 oxen, and the average weight is about 3 tons, the
number of oxen employed to perform the service in
these two years was about 97,300 in 1889, and 1 10,016
in 1 890, assuming each wagon made four trips during
the season.
Coal. — There is coal of excellent quality and
illimitable quantity in Natal ; but it has until quite
recently been of little value owing to the distance of
the coal fields (about 250 miles) from the seaboard.
Now, however, the railways penetrate these fields ;
the railways themselves are entirely supplied from
them, and a considerable quantity is being supplied
to shipping at the Port at about 20/ per ton, the
Government having agreed to convey coal at a half
penny per ton per mile.
Staff. — The men employed in the responsible
working of the railways, such as stationmasters,
clerks, enginemen, firemen, guards, are nearly all of
European origin or descent ; but the porters, points
men, gatekeepers and labourers are Indian coolies,

RAILWAY EXTENSION. l6l
who have been specially imported into the country for
labour purposes, in consequence of the impossibility
of getting the Kafirs for continuous employment.
The Kafirs, however, are largely employed in gangs
in construction and similar works, and do excellent
service ; but they rarely stay in employment longer
than six or twelve months at a time, after which they
wish to go home to their kraals "to rest" for an
indefinite period.

EXTENSION OF THE RAILWAY TO THE TRANSVAAL.
We learn from the newspapers of Natal that the
railway was extended to the borders of the South
African Republic in the month of April last. The
President of the Republic, along with his Execu
tive and members of the Volksraad, were present at
the opening ceremony. President Kruger and His
Excellency Sir Charles Mitchell met at Charlestown
station, and there was on the part of both, as well as
on the part of the thousands assembled to witness the
ceremony, the utmost possible demonstration of
brotherhood, amity, and goodwill. All the speeches
made on the occasion, so far as we have read them,
seem to have been wisely conceived and admirably
expressed. The speeches of the President, of Sir Charles
Mitchell, and of the general manager, Mr. Hunter,
seem to us to have been particularly happy. The
banners displayed on the occasion by the people of
the Transvaal had such mottoes as this : — " Cead
mille failte," "A hundred thousand welcomes."

fi- — 3 ""* ^
=g
F~S _
CHAPTER XIII.
DUNIRA: RESTING AND RAMBLING.
HE dirty streets, the dust, the broil
ing heat and close atmosphere of
the city of Maritzburg made us
willing to leave it and go somewhere
else to enjoy our holiday and find
the conditions of recreation. Feel
ing somewhat as those who cannot
afford to be bored by the inanities of a fashionable
hotel and table d' hole chatter, who get bewildered
by the eccentricities of railway guides and the
brilliances of mere outward forms of existence, we
resolved to return to Durban, and thence to Zululand.
But while meditating upon certain possibilities, the
young laird of Dunira came to our rescue. He not
only cordially invited us, but sent a pair of horses to
convey us to his home, where the atmosphere is
usually very bracing, and where dust and dirty roads
are unknown.
Dunira is about four miles from the city of Maritz
burg. It is beautiful in respect of situation and
surroundings. The young laird of this beautiful
A WELL-TRAINED FAMILY. 1 63
country residence and farm of nearly seven hundred
acres went from Scotland to the Colony of Natal
about ten years ago, and has, by dint of scheming
head and skilful hand, become very successful. He
and his young wife entered the Colony as utter
strangers to the land and all its inhabitants, and are
now comparatively independent. God, whom they
humbly acknowledge in all their ways, hath not only
blessed them with a competent share of the good,
things of this life, but with as nice a family as we
have ever seen. The parents recognise God's good
ness to them by doing what they can to make their
children "meet for the Master's use" in their day,
and generation. Both father ancl mother are above
the average as disciplinarians. They know how to
be strict in order to be kind. Precept and example
go hand in hand. Punishment is never the outcome
of angry passion. No kind promises are made with
out fulfilment, and no threats are uttered without
execution. The children have thus come to believe
that what their parents say they mean. They are
not sweet in temper the one minute, and sour the
next, but are always in mood and manner the same.
This kind of training, it seems to us, is the basis of a
superior moral education.
On reaching the garden walk leading to their home,
the young lady, with her four children, met us, and
shouted, "Welcome! welcome!" This salutation
was uttered with such an amount of heart-feeling
and exuberance of generosity that we felt at a loss
for a minute how to respond. On entering the house
everything possible was provided for our comfort.

164 DIFFERENT KRAALS.
Outside, under the verandah, were couches and
chairs on which to recline or sit, as we felt disposed,
while above our heads, and right and left, were
suspended rich clusters of grapes. In the garden
immediately before us were various fruit-trees, and
almost all kinds of semi-tropical plants. On the other
side of the house, not far from the stable and other
outhouses, was a large Kafir kraal. We were
curious to see this strange-looking house, and so we
crawled in, duly guarding against the possibility of
an attack from mamba, a snake. The kraal had not
been occupied for some time, but it gave us a suffi
ciently correct idea of most of the kraals throughout
the country as to size and accommodation. The term
kraal is sometimes applied to one, and sometimes to
several small huts in the form of beehives. The
chief and his wives live in the two or three larger
huts. The smaller ones on the right of the entrance
are the "eelauw," or young unmarried men's huts,
while those on the left are the " eelauw," or huts of the
young unmarried women. Some kraals, the majority,
are round, as I have said, like beehives. "What
then," I asked, "do those square-shaped kraals
signify?" "Those square-shaped kraals mean that
their occupants have become Christians." That
shape of house is their Christian banner, or the first
indication the Kafir gives that he has forsaken the
religion of his fathers and become a Christian !
Killing a Snake. — Snakes of different kinds are
numerous throughout the Colony, and some of them
are as venomous as they are vicious. Few persons,
if any, will venture to walk in the fields or among

KILLING A SNAKE. 1 65
long grass without a whip or a stick. Some of the
reptiles are said to kill their prey, not by their teeth,
but by coiling round it, while others crush with their
teeth, or swallow it entire and living. The mamba
kind appear in three different colours, green, black,
and blue. The puff-adder, if suddenly overtaken, will
not scruple to leap up and send its deadly pOison-
fangs into any person from whom it cannot escape.
Having heard so much of these creatures, grass
snakes, puff-adders, water serpents, rattlesnakes, &c,
&c, we felt somewhat uneasy. Moreover, we were
told that our host had killed a large hissing-adder
the day before we arrived, and it was almost certain
that another one would be lurking about. This made
some of us still more uneasy. The following day, as
we were preparing to have a ramble through the
forest to the farm house, and thence to a neighbour
ing farm, we heard some shouting behind the
house, and on rushing out we found our hostess
doing her utmost to kill the companionless snake.
She was thoroughly in earnest, — that was visible at a
glance, — and so was the young Kafir. The brute had
coiled itself round a pot at the back-door, and the
lady came on it so suddenly that it had no time to
give its warning puff, while she, as might be expected,
could only scream. We all at once did our best to
make an end of the viper. Our excitement for a
few minutes could not have been more intense had
we been fighting with the Boers on the heights of
Majuba ! Who could blame our lady friends for
dreaming dreadfully the whole of that night that they
were killing snakes !

1 66 AN AGED KAFIR.
We were told that several persons die every year
from snake bites. We heard of a young Kafir who,
while watching his master's cattle, had been bitten
by a snake. The boy ran to his master as fast as he
could, crying, "Mamba, mamba," but before the
master could do anything to relieve him he was dead.
No doubt the boy's excitement and exertion in run
ning home had caused the poison to course through
his veins more rapidly than it would have done had
he remained still.
Almost all farmers and householders have provided
themselves with certain antidotes or cures for snake,
bites. But the most effectual cure, if victims were
strong enough in will and nerve powers to do it, is
to stop the circulation as far as possible, and cut out
or cut off the poisoned part.
Conversation with an aged Kafir. A wrong use of
Kafir words. — We paid a visit to a neighbouring
farm, and were very kindly received and entertained
by the farmer's wife and family. The farmer, with
his Kafir servants, were out on the harvest field, and
thither we went to see him. Among the Kafir ser
vants was a very old man, who stared at us as if he
had never seen a big white man before. The master
had to tell him who we were, that I was a minister
of the Gospel from the land beyond the sea, and that
I was this, that, and the other thing. The man
seemed to be so greatly impressed with what his
master had said to him that he was ready to lie down
at our feet with feelings of reverence. To show him
that we had not come from heaven, as he supposed,
we took a snuff, whereupon he held out both his hands,

THE KAFIR NOT AN ATHEIST. 1 67
as if beseeching us to give him some. "What does
the man mean ?" I said. "That," said Mr. Ellenor,
"is the usual Kafir way of taking a gift, however
small, or of whatever kind." " Does this old man
take snuff?" "Snuff! he would snuff a pound of
snuff every day if he could get it ! " I then asked the
old fellow to tell me what age he was. He could
only tell me that through Mr. Ellenor by referring to
some special event in history, or to the period of
some chiefs reign. The Kafirs seem to have no
ideas of time, space, or distance. They mark certain
things which happen, or which they expect to happen,
by means of notches on sticks. I tried to discover
from this old Kafir what his ideas of God, of sin, and
salvation by Jesus Christ were, if he had any. " O
yes. He believed in the Great Great ' Unkulun-
kulu.'" " You are now an old man," I said, " and soon
you must die." " O yes," he replied, " I am not very
well." "Your lungs are quite sound. yet," I contin
ued, at the same time striking hard upon my chest.
"Yes," he answered, striking hard upon his chest as
I had done, but with a good deal more energy. I
then began to tell the old man what he should do,
making the best use I could of the Kafir language.
He stood amazed, as if he did not know whether to
laugh or look serious. It seems I had used words
outrageously out of place, and my friends began
to laugh, and continued to laugh, so that we had to
leave the field. At intervals, all the way home, the
laughing continued. I was at length obliged seri
ously to ask them to tell me the meaning of the words
I had used, and on being informed I began to laugh

1 68 OUTRAGING THE KAFIR LANGUAGE.
myself, and do so still as I remember the scene.
The joke is too serious, if not absurd, to be recorded
here. Suffice to say, that it was of the nature of
those blunders which are sometimes committed by
some Englishmen when they try to speak the lan
guage of Paris, or such as the lowlander committed
when he commanded the stableman to put the saddle
upon the horse. The name of his satanic majesty
and the word for saddle in Gaelic are like each other
in sound. The lowlander, therefore, thought that he
might use the Gaelic word, and so he commanded
the man to put "the devil upon the horse!" One
day, as we returned home from a ramble in the city,
our Kafir boy saluted Mrs. C. by saying, " Please,
ma'm, will I cook the kettle ?"
Newspapers. — There is a considerable number and
variety of newspapers in both Colonies, and some of
them are fairly well conducted, while with others
there is room for improvement. Some of them
belong not only to the " Fourth Estate " in the order
of time but also in the order of philosophical power
and literary ability. Colonial statesmen are not likely
to take the keynote of their speeches or the inspira
tion of their opinions from some of their columns ;
nor are the people likely to be made fat by
them, or to be greatly improved in their moral and
mental nature by reading them. These papers, like
too many papers elsewhere, seem to exist merely for
the sake of the penny. Few, however, if any, are
hostile to religion or to its advocates. All priests
and presbyters, ministers and missionaries, seem to
lie beyond the scope of their vision, or are not

STRANGE LIQUOR LAWS. 1 69
regarded as legitimate objects of criticism. In vain
did we scan their pages for a lecture on any religious
topic or for an extract of a sermon, or for a short
paragraph bearing on anything even semi-religious.
In this they greatly resemble the English newspapers,
and are a contrast to those of America and Canada.
In grammar and style of composition, as well as in
bold and singular advertisements, they reminded us
of some newspapers we saw in the New West
World. During our leisure hours at Dunira, we culled
among other tit-bits, the following : —
"Mr. Labouchere had quoted a paragraph from one
of the Natal papers respecting a new liquor law for
the Colony, and the Natal press were startled out of
their propriety by his criticism of it. The truth of
the paragraph in Truth having being confirmed,
the critic returned to it, and declared, beyond all
doubt, that, 'While the sale of intoxicating liquor
to natives has been absolutely prohibited by Natal
law for 40 years, exemptions from the operation of
this law are officially granted to natives embracing
Christianity. Such nativesare distinguished by abadge,
and all such, together with their wives and families,
may purchase liquor in any quantities from both wine
and spirit merchants and canteen keepers.' ' It is a
pity,' says the critic, 'that Canon Isaac Taylor was
not aware of this beneficent provision when he con
trasted the operation of Islam in Africa with that of
Christianity. Is it founded on the idea that Christi
anity is a safeguard against intoxication ? If so, the
premises look a little inadequate to the conclusion.' "

170 CURIOUS ADVERTISEMENTS.
Literary Curiosities. — A Postal Announcement
Criticised. " Really Mr. Russell should send some one versed
in grammar round to the Post Office, the notices
posted there being rather wanting in that branch of
knowledge. The following notice was on the board
on Sunday : — ' The mail left Capetown, per fast
train, at 8 a.m. to-day (Friday), and will go forward
from Port Elizabeth on Sunday morning.' Go for
ward where ?"
In another paragraph headed, " A father kills his
daughter," the writer characterises the case as one of
"cruel fratricide." No doubt this is a "printer's
blunder !"
An old Colonist, and a wealthy, influential citizen
of Maritzburg, has written a pamphlet in which he
gives strangers some graphic glimpses of his experi
ences. We infer from his " Sundry Tit-Bits," and
from his own style of writing, that the schoolmaster
was from home in the early days of the Colony.
The following are specimens of advertisements : —
" H. Davies, pianoforte maker ; concertinas repaired
and saws sharpened." " Hair-cutting done and seed
potatoes sold here." "A. M  , bricklayer,
plasterer, and general jobber. N.B. — Dancing
parties attended." The Colonist's own style of put
ting things is at least graphic. Any attempt on our
part to improve upon his description of bad roads
would be to spoil it. After a kindly reference to the
Government for probably doing what they could with
the roads, he says : — " Just look at the extent of the
trunk roads and arteries throughout the Colony,

HARD EXPERIENCES. 171
which not only have to be kept in repair, such as it
is, but actually made out of the very limited supplies
from an annual revenue. Look here ! A trader (a
real one, not a swell chap with a long-tailed coat,
and nothing in his pocket), gets a good strong wagon
and a span of good strong oxen ; he buys judiciously
and loads up a good trading cargo, bids his friends
good-bye, and starts for the interior full of well-
founded expectations of a profitable trip. A few
days afterwards he is accidentally run against in
town again by a friend, — 'Ulloa!' says the friend,
' I thought you'd gone !' ' So I had,' says the trader,
' but was obliged to bring a wheel back to get
mended ; it got smashed going over them confounded
stones over the hill yonder. I expect to get it again
to-day, but that devil of a blacksmith is on the spree.
However, I hope I shall get it to-morrow.' (Dare
say he does, don't he wish he may get it.) The
following week the trader may be seen literally
' putting his shoulder to the wheel ' by helping to
carry it from town to his wagon. He starts again,
and gets on for two or three days in good style ; but
he comes to a soft-looking spot which makes him
scratch his head a bit, and look first on one side of
the road and then on the other for firmer ground,
but he doesn't meet with any, so he shouts cheeringly
to his cattle, cracks his whip, and pushes forward.
The wheels sink deeply, but he hopes to get through.
The oxen pull till they pant again, but the mire is too
heavy. After two or three more desperate tugs, which
seem to make the wagon creak all over, it becomes a
hopeless case. The wagon must be unloaded and dug

172 A TRADER IN A FIX.
out. He outspans accordingly. Too late that day
to do anything, so he lodges in the swamp. Next
day wet, cannot unload for fear of damaging the
goods ; passes another night in the swamp. Next
morning, fine weather, sends the Kafir for the oxen,
while all the other hands turn out the load. No oxen
appear. Towards sunset the Kafir returns, and
reports ' I bona inkaabi ' (can't find em). During
the night it rains hard — cargo suffers severely,
especially sugar, salt, and prints, which are not
warranted to wash. Kafir is sent out next morning,
and after a week's absence, returns with a note from
a poundmaster about 50 miles off, stating that the
cattle are in his pound, and politely requesting pay
ment of £2 19s. for pound fees, and £9 19s. for
damages to somebody's forage, and unless it is paid
forthwith they will be sold. Now here's a pretty
kettle of fish ? Where the dickens is he to raise a
sum like that in the wilderness ? But it must be done
somehow. So after a horrible quantity of blessings
on the heads of the roadmakers and poundmasters,
he sends to a friend in the town to pay the money
for him, promising to pay long chalks in the way of
interest on his return. In about another week the
oxen make their appearance, considerably worse for
their imprisonment. Inspanned again, the empty
wagon is at length hauled from the mud, cargo re
placed, and once again on 'trek.' His spirits begin
to revive as his wagon rolls merrily over the ground,
and apparently bids fair to make up for lost time.
But he comes to the river. A great portion of the
time he lost while stuck in the mud was very rainy,

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"THE WANT OF A BRIDGE." 1 73
and now the river is full. He looks anxiously at the
flood, but dares not venture to cross. He therefore
makes things as snug as possible, sends the oxen out
to graze, fills his pipe, and gets out his cracked
accordion to help while away the time. Day after
day he makes marks at the water's edge, that he may
know the next day whether the stream is rising or
falling. His stock of provisions gets less ; he hangs
out another week, and then has to pitch into his
cargo. His anxiety increases; his clothes seem to
hang about him like sacks, and, by Jingo, he begins
to look quite consumptive. But the clouds clear
away, the bright sun again shows his clear face, the
waters go down,' his oxen are once again in the yoke,
and he reaches the opposite shore — only having been
detained five weeks for the want of a bridge /"
Although facilities for general traffic or travelling
are now vastly superior to what they were for the
early settlers,' or what they were even twenty years
ago, the foads throughout the. country for transport
wagons are still very bad. The holes here and there
are deep -and dangerous. These are bad1 enough for
those who travel during the day time, but they must be
specially troublesome to transport wagons and riders
during/the night. After heavy thunder storms the
water flows down the roads like rivers in flood, and
no efforts seem to have been made to turn it into other
channels. The rivers of the Colony also become
dangerous to men and beasts, as they rise very
rapidly, and overflow their banks. Often men,
horses, and oxen have been drowned by attempting
to cross them. Two days before we crossed the
N

174 CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.
Buffalo river on our way to the Transvaal a span of
oxen was drowned in it.
While the Government railways have been a great
boon to the Colony, not only in respect of commercial
prosperity, but also in greatly removing the needs of
the people for transport traffic, and so reducing vari
ous forms of cruelty to animals, there is yet much to
be done in the interest of man and beast. The poor,
plodding ox, in addition to the severe whipping it
sometimes receives, and the other hardships imposed
upon it by heavy loads and long journeys — often until
it dies by the way from sheer fatigue and starvation —
we were frequently pained to witness was the victim
of little tormenting creatures called "ticks." These
tiny creatures fasten themselves about the head and
ears of the oxen and other animals, and suck their
blood until they swell like coffee berries, and then
drop off in death. But others come immediately and
do the same thing ; and thus the poor ox continues
more or less constantly in labour and in a state of
torment, until it dies or is killed by the butcher.
Reader, let me remind you of the Scripture injunc
tion, " Open thy mouth for the dumb."

CHAPTER XIV.

DUNIRA TO LADYSMITH.
E had completed the programme of
our rambles in Natal with our stay in
Maritzburg, where we had seen all
our friends and enjoyed their fellow
ship. We had no thought of visit
ing Dunira, nor had we any inten
tion of going so far inland and up-
and as Ladysmith. Our resting and rambling
at Dunira over, we were prepared to go as far as
Mashonaland, to see the recently discovered ruins
of the palace of the Queen of Sheba.
We learned in one of the newspapers that the Royal
Geographical Society, aided by a grant of money from
the funds of the British Association, had resolved to
send one of their most competent and successful ex
plorers in Greece and Asia Minor to verify the reports
which had been made regarding these extensive ruins,
and which are now regarded as the ruins of the
palace of the Queen of Sheba. These ruins were
known as occupied by the Moors in the early years
of the 1 6th century, and competent judges have
declared them to be of Phoenician origin. Mashona-

176 ENGINEERING SKILL.
land is believed to have been the country or sophira
from which King Solomon got his treasures of gold
and silver.
But however willing to go and see these interesting
ruins, neither the state of our health nor the time at
our disposal would permit of it. We therefore re
solved to comply with a pressing invitation we had
received to visit Ladysmith, especially as we could
more conveniently go that way to see the Transvaal
or the Boer country.
Ladysmith, on the Klip river, is said to be the
third most important town in the Colony of Natal.
For years prior to the railway extension to Newcastle*
the town was a lively commercial centre, it being the
railway terminus ; and transport traffic to the Free
State and the Transvaal gave it all the appearance
of a large, flourishing city. Since, then it has not
been quite so lively : still it lives and flourishes.
Our first glimpse of its general appearance reminded
us of Damascus, on the plain of Syria, with its
flowing river, its numerous trees and beautiful
gardens. The distance between Durban and Lady
smith is 190 miles, and it is nearly all up-hill.
As we climbed the hills and went round the sharp
curves between Maritzburg and Ladysmith, we again
thought of the man who had planned the railway.
We thought he should be canonized, if he is not so
already, after the order of first-class engineers ; and
we also thought that if the Turk found insuperable
difficulties in making a railway over the hills of Judea,
he should be told to send for this gentleman, and he
would surmount them.

MISSIONARIES.

177

The train by which we went could not be regarded
as an express one. It halted at every station by the
way, and the stations were neither few nor very far
between. We noticed such stations as Howick, a
pretty place, Springvale, Mooi River, Highlands,
Estcourt, and Colenso. At Estcourt we parted with
the Rev. Mr. Metcalf, superintendent of Wesleyan
missions, who had kindly furnished us with a good
deal of information regarding his work and how it is
carried on. He introduced us to two or three Ger
man missionaries there, who were on their way to
visit the natives at their kraals. One or two
priests of the Trappist Order were also there, on
their way to teach men how to crucify the flesh
with its affections and lusts, and how to give
their souls a chance of living, not by feasting, but by
fasting. At length we got to Ladysmith, and were soon at
rest in the home of Mr. John A. M'Laren, F.E.I.S.,
F.S.Sc, headmaster of the Ladysmith Government
School. Our relation to this young man forbids any length
ened remarks of a personal kind. Suffice to say that
we were pleased to find him at the head of such a
large and prosperous institution, the prosperity of
the school, according to the latest Government report
on education in the Colony, being largely due to his
eminent abilities as a teacher and his indefatigable
efforts in the interests of education generally. From
the record of his early training and career in connec
tion with the Alloa Academy in central Scotland we
were prepared to learn this much.

178 PLACES OF INTEREST.
The following day (Saturday) we sauntered along
the streets and rambled here and there about the
town, our young friend pointing out the various
places of interest. Among these may be mentioned
the Laager, a kind of castle-keep erected at the time
of the recent wars with the Zulus and Boers. In the
event of immediate danger, the people who could
not defend themselves, mostly women and children,
were to receive orders from the " powers that be " to
enter the Laager when a certain signal was given ;
and there they would be supplied with bread and
water, or with the bare necessaries of life, while the
war lasted. Fortunately these extreme measures
were never required. But there the Laager stands,
as a memorial of troublous times. It looked to us like
an ordinary prison, or a large square house without
windows, only narrow crevices to admit of sufficient
light and currents of air. It might be large enough
to accommodate from three to four hundred persons.
The one at Maritzburg was capable of accommodating
about 4000 persons.
The Chief Constable, a Mr. M 'Donald, a native
of Stirling or its immediate neighbourhood, kindly
showed us the New Town Hall and Court-house,
and was otherwise obliging. We visited the Ceme
tery, a beautiful place on the banks of the Klip river.
It is fairly well kept, but the river threatens to under
mine some parts of it.
This was a place of sadness for some of the friends
who accompanied us. One at least might be ready
to express her sadness in the words of the well-
known song : —

A REASON FOR FOND HOPE. 1 79
" Our bonnie bairn's there, John ;
She was baith guid and fair, John ;
And, oh ! we grudged her sair
To the land o' the leal."
Both parents might feel quite sure that their little
one was " not lost, but gone before," that it had been
" transplanted from earth and the evils to come," and
yet, as in the case of thousands, might not be able
to give a reason for the fond hope.
We tried to recite the words of the epitaph : —
" Bold infidelity, turn pale and die,
Beneath this stone four infants' ashes lie,
Say, are they lost or saved ?
If death's by sin, they have sinned, for they lie here ;
If heaven's by works ; in heaven they can't appear.
Ah reason, how depraved !
They died, for Adam sinned; they live, for Jesus died."
There are several places of worship in Ladysmith.
The Dutch people have a place of meeting, but as
they are comparatively few in number in the town,
and' are widely scattered in the country, they only
meet in the church for worship occasionally. The
South African Church, or Episcopalians, have also a
place of worship, but whether the worshippers are
high or low, broad or narrow, or evangelical in their
doctrines and forms of worship, we failed to find out.
The Wesleyans have also a chapel, but it has proved
too small, and they were building a larger one when
we were there. The Congregationalists also have a
good church and a strong and flourishing congrega
tion. The Rev. Mr. Thompson is a good man and
an excellent pastor, but not very robust.

l80 A GOOD STORY.
It had been arranged before we reached Lady
smith that I should be asked to preach in the Con
gregational Chapel and re-deliver the sermon I had
given in Maritzburg. I was not quite prepared for
this, but when I saw Mr. Thompson on the Saturday
afternoon* and learned that he had not been very well
for some time, I resolved to carry out the arrange
ment. At the close of the forenoon service Mt\
Thompson, in making some intimations, made a state
ment which only an " Aberdonian" could have made
to secure the full " pound of flesh," and by which I
could not well refuse to preach again in the evening.
I realised the difficulty of the situation for myself,
only when it was too late.
By that difficulty I was reminded of a good story
that is told of the late Dr. Robertson of Irvine. Dr.
Robertson when a young man had been preaching at
some place in the Kingdom of Fife, and had preached
so well, in the opinion of some who heard him, that he
was requested to preach again the following Sabbath.
The Doctor said " No." " Why ?" said one, who
was intimate with him, "you're surely very soon
tired of us and this place." " Far from that," was
the reply ; " but, man, I've no more prayers left."
" No more prayers !" said his friend ; " I know you've
three, and you've only held forth twice." " I know
that," said Robertson, "but I've used up the third in
blessings." This story is not intended to be seriously
pondered by readers of uncircumcised hearts.
My difficulty in relation to the evening service was
not the want of prayers, but the want of a suitable
sermon. In the interval I did my best to turn over

AN IMPORTANT QUESTION. l8l
the leaves of memory, if not the proverbial " barrel,"
in the hope of finding an address that might be
pleasing to God and profitable to man, but I found
none. In this state of mental uncertainty, and relying
wholly on the promised help of the Holy Spirit, I
went to the pulpit and preached from the words
of our Lord to Simon Peter : " Lovest thou Me
more than these?" (John xxi. 15). The line of
thought and the words of the address were sufficiently
impressed upon my mind, in the circumstances, that
I can easily recall them ; and believing that the
address may be of use to some of those who heard it,
I take the liberty of printing it : —
We are seldom if ever deceived or disappointed
with the forces of nature. We expect the sun to
rise and set, the moon to wax and wane, and the tides
to ebb and flow at certain times, and we are never
disappointed. We never expect the forces of nature to do in the
month of January what they do in the month of
June. The life-tide that is dominant in the kingdom
of nature in the month of April creates certain
aspects of the garden and of the fields, which we do
not expect to see in the month of October. It is
only when we turn to consider and deal with man
that we are disappointed. We should think it strange
if a loving father felt compelled to ask his child seri
ously, Do you love me ? Think of a wife putting
such a question to her husband, or a husband to his
wife. There must have been something far wrong
in Simon Peter, when Jesus found it necessary to

1 82 Shakespeare's opinion applied.
put this question to him: "Lovest thou Me more
than these?"
Of the man who has no love to God, no love to
Jesus Christ, we may say what Shakespeare has said
of the man who has no music in his soul : — ¦
" The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils ;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus :
Let no such man be trusted."
One much greater than Shakespeare has said, " It
a man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be
Anathema Maran-atha" (i Cor. xvi. 22). The
author of Ecce Homo is right in affirming that Jesus
claims the love of the heart as a primary condition
of discipleship.
Jesus did not mean that His people should be all
alike in their gifts and graces. There are diversities
of gifts, as there are degrees of attainment.
No two trees in the forest, and no two flowers of the
garden, are exactly alike. It was not intended that
the Church should be a thing of dull monotony or 01
dead uniformity, but rather that she should be as the
flower garden, where all flowers grow up under the
same sun and are watered by the same showers, each
flower manifesting its own beauty and emitting its
own special fragrance.
We can see that this was intended by Jesus by
His choice of different natural characters in His
early disciples.

DIFFERENT CHARACTERS. 183
Thomas, among the early disciples, may be regarded
as representing the more intellectual men of the
Church ; Philip those who are specially prone to be
always learning and never able to come to the know
ledge of the truth ; Judas may represent the tares
among the wheat ; John may represent those of an
amiable disposition;' Jude may represent those who
are prone to be generous without being just. It
was Jude who put this question : " Lord, how is it
that Thou wilt manifest Thyself unto us and not unto
the world ?" Men who fail to understand the limi
tations of Divine favour should ponder the Lord's
answer. There is something of the nature of law in
the words " Grace for grace," or love for love, as
there is in the words, measure for measure. Peter
may represent those in Christ's kingdom who are
naturally impulsive, who are given to speak and act
irrespective of consequences.
There was a wonderful variety of capacity, natural
disposition and temperament among the early disciples,
and we .cannot doubt that this was intended to be a
characteristic of the Church in all ages. But behind
the variety, there was also intended to be in all ages
essential unity. The root principle of that unity is
love to Christ. Without a lOvihg heart towards
Jesus Christ there can be no true service, no keep
ing of His commandments. What cares a parent
for the best gift that his child can offer if the child
withholds the love of his heart ?
Before Peter could be a true co-worker with God,
before he could care for the lambs of the Chief
Shepherd or feed His sheep, he had to be examined

184 "MORE THAN THESE."
on the principle of love to Christ. He had to learn
that natural affection is not Christian love, that animal
passion is not moral principle, and that ebullitions of
feeling are not faith.
But why, it may be asked, should Peter be thus
questioned, and not John ? This will appear if we
consider (1) Peter's fall, or his thrice denial, (2)
Peter's repentance, or his going out and weeping
bitterly, and (3) Peter's restoration. Having enlarged
on these different points, we applied the question.
The question, " Lovest thou Me more than
these ?" comes to us all. It comes to men like the
young ruler who had "great possessions," and to such
as may be ready to give their goods to feed the poor or
become martyrs. It comes also to fathers and mothers
in presence of their children : as if the Lord said,
Father, mother, I know that you love these children,
that you are ready to sacrifice much for their sake ;
but My question is, " Lovest thou Me more than
these ?" " He that loveth father or mother, wife or
child, more than Me, is not worthy of Me." The
question comes also to those of a doubting disposi
tion. Some professing Christians may be regarded
as animated with the spirit of those who hung their
harps upon the willows by Babel's streams, or as
those who go mourning all their days, saying at
times, — " 'Tis a point I long to know,
Oft it causes anxious thought ;
Do I love the Lord or no,
Am I His, or am I not?"
Does a dutiful son or daughter, husband or wife,

WELL-TAUGHT CHILDREN. 1 85
father or mother, continue to doubt in this way ?
Does the mother doubt the love of her son, or would
a son hesitate to acknowledge his love to his mother ?
Surely not. But how does any son know that he
loves his mother ? Every true son finds the witness
of this in his heart, and will not be ashamed to own
it if need be. Jesus, the oldest and best Friend of us
all, demands this personal and public acknowledg
ment from every one of us. "If ye love Me," said
Jesus, " keep My commandments." And again He
says, " He that keepeth My commandments, he it is
that loveth Me."

AN EXAMINATION.
One day in the course of the week we were invited
to be present at an examination of the children
attending the Government Schools, and at the close of
the proceedings had the privilege of addressing the
scholars. We felt constrained to admit that nowhere
during the period of our connection with School
Boards had we seen clearer evidence of better teach
ing, or better discipline, than we had seen that day
in the Ladysmith Government School.
The understanding, or natural intelligence, of the
children had evidently been developed by exercise,
and not merely supplied with an array of facts and
figures. The children had been taught, not as parrots,
but as rational creatures, each one with a latent per
sonality. The drilling powers of our young friend
seemed to be admirable. If ever these young lads
whom he drilled are called into action in defence of

1 86 • WATER WORKS.
their homes and country, they are almost certain hot
to fail under the orders of an intelligent commander.
We were pleased to meet with another M 'Donald
in Ladysmith, and one who has not altogether for
gotten the use of his mother tongue. This M 'Donald
is one of the many Scotsmen in the Colony who have
been neither lame nor lazy, and so has prospered.
He was pleased to give us a few mementoes of our
visit to Ladysmith, and as an earnest of the hope
that the clans M 'Donald and Campbell will study
war no more !
We felt that the drinking water of the town was
not what it ought to be ; but since we were there steps
have been taken to remedy this. From a newspaper
dated March 7, 1891, we learn that "The Ladysmith
Local Board have invited tenders for the execution of
the works necessary for the construction of a system
of water works for the township." When this is
carried out Ladysmith will be a very desirable place
of residence.

CHAPTER XV.

LADYSMITH TO NEWCASTLE.
E thought we were high enough up
in the Highlands of Natal at Lady
smith, but when we reached New
castle we were much nearer the
moon. Ladysmith is about 3,300
feet above the sea level, and. New
castle is about 4,000 feet. On one of
the heights above Newcastle we seemed to be on a
level with the Drakensberg mountains, which on the
west and north-west separate Natal from the Trans
vaal and Basutoland. From Ladysmith to New
castle, gardens, orchards, and semi-tropical plants
became less and less visible : the land seemed to be
less fertile, and pasture land, or sheep farms, were
more common. Here and there, on both sides of the
railway track, we could see what seemed to have been
forts at one time, but are now cattle kraals. Farm
houses, hamlets, and Kafir kraals dotted the landscape,
indicating a somewhat numerous and mixed popula
tion. In the neighbourhood of Dundee, a town about
100 feet higher than Newcastle, coal mines abound.
Although the train by which we travelled was
called the " mail train," it halted as usual at every

1 88 KAFIR DRESS.
station, and gave us sufficient time to go out of the
carriage and have strolls to Kafir kraals and coal
mines. At one of the stations the station-master
came forward and said, " How are you, Dr. Camp
bell ?" I failed to recognise him, until he told me
that his name was Duncan, and that his uncle and
family were at one time connected with my church in
Stirling. We were pleased to see Mr. Duncan, and
also his wife, a daughter of Mr. Stubbs, gamekeeper
on Keir Estate, Bridge of Allan.
At " Glencoe Junction " we felt constrained to
leave our carriage and look round about for a host of
M 'Donalds in their native attire, but none were
visible. The word " Glencoe " sounded strangely
in our ears in South Africa. Kafir men and women
in a state of nudity were numerous at this station.
It must not be supposed that these scantily-clothed
Kafir men and women are wholly destitute of shame,
or that their lack of raiment is necessarily a sign of
a lower state of morality than exists generally among
certain classes of Europeans. They are not without
shame, but they are not conscious of it until it may be
suggested to them by some one better clothed. Their
clothing is quite in keeping with their conditions of
climate, and is in harmony with the highest and
purest thoughts of the people among whom they
live. Europeans soon become indifferent to the Kafir
dress. Daily among the natives, their sense of pro
priety is in no way offended, as it would be by the
same style of dress and habits of living at home.
The situation of Glencoe Junction is somewhat
bleaky, and the hills in the neighbourhood had a

OLD FRIENDS. 1 89
somewhat barren appearance. The railway track
being here and there unfenced, the cattle grazing
on the hills and plains sometimes stray upon it
and are killed. We saw a very fine-looking bullock
lying dead by the side of the track.
As we approached Newcastle, our young friend,
James, the guard of the mail train, pointed out vari
ous spots of interest to. us in connection with the
recent war between the Boers and the British.
"Yonder," he said, pointing to a flat mountain
summit some 12 miles away, "is Amajuba; yonder,
to the right, is Lang's Nek ; yonder, to the left, at a
considerable distance, is Umquelah ; down on the
plain is the site, of the camp, and that house, without
a roof, was the hospital." " Thank you, James ; we
must go and see these places," and we did so. We will
speak of these more definitely in another chapter.
Newcastle. — On reaching Newcastle we were
kindly received and entertained by Mr. Littlejohn
and his good lady. Mr. Littlejohn, the station agent
and district superintendent, is no stranger to the
"City of the Rock," where his brother still resides.
Mr. Ramage soon made his appearance, like a Saul
among the people, and cordially welcomed us. We
had known Mr. Ramage at Stirling station,' and were
glad to meet him at Newcastle, holding a higher
and, if possible, a more responsible situation.
Newcastle is comparatively a small town. It
derives its name, not, it is said, from its extensive
coal mines, but from the Duke of Newcastle, who
was Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1852 and

190 NEWCASTLE PUBLIC SCHOOL.
also in 1859. Although the houses are not as yet
very numerous, and some of them not very palatial
in appearance, they are on the whole substantial and
sufficiently comfortable. The majority of the in
habitants are supported by the wool trade, or by
their connection with the railway, and the traffic
carried on between the railway and various parts of
the neighbouring Republics.
We visited the Government School, a large and
substantial structure at the extreme end of the town,
and were kindly received by Mr. M'Bean, the head
master. Mr. M'Bean took us to the various class
rooms, and we were gratified to find every one of
them well filled with bright, intelligent-looking
children. The school, though large, seemed to be
somewhat too small for the number of pupils present.
We found a large class of boys and girls outside the
building, sheltered from the sun's rays by a piece of
canvas. Mr. M'Bean seemed to us to be an excellent
teacher and a good disciplinarian.
We were sorry to learn here, as elsewhere, that
the religious teaching was not what it should be.
The children got Bible lessons, but no Catechism or
memory work of any kind, and were not examined
at the close of the session according to the rule of
"use and wont." Neither Mr. M'Bean nor the
other head-masters of the Government Schools can
be regarded as in any way responsible for this state
of things ; but we would venture to express the
hope that religious instruction may soon receive a
more prominent place in the work of the schools.
It is necessary, in the interests Of the children and of

A DESIRABLE RESIDENCE. 191
the Colony, that a remedy should be devised and
carried into effect without delay. A mere secular
system of education in our national schools betrays a
short-sighted and suicidal policy. Roman Catholics
and Episcopalians know this.
Newcastle, we think, is likely to become a large and
prosperous city, and when better known, will be
attractive to people living on the coast. The heat
during the summer months is less oppressive than
anywhere else in Natal. Its mountainous neighbour
hood may render the climate less bracing during
winter, but in summer more healthy and invigor
ating. Were we called upon to live in Natal, we
would prefer Newcastle as a place of residence to
any other town or city we had visited in the Colony.
Newcastle railway station is second to no other in
Natal for order, comfort, and salubrity, and its "Plough
Hotel " can supply the tourist with almost everything
from a needle to an anchor. The proprietor assured us
that he could furnish us with everything of the nature
of refreshments ; yes, but give him time, and could give
us a conveyance to take us to the Transvaal in royal
fashion, if we so desired it! Our young friend of Lady
smith had evidently resolved to do us all the honour
in his power in connection with the journey to the
Transvaal, and so ordered a suitable carriage with four
horses to be in readiness for us at a certain hour. Be
fore we attempt to describe the journey to the Trans
vaal, and what we saw there when we went, we feel
constrained to relate to the reader what we learned
regarding it, or the history of the Boers in relation
to it, till the terrible disaster of Amajuba in 1881.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE TRANSYAAL.
HE Transvaal, or the South African
Republic, or the land of the Boers, is
supposed to be one of the richest
mineral countries in the world. On
the south it joins the territory of the
Free State and the Colony of Natal ;
j on the north it is bounded by Mata-
aeleland, on the east by Zululand, Gaza Country, and
Swaziland, and on the west by Bechuanaland. From
south to north extremes the distance is about 400
miles, and between the extremes south and east the
distance is about 700 miles. It is about 50 miles
from Delagoa Bay, 540 miles from Port Elizabeth,
300 miles from Durban, and 700 miles from Cape
Town. The area of the Transvaal is said to com
prise 120,000 square miles. It is six times the size
of the Colony of Natal, three times the size of the
Orange Free State, about one half the size of Cape
Colony, and nearly as large as the whole of Great
Britain and Ireland. These ascertained facts as to
the size of the South African Republic, its great
mineral wealth, and, it may be added, its salubrious

WHO ARE THE BOERS? 1 93
atmosphere, have made it a "goodly land," a land,
in the opinion of many, worth fighting for.
This land is called the country of the Boers. But
who are the Boers ? The Boers are supposed to be
wholly Dutch people and Dutch farmers. The word
Dutch as designating the people is not strictly cor
rect, for they are largely mixed with the French
people who fled from France to Holland on the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. At that
period Van der Stell was governor at the Cape, and
he made request to the home Government to send
out men who would settle in the country and culti
vate the soil. In 1688 and 1689, a hundred and fifty
persons, mostly Huguenots, arrived in Cape Colony,
and on arrival came under obligations to serve by
the rules and regulations of the Dutch East India
Company, but these laws they found to be so oppres
sive that they resolved to seek refuge from their sway
in the wilderness. Many of the older settlers in
Cape Colony had already resisted these laws and
gone a trekking, that is, a wandering from place to
place in the wilderness, seeking food and shelter
where they could find them.
The Huguenot refugees, shortly after their arrival
from Holland, followed the example of these early
Hollanders. Both parties united and became mixed
in families. But even the original settlers, who had
left Cape Town and neighbourhood, were not all
Dutch. According to Sir Benjamin Pine, of Natal,
they included Germans, Poles, and Portuguese. The
Dutch, however, may have been the dominant
party, and this accounts for the fact that the Dutch

194 T0 WHOM DOES THE LAND BELONG?
language gradually became the language of the
Boers, or Dutch farmers of the Transvaal.
But now the question arises : —
WHAT RIGHT HAD, OR HAVE THE BOERS TO THE
TRANSVAAL ?
Must we in answering this question fall back on the
old aphorism and say, "Might is right?" or can
right in any case be determined by possession ?
If a man is overtaken on the highway or anywhere
else, and is robbed of his watch, can the robber be
regarded as the rightful owner of the watch in all
time coming ?
If a large company of pirates should overtake a
well-laden ship at sea, kill the captain and all the
people on board, and so take possession of the ship,
could these pirates be regarded as the rightful
owners of the ship and all in it ?
If a ship laden with emigrants should be wrecked
on the coast of some island, and were the emigrants
fortunate enough to escape with their lives and take
possession of the island, would their possession of it
entitle them to be regarded as the rightful owners ?
Perhaps the next day or the following week they
might be surrounded by naked savages threatening
to kill them if they did not leave their island. What
in that case could the poor emigrants do ? They
might try and show them that they had as good a right
to the island as they, the natives, had, or they might
feel compelled to fight for their lives, or, if not, at
least to plead for mercy. But to whom in any case
did the island really belong ? Did the mere posses-

EARLY OCCUPANTS OF THE TRANSVAAL. 1 95
sion of it by the savages constitute their exclusive
right to it ? We are decidedly of opinion that it did
not. No island or land can belong to a people,
savage or civilised, who fail to occupy it and bring
forth the fruits of it. We base this opinion upon the
principle of the original charter given to man in
the garden of Eden. As "The earth is the Lord's
and the fulness thereof," and as He gave the earth
to man for occupation and use, it follows that man
must either fulfil this charter or forfeit his right to
live upon the earth. God made man to work, and if
he does not work neither should he eat. God gave
the land of Canaan to the Hebrews by promise,
and in the course of years He adopted the means
which were necessary to have the promise fulfilled.
In fulfilling the promise, the Hebrews were com
manded to drive out the indolent and useless tribes
which had settled upon it. These tribes might have
rights, but not to the land which they neither
occupied nor used with advantage to themselves or
others. As well might we speak of the rights of
cattle to the grass parks or to hills upon which they
browse and crop the grass.
Let us see how far all this applies to the people of
the South African Republic.
We know not who the first occupants of the Trans
vaal were. We know not exactly who the Kafirs are,
although it is generally believed that they belong to
the race of Ishmael. There is little room to doubt
that they came southwards from the ancient land of
Ham, and that as they trekked or pushed their way
southwards they would expel or exterminate the

196 IS "might" "right?"
tribes who might be in different parts of the land
before them. And when they reached those parts
now called Bechuanaland, Transvaal, and Natal,
they might exercise their exterminating powers on
the tribes living there, as these tribes had done to
other tribes, and the other tribes to previous tribes,
and so on. But did their superior exterminating
power in any case give them a right or title to the
Transvaal, Natal, or Zululand ? If it did, it follows
that "might is right." It follows that any man or
company of men who can conquer, murder, and rob
another man or company of men less numerous and
strong are entitled to be regarded as the rightful
owners of whatever they may have robbed. We are
not prepared to accept this conclusion with respect to
personal property, even though a man, or company of
men, may not be able to produce documentary evi
dence or any direct proof that what had been taken
from them was legally and rightly their own. The
Hottentots, the aborigines of Cape Colony, the
Kafirs and Zulus of the Transvaal and Natal might
have nothing to show that they had lawfully come into
possession of the land, and yet be able to say to all new
comers, "We have at least as good a right to these
lands as you can have." Yes ; provided they occu
pied these lands and made a proper use of them. At
the very least they would have the right to inhabit
them, and perhaps also the right of selecting the best
parts of them. But if they allowed fertile soil to lie
fallow from year to year, while thousands of men
were starving for the bread that these fertile acres
would yield ; and if they were indifferent to the mines

NEGOTIATING WITH DINGAAN. 1 97
of gold and silver, and other precious metals, which
lay buried beneath the soil, their right in that case
would be null and void.
As a matter of fact, the natives of Kafirdom,
Transvaal, Natal, and Zululand, whoever they may
have been, did not cultivate the soil of these lands
and enrich themselves and the world with their
mineral wealth. In the days of the Umtetwa chiefs,
as well as in those of Tyaka, Umpande, Dingaan,
and Cetewayo, the so-called natives were mere
squatters, who had taken the right of the land by
superior force, and did nothing to it to justify their
existence or claims to possess it in all time coming.
They simply lived upon the land, not to plough, and
sow, and reap, not to fence the fields, cut down the
timber and work it, but very much after the fashion
of the wild beasts.
It was not in this way that the Boers took posses
sion of the Transvaal. In the course of trekking
they came upon a land beyond the Vaal river, which
was neglected, unused, unimproved, and they sent
messengers to the king who reigned over the people
and said to him, "We desire to possess portions of
this land, and are willing to pay you for them."
They did not go by force of arms or armies and
compel him to sell them the land or take the land
from him. They simply did what seems to us to
have been right and reasonable in the circumstances.
When the trekking Dutch sent their chief man,
Pieter Retief, to King Dingaan in 1838 asking him
to grant them land, they acted in a straightforward
way, and had no ulterior object in view. The king,

198 DINGAAN's CRUEL TREACHERY.
Dingaan, was quite willing to cede the land wanted
on condition that they would get Sigomzela to give
him back the cattle which he had stolen. This was
done, and the land was ceded. When the treaty was
signed and safely in the pocket of the leading Dutch
man, Dingaan acted the part of a Judas by inviting
the Boers to a feast, and then giving orders to have
them killed, Bulalani abatakati. After killing these
Boers and throwing their bodies into a heap, some
12,000 of Dingaan's men went off to slay all they
could find of the Boers and their families in Natal.
The Boers resolved to take revenge on Dingaan for
these acts of treachery and cruelty. They raised an
army and went forth to meet his army at what is now
known as the Blood river, and there they fought in
the name of " the God of battles " and conquered the
savages. In the month of June the following year,
Dingaan returned from his hiding-place and sought
to make a treaty of peace with the Boers, offering
them, as we have already stated, as an evidence of
his sincerity, 40,000 head of oxen, but they declined
to have anything more to do with him. Regarding
him as totally unreliable, they resolved to exalt
Umpande as king. Over this another battle had to
be fought, and in this battle Dingaan was defeated.
Under Umpande, the Boers entered upon their in
heritance in the Transvaal, the inheritance of land
which had been agreed to in the treaty between
Dingaan and the leaders of the Dutch deputation.
The reader must now judge whether or not the
Boers have a right to possess the land of the Trans
vaal.

AN APPEAL TO REASON. I 99
We think they have as good a claim to the Trans
vaal as the circumstances would permit. What
better claim could the British or any other nation
have in the circumstances ? We agree with Mr.
Froude in believing that the Boers had good grounds
of complaint against the British Government for
interfering with their claims in the Transvaal. The
Boers declared, not without a show of reason, that
the Diamond Fields belonged to them, and not to a
native chief. The Boers alleged that the British
coveted these fields for their own use, and that the
Zulus had been supplied by the British with the fire
arms which they had used under Cetewayo. This
may or may not be true ; we failed to verify it ; but if
it be true to the extent of the proverbial water where
the ox is drowned, we do not wonder that the results
of the interference were so disastrous. Sir Bartle
Frere complained that the " Boers would not listen
to reason, nor settle down to work." No, not likely,
if the Boers believed in their heart that a political
policy had been adopted by the British Government
which had for its object their enforced removal from
place and power in the Transvaal.
We are not to do evil that good may come. The
ruling principle of this country is not our own self-
interest, but that of doing justly and loving mercy.

CHAPTER XVII.
OUR JOURNEY TO THE TRANSYAAL.
HE railway officials, Messrs. Little
john and Ramage, were willing
to send us to the Transvaal by means
of a special train, but the movements
of the "ballast trains" engaged in
the extension of the railway to
Charlestown rendered their generous
offer too hazardous, if not impossible. We were thus
obliged to avail ourselves of the offer of our young
friend, and go by means of a "coach and four." At
a certain hour of the day four spirited young horses
were yoked to a conveyance which a strong
man might lift on his back and run away with.
Some one called it a "spider." To us it had more
the appearance of a toy-machine for boys and girls,
rather than of a carriage sufficiently strong to carry
four men over a rough country road to the Transvaal-
However, we got up to the front seat on the left of
the driver, while our two learned friends got up
behind. No sooner had the driver taken his seat
and cracked his long whip than the horses set off at
a gallop. We had to cross an open space of ground
about a mile in length till we reached the bridge that

A JEHU DRIVE. 201
spans the river Incandu, and only there, by the full
strength of both my arms, were the horses pulled up.
Jehu, we feel sure, never crossed the Plain of Jezreel
at such a furious rate of speed as we that day, in our
spider-chariot, crossed the field between the Plough
Hotel of Newcasde and the bridge of Incandu. The
ground was anything but level or smooth. It was
full of holes, filled with water, and it was covered
with boulder-stones, hillocks, and ant-hills. During
the first five minutes or so, we were in a somewhat
hilarious mood, but when I saw the driver handing
back his whip to Mr. M'B., and then, as in a state of
despair, heard him calling upon me to help him, we
began to feel that matters were too serious to be
laughed at. I at once took hold of the reins,
and, with a gentle, steady, but very decided pull,
brought the fiery steeds to a more reasonable rate
of speed. We then took breath, and, by a natural
process of reaction, laughed right heartily. I looked
at the driver, as much as to say, "You're a queer
driver. Why did you allow the horses to run off
that way ?" He began to tell us that they were
young beasts, and had not been in the yoke for weeks
before. He assured us that he was not an incom
petent driver, that he. had • driven the "mail coach"
for many years, that he had charge of horses during
the recent wars in the Transvaal and Zululand ; in
short, according to his showing, he was the best
driver in the Colony !
"My word," said one, "and that was a drive!
Did you ever experience the like of it?" The mud
from the wheels and from the gutters rose several

202 A BOAT OF BEER BARRELS.
feet above our heads, and bespattered the carriage
and our clothes all over. It was well that we had
no intention of going to the Volksraad, or of having
an audience with the venerable President of the
South African Republic. Nevertheless, our journey
to the Transvaal, while a little threatening, not to
say grand, and withal a little comical to begin with,
turned out to be one of the most pleasant of our ex
periences in Natal. We accomplished the journey
to the Buffalo river in less than ninety minutes. We
halted at the Dutchman's Inn or store near the river,
and shortly after proceeded to cross it in a boat con
structed of beer barrels and a few planks.

THE BOAT OF BEER BARRELS ON THE BUFFALO.
We had seen many different kinds of boats in our
day, on the Tay and on the Tiber, on the Nile and
on the Jordan, but this boat of beer barrels was alto
gether the queerest, the most primitive thing we had
ever seen. Looking at the broad, deep and strong
current of the river, and then at the rickety character
of the boat, it seemed to be a daring contrivance,
and quite insufficient for the purpose. Three barrels
on one side and three on the other, end to end
and side to side, forming a kind of square, on the top
of which was placed the frame of an old cart, bound
together with pieces of rope, constituted the boat. We
lay down upon the bank of the river for a few minutes,
wondering whether we should risk ourselves in
such a frail thing, and while thus waiting, we beheld

A COSTLY FERRY. 203
a gentleman driving four horses in a carriage in the
direction of the ferry. When we saw the safe and
expeditious way in which he crossed with all his be
longings, we had sufficient evidence that the tag-rag-
looking thing was quite sufficient for our purpose,
and so we entered it. Five Dutchmen on the Natal
side of the river, and nine Zulus and Kafirs on the
Transvaal side, guided and pulled the beer-barrel
boat across, and thus we were safely landed in the
Transvaal territory. Each of these men, the Dutch
men on the one side, fairly well dressed, and the
Kafirs and Zulus on the other side, quite naked, had
to be paid at the rate of one shilling each. That
was the Dutchman's charge for the labour of ten
minutes.

THE BATTLE OF AMAJUBA, AND WHAT LED TO IT.
Under the guidance of our friends, who had studied
the geography of the Transvaal, especially those
parts connected with the recent war, we were en
abled, in the immediate neighbourhood of Amajuba
Hill, to understand the movements of the Boers and
of the British on the morning of the 27th February,
1881. We have already referred to the circumstances
connected with the entrance of the Boers into the
Transvaal in 1838, and how they came to be the
owners of the land. The independence of the Boer
Republic was duly acknowledged by the British in
1852, and in 1853, it was designated the "South
African Republic," the name it still bears. In 1877,

204 AN INJUDICIOUS REMARK.
the British Government resolved to change its opinion
and relationship to this Republic. Sir Theophilus
Shepstone was commanded to have it annexed and
proclaimed as British territory, and this gave great
offence to the Boers ; so, after three years' medita
tion on the subject, they resolved to fight the British
for their independence. The small cloud, the presage
of the war storm, thus began in 1877, and it continued
to grow larger and larger,, until it gave vent to its
fury in the disaster of Amajuba in 1881.
Deputation after deputation of the leading Boers
went to London, in the hope of getting matters
adjusted, but the British Government gave them
the cold shoulder. At length, when Sir Garnet
Wolseley, now Lord Wolseley, was sent as High
Commissioner to deal with the Zulus, he pro
ceeded to deal also with the Boers in the Trans
vaal. After reasoning with them for a time, he
gave utterance to the following words : "So long
as the sun shone in the heavens, so long would the
Transvaal be British territory." These words gave
still greater offence. The Boers listened, and said
but little. The leaders called a great meeting of
their people, and at that meeting they unanimously
resolved to fight for their former independence. The
country was immediately proclaimed as in a state of
siege and under the conditions of martial law. On
the 1 6th of December, 1880, the Republican flag was
hoisted, and all persons in the Transvaal who claimed
the protection of the British flag were in danger, and
hastened out of the country. On the 7th day of
February, 1881, the postman and his bodyguard, on

ON AMAJUBA HILL. 205
their way to Newcastle, were fired upon by some
Boers in the neighbourhood of Ingogo, and forced to
return to a place of shelter at Mount Prospect.
This may be said to have been the beginning of
practical hostilities. It led to a serious engagement
on the heights of Ingogo, in which the British were
defeated. A more serious disaster was soon to follow.
Early on a Sabbath morning in the month of Feb
ruary, 1 88 1, the British army, under command of
General Sir George Colley, the Lieutenant-Governor
and Commander-in-chief, went into the Transvaal
for the purpose of relieving those who had been
made prisoners while claiming the protection of the
British flag. He pitched his camp at a place called
Mount Prospect, about four miles from Lang's
Nek. This Lang's Nek is a passage for wagon
traffic between two hills, and where a previous
engagement had taken place, ending in defeat to
the British. On the Saturday previous to the day
of which we speak, Sir George Colley resolved to
take action in the hope of retrieving the honour of
the British army. He ordered so many companies to
march In the direction of Amajuba under the cover
of night. When they reached *the hill, the men
were divided into smaller companies, while about
400 climbed the steep and very rough sides of the
mountain, and were on the summit at half-past 3
o'clock on Sabbath morning. Where at this time
were the Boers ? They were in their camp at Lang's
Nek, About 4 o'clock in the morning they were
seen by the men on the heights of Amajuba. Not
only were they seen, their song of praise to God at
p

206 THE SECRET OF BOER TRIUMPH.
that early hour was also distinctly heard. This re
minded us of what the Scottish soldiers did before
the Battle of Bannockburn. The Scottish army in
1 3 14, and the Boer army in 1881, seem to have been
of the same mind and spirit. If they must fight for
their liberty and privileges, they will fight in the
name of Jehovah! When will all men learn and
know that superior skill in the use of weapons is vain
without a just cause, or without God ? Even
the giant of Gath could be no match for the
stripling David with God on his side. In the
light of modern science and its discoveries, the
British might have been more than a match for the
Boers, but they were feeble in respect of numbers,
whatever their faith and courage may have been.
The top- of Amajuba mountain might seem a splendid
position for the British to occupy, for it commanded
the camp of the Boers at Lang's Nek, but the British
guns could not command Lang's stone kraals and
the numerous boulders behind which the Boers had
taken shelter. The Boer guns from behind these
stones and stone kraals could command the British
on the summit, and that to our gallant soldiers was
the annoying thing. It is believed by many of those
who should know, that the Boers would not have
fired a single shot on that Sabbath day, had the British
not first fired a shot at a few of their men, who were
walking round the base of the hill. That shot had
been fired by order of the General. The Boers at
once galloped back to their camp and told their
leaders what they experienced, and immediately the
Battle of Amajuba began.

BOER ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. 207
Commander Joubert ordered a company of his men
to find their way to the summit of the hill and clear
it. The men at once complied, creeping up the
steeps from terrace to terrace, and firing upon the
British soldiers on the sky line as they advanced.
When they reached the summit comparatively few of
our soldiers remained alive, and those who were left
resolved to flee. They went down the rugged steeps
of the hill, up which they had climbed with the
greatest difficulty a few hours before, but feeling sure
that the day was lost, and that once more British
honour was in the dust! The disaster of Amajuba
ended the war between the Boers and the British.
Among the first words uttered by Commander
Joubert to President Kruger were : " The men under
General Colley fought as true heroes ; but God hath
given us the victory. " ' ' Yea, " answered the President,
as if quoting the words of the Psalm, "the Lord
hath done great things for us, whence joy to us is
brought." Sir George Colley was found dead, and
different opinions have been expressed as to how he
was killed. One man who was present during the
war declared that Sir George was shot through the
head by a young Boer, a mere boy. In any case
Sir George lost his life, and his body lies buried with
many others in the cemetery at Mount Prospect.
On the 23rd of March, the same year, Sir Evelyn
Wood met the leaders of the Boers at O'Neill's farm
house at the base of Amajuba, and agreed to a treaty
of peace. Thus the Transvaal became -the conquered
territory of the Boers.

CHAPTER XVIII.

FROM THE TRANSYAAL TO DURBAN:
MISCELLANEOUS.
THE CHARACTER OF THE BOERS.
E had many favourable opportunities
of studying the character of the
Boers, and we are decidedly of
opinion that they are not men to be
trifled with. Some of them may
have an unkempt and dirty-looking
appearance : their hair and beards
ong and shaggy ; their faces somewhat tanned with
the weather, and having the colour of mahogany;
their clothes, in the case of many, may not be
fitting, corduroy trousers somewhat baggy, the coats
of many colours, and the heads covered with broad-
brimmed felt hats ; but beneath these felt hats there
are heads well furnished, and within the bodies so
covered there are souls that claim connection and
friendship with the Almighty. The Boers are in a
high sense a religious people. They have been
trained from their earliest years by religious precept
and example ; and religion is no mere sentiment with
them, but a thing of heart and everyday life. Those

A KINGLY MAN. 209
of them who were sent at first to spy out the land
were commanded by their Government to maintain
their religious character in all their dealings with the
natives, and to have family and public worship every
week day and every Lord's Day. Perhaps the only
book that many of the Boers in the Transvaal have
ever read is the Bible. To newspapers and other
kinds of literature they are utter strangers.
Should the relationships now existing between the
Boers and the British become strained, — and that is
possible, — the Boers must not be dealt with as if they
were a company of nobodies.
The Englishman with his imperious airs, and the
Irishman who may assume such airs as Lord
Wolseley once did, should not be sent to adjust
matters. The Boers, speaking generally, are men
of deep, penetrating thought, and their sense of right
as against might is so strong that no mere dictation,
threats, and swagger will move them. No man
could have done better service in the Transvaal, in
the interests of all concerned, than Sir Donald
Currie, M.P.
Sir Donald has not only the measures of humanity
to the full, but these measures are largely akin to
those of the Boers, and hence his kingly powers and
influence in giving them advice. When Sir Donald
visited the Transvaal a few years ago he was re
ceived by all ranks and classes of the people with
every possible demonstration of respect and goodwill.
Sir Donald has not only great powers as a business
man, he has also a keen and true perception of
human nature, and withal, the sixth sense, tact.

2IO ZULU MOTHERS AND CHILDREN.
THE ZULUS AND ZULULAND.
While in the Transvaal and on our way back to
Newcastle, several of the battlefields in Zululand
were pointed out to us, but we had no time and no
Inclination to visit them.
As the Zulus themselves came daily under our
observation, we turned our attention to the study of
their character as a factor in the future development
of the Colony, and how far it might be wise or other
wise for the British Government to place them in
their own land under the present captive Prince.
Physically, the Zulus are a noble, manly race of
men. The instincts of nature seem to have guided
Zulu mothers, strong, healthy women, into all the
ways and means by which children become healthy
and strong like their parents. The infants are not
swathed and carried about in the arms of nurses, or
wheeled in coaches, as infants are in this land of
civilisation, but are allowed to walk on their own feet
at a very early period, are fed on milk and mealies,
and the result is that they grow up without any
physical ailments. From other causes, however,
there is a great deal of infant mortality in Zululand.
When twins are born only one is permitted to live ;
the other is allowed to die as a sacrifice.
There are few, if any, deformed men and women
among the Zulus, for the simple reason that any
child or young person showing symptoms of insanity,
or who is in any way physically malformed, is cut off.
For many generations diseases such as are common
in civilised countries have been unknown among the

TUTORS AND GOVERNORS NECESSARY. 211
Zulus. We have already referred to their religious
character, and to some of their rites and ceremonies,
and we have nothing to add. The Zulus, if wisely
and firmly guided by the Colonial Government, are
as a race capable of reaching a high stage of civilisa
tion and Christian usefulness. But in view of their
past history and present character, it would be wrong,
we think, to place them once more under any Zulu
king in Zululand. The war spirit is still strong in
them ; they hate the Boers of the Transvaal with a
perfect hatred, and British prestige since the Amajuba
disaster has not been exalted in their estimation. It
was a great blessing for the Zulus themselves that
Cetewayo was defeated, for he was cruel to them in
many ways. Superstition and witchcraft are still
great powers in the land, and acts of cruelty
would still be perpetrated. Moreover, the Zulus
are powerful in respect of numbers, and they
have learned many lessons from the British since
the recent War which they would not be slow
to use against the British were another war to take
place. Therefore, in mercy to themselves and to all
concerned, let the Prince whose natural ambition is
to rule the Zulus in Zululand remain where he is, in
the island of St. Helena, or somewhere else, in sub
jection to the Colonial Government. Thus schools
and Christian Missions among the Zulus will have a
chance of flourishing, and civilisation will follow, all
teaching them —
" To hang the trumpet in the hall,
And study war no more."

2 12 SUCCESSFUL COLONISTS.

PARTING WITH FRIENDS.
We parted with some of our friends at Newcastle,
with others at Ladysmith, with others at Maritzburg,
and with others at Durban. In each case we natur
ally felt saddened by the thought that we might
never see these friends again. We had received
much kindness from them all, and we could only hope
that our visit to them had not been altogether in
vain. We had fellowship with some in the Colony
who had been our close companions in youth, at play
and at school, and in that case, at least, the parting
was not joyous, but grievous.
We conversed with others whose career in the
Colony had been somewhat as the morning light that
shineth more and more unto the perfect day. So
far as success in this world was their aim, they had
largely realised their ideal. At no time could these
have been as those described by Burns : —
" A country fellow at the pleugh,
His acres tilled, he's right eneugh ;
A country girl at her wheel,
Her dizzens done, she's unco weel ;
But gentlemen an' ladies warst,
Wi' ev'ndown want o' wark are curst.
They loiter, lounging, lank, and lazy ;
Though deil haet ails them, yet uneasy ;
Their days insipid, dull, arid tasteless ;
Their nights unquiet, lang, an' restless."
And yet they might now be ready to say, " How
true are the words of Burns !" in another stanza :- —

AN INTERESTING STORY. 213
" It's no in titles nor in rank ;
It's no in wealth like Lon'on bank,
To purchase peace and rest ;
It's no in making muckle mair ;
It's no in books ; it's no in lear,
To mak us truly blest ;
If happiness hae not her seat
And centre in the breast,
We may be wise, or rich, or great,
But never can be blest :
Nae treasures nor pleasures
Could make us happy lang ;
The heart aye's the part aye
That makes us right or wrang."

We had seen and conversed with more than one
who in the days of their youth had breathed the
"bracing air of poverty," and are now in affluent
circumstances. These reminded us of the man who
described his own career, or its beginning rather, in a
parodic translation of a line of the immortal Tuscan :
" That day I wore my gloves no more." The man,
when a boy, had been sent by his mother upon an
errand to a neighbour in more affluent circumstances.
Before sending him, the mother had done her very
best to conceal the rents and chasms which the tooth
of time had made in his clothes ; and then, to com
plete his appearance of gentility, enclosed his toil-
hardened hands in a pair of gloves which had been
worn by herself when her years were fewer and her
heart lighter. Thus dressed the boy sallied forth on
his errand, until he met a much older and bigger
boy whose rags fluttered in the breeze, whose bonnet
was constructed on the most approved principle

214 "THAT DAY I WORE MY GLOVES NO MORE.
of ventilation, and whose shoes might have been
those which Shem threw off when he entered the
ark. This young fellow had a swaggering air in his
talk as well as in his gait, but he had an eye to detect
the practical inconsistencies of his neighbour's cos
tume. After turning the errand boy round and
round and surveying him from head to foot, he
exclaimed, with a laugh of derision, "Oh!
Sandy, a patch on baith knees, and gloves on!''
" That day," said the errand boy, " I wore my gloves
no more." Natal has not been to many a land for
the use of gloves.
The majority of those who have risen to wealth,
affluence, and influence in the Colony rose by the
force of self-energy. They did not think by other
men's thoughts, or believe by other men's beliefs, or
grow strong by pulling other men down, but they
went upwards and onwards by their own independent
exertions. In most cases their best friends were
their own ten fingers.
The majority of the men whom they met in the
Colony when they reached it were the sordid and
narrow-minded, who think of nobody but themselves ;
the lazy, who cannot be troubled with anybody or
anything ; the busy, who had no time to think of the
claims of others ; the wealthy, who had got beyond
caring for the poor and needy ; the poor, who were
as poor in spirit as they were in purse, and could
not ; and the fools, who, however good-natured and
willing to help, were incapable of doing so. There
fore, they were obliged to imbibe the spirit of the old
English rhyme, which we heard quoted by Arch-

A SUDDEN CALL. 215
deacon Farrar, D.D., in Exeter Hall, when we
reached London, —
" If I were a cobbler, I'd make it my pride
The best of all cobblers to be ;
If I were a tinker, no tinker beside
Should mend an old kettle like me.''
We could have wished to have seen many more
Scotsmen like Mr. Hunter, the general manager of
the Government railways, and Mr. Andrew, of the
Castle Line Company, and several others, at the
wheel of affairs in Natal ; for Scotsmen, as a rule,
while not willing to make an apology for their exist
ence to the first beggars they meet, are not so
imperious in their nature as the Sassenachs are, and
are quite as good pioneers of Christian civilisation.
A number of relatives and friends did us the
honour of coming long distances to see us away with
the Dunottar Castle. There was a large crowd of
people at Durban harbour, some of them evidently sad
enough, while others were specially lively, who, if
they only knew, or could have seen a few days into
the future, would have been specially sad. One fine-
looking gentleman came down from Durban to see
his wife and child safely on board, and he seemed to
be quite healthy and happy. When his wife reached
Cape Town, she got a telegram intimating his death!
He had died, with a few hours' illness, two days after
they had parted on board the Dunottar Castle. We
stepped on board with as much of that faith which is
" the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence
of things not seen," as we could exercise for our-

2l6

FAREWELL TO THE COLONY.

selves and others, and silently saying, Farewell
Janet, farewell John, farewell James, farewell Helen
Kerr, farewell Alexander, and farewell Peter, whom
we have not seen ; all friends in the Colony, yea, and
the Colony itself, farewell. Then the words of
Burns rose before our mental vision, —
" A few days may, a few years must,
Repose us in the silent dust ;
The voice of Nature loudly cries,
And many a message from the skies,
That something in us never dies ;
That on this frail, uncertain state
Hang matters of eternal weight ;
That future life in worlds unknown
Must take its hue from this alone ;
Let us the important Now employ,
And live as those who never die."

CHAPTER XIX.

DURBAN TO CAPE TOWN.
IAFELY on board the Dunottar
Castle, and fairly out to sea, we
went below in search of our cabin,
and to see if our baggage was all
right. Once below we felt that we
were at sea in more ways than one.
Among the numerous passengers
lurrying to and fro — some of them tall and some of
them small, some pretty and some plain, some grave
and some gay, some broad and some narrow, some
fat and some lean, some very rich, judging by their
gold bracelets and brooches, studs, and sparkling
diamonds, and some plain enough, like ourselves
— we lost our way. The fact is, our mental powers
were so much distracted and divided with what
we saw that for a time we forgot what we had
gone down below to search for. When at length we
recovered our mental equilibrium, and found our
cabin, we felt constrained to exclaim, What a
magnificent vessel this is! what solidity of con
struction and perfection of comfort and arrangement
it exhibits ! Everywhere there is grandeur, luxury,
elegance and comfort. Behold this cabin, so clean,

2l8 A FLOATING PALACE.
so large and well ventilated, furnished with an
electric light and pneumatic bell — it is more like a
well-furnished room in a palace, than a cabin for us
two on board this steamer !
If the Dunrobin Castle, in which we sailed to
Natal, was worthy of being designated a floating
hotel, this Dunottar Castle might well be called a
royal or floating palace. To all intents and pur
poses it is so for the time being. There is Captain
Webster, as king ; there are his officers, who are his
cabinet ministers ; and there are the passengers, great
and small, lords and commons ! We were for the
time being Great Britain and Ireland in miniature.
We sallied forth from our cabin before the shades of
evening could conceal our companions from view.
What a strange and varied, lot we seemed to be !
There were Dutch, Jews, and Germans from the
Transvaal, and Englishmen, Irishmen, and Scotch
men from various parts of Natal. There were
doctors, lawyers, judges, bankers, merchants, and
ministers from the Free State, Zululand, Mada
gascar, Mauritius, and various other parts of the
world. High above us all, as Saul among the
people, there stood the Rev. Mr. Knaggs, a Con
gregational minister from London, He had been
visiting his friends in the Colony, and was now on his
way home. He was introduced to us by the Con
gregational minister of Durban, and we found him
an intelligent and good companion all the way to
Madeira. We were assured by some who knew
him that he had the repute of being one of the most
eloquent Congregational ministers in London ; and

"SABBATH-BREAKERS AT NEW LONDON. 219
having heard him, we readily believed that he should
be so.
We reached New London on Sabbath morning
about half-past 10 o'clock. In less than an hour the
Castle Line Company's steam launch came alongside
of us, crowded with men and women, whom we sup
posed were additional passengers, but it turned out
that they were only a lot of " Sabbath-breakers "
'" a-fishing for good whisky," as one put it.
They were not a healthy -looking lot; they had a
lean and scorched appearance. Many of them looked
as if they had recently come out of a fever hospital.
They were more like copper-coloured Hottentots than
Europeans. When they left us, sometime in the afternoon, two
or three of the passengers went to the captain to
ascertain if he would have any objections to our
having Divine service on board. He said, " Certainly
not, if you are all agreeable."
When the deputation returned, it was agreed that I
should preach in the evening, and that the Rev. Mr.
Knaggs should conduct the devotional exercises — of
course, without the prayer-book. The following is
the sermon I delivered : —
A GOSPEL CHAIN OF FIVE LINKS.
I propose briefly to explain and illustrate five
" one things " of the Bible. The first one thing is,
the "One thing lacking" (Mark x. 21); the second
one thing is, the " One thing needful " (Luke x. 42) ;
the third one thing is, the one thing of desire,
"One thing have I desired" (Psalm xxvii. 4); the

220 "THE ONE THING LACKING.
fourth one thing is, the one thing of knowledge or
experience, "One thing I know" (John ix. 25); and
the fifth one thing is, the one thing of practical endea
vour, "This one thing I do" (Phil. iii. 13).
(1) The one thing lacking. — Years ago a man
bought a piece of ground, on which he intended to
build a palatial edifice. The ground was beautiful
for situation ; it commanded an extensive view of the
surrounding country. After spending much of his
time, money, and labour on that piece of ground, he
discovered that it lacked water. A solitary tree and
some ruins now mark the spot, and perpetuate the
folly of that man. That man, like the man of the
Gospel story, began to build, and was not able to
finish. Our Lord, in one of His parables, speaks of
a man who built his house upon the sand, " and the
rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds
blew, and beat upon that house ; and it fell : and
great was the fall of it." The man's house, however
well built, lacked a proper foundation.
There are many men in this world whose lives are
only as bundles of beginnings. These men think
they can live as they like, that they can afford to
ignore law and order, and do in all things as they
please. But no man, no atheist or infidel, can afford
to live regardless of the laws of righteousness. In
things moral, as in things material, there is a law by
which all wrong is rejected and truth prevails. No
thing in nature and nothing in grace can be said to
be done, or done well, until it is done right. Can the
husbandman reverse the laws of nature? Can he
plough and sow in October as he may in March?

A THREEFOLD LIFE. 221
Can the mason build a house without any reference to
or knowledge of the law of gravitation ? Verily not.
There is a law in nature that will throw down every
wall that is not built by the plumb-line of righteous
ness ; and there are forces in the sea that will kick to
pieces every ship that has not been constructed upon
certain lines of stability. Even so, there are forces
in the moral kingdom which will rigidly exclude
every self-righteous Pharisee from Christ. The
swellings of Jordan will prove more than a match for
the man who is without love to God and faith in
Christ. These the young ruler lacked, these all men
in a state of nature lack.
We are born into this world to live a threefold
life : the life of sense, the life of thought, and the
"higher life of the soul. The life of the senses finds
its appropriate sphere, its beginning and end, in the
kingdom of nature ; the life of thought finds its
appropriate sphere and food not so much in nature as
in the realities which nature suggests, while the life
of the soul transcends nature, and finds its food and
complement in God.
But this higher life of the soul has lost its original
quality or character. Born in sin and shapen in
iniquity, the soul by nature is as those who have
eyes and see not, and ears but hear not. Men by
nature, in relation to God, are somewhat as those
who have lost their limbs by accident or amputation :
they can hardly believe at times that they have lost
them. Those whom the Apostle Paul describes as
the "natural man" have become so much the
creatures of time and sense, of intellectual conceit
Q

2 22 MEN MAY DO MUCH AND YET FAIL.
and pride of reason, that they cannot understand the
things of the Spirit of God. Like the young ruler,
they may have great possessions, great rank and riches,
sounding titles and worldly fame, sound judgment
and unblemished reputation. Like the ruler, they
may claim to have gone the whole round of the moral
law from their youth up, and lack nothing. But not
withstanding their great possessions and their
supposed perfect obedience, they may be all the
while as the man to whom Jesus said, "One thing
thou lackest."
Men may presume to speak with the tongues of
men and of angels, they may give their goods to
feed the poor and their bodies to be burned, but if
they have not charity or love, or the faith that
worketh by love purifying the heart and overcoming
the world, they are only as the Pharisees of our
Lord's day, "whited sepulchres."
Judas was a disciple, but living false in heart he was
false in life ; therefore by moral gravitation he went
at length to his own place. Ahitophel, we are told,
was a sagacious counsellor, but he lived as a traitor,
and so he died as a fool. Balaam was a prophet,
but he loved the wages of unrighteousness, and so he
died as an outcast. " God is not mocked. Whatso
ever a man soweth that shall he also reap." The
man who lives without love to Christ shall be Ana
thema Maran-atha. The man who loves the present
evil world, the love of the Father is not in him.
That the young ruler loved this world to excess is
shown by the fact that he went away sorrowful, " for
he had great possessions." Had he loved God with

THE ONE THING NEEDFUL. 223
all his heart and soul, strength and mind, as he pro
fessed to have done from his youth up, this could not
have happened. He neither loved God nor his
neighbour as himself.
(2) The one thing needful. — The one thing lacking
is the one thing needful ; and that is the love or the
life of God in the soul.
If you separate a tree from the soil it will cease to
live ; if you separate a river from the fountain it will
cease to flow ; if you separate the planets from the
sun they will cease to shine ; or, if you cut the tele
graph or electric wire, the message will stop. Man
should be related to God as the branch is related to
the vine. Related to Christ by faith as the branch is
united to the vine, we live and bear fruit ; but separ
ated from Him, we wither and die. By nature we
are so separated. By nature we are born to die.
Our life upon the earth is as the vapour that appeareth
a little while and vanisheth away. Away from God
we feel that there is nothing positive, real, or substan
tial in our existence, but that all is vanity and vexation
of spirit. What fuel is without fire, what the body is
without the spirit, what the landscape is without light,
what great worldly possessions are without health, the
whole world is without God. Ten thousand ciphers
summed up mean nothing, but add the positive
figure one, and you do more than was ever done by
magic : you change the character of the whole sum.
Then the sum may mean ten thousand pounds or ten
thousand acres of land.
It is the life of God in the soul that gives value
and reality to all our possessions. Without God's

224 THE 0NE THING OF DESIRE.
love or life the world is but a huge hospital or a
valley of dry bones. Great possessions, treasures
upon the earth and well-laden ships upon the sea,
and the wealth of Croesus at their command in the
banks, but what are they all without life or health to
enjoy them ? Money may bring us plenty, but it
cannot bring us peace ; it may bring us bread to eat,
but not an appetite to relish or enjoy it; it may
command the physician's skill, but not one hour's
true rest or one day more of life. The life Divine is
the only real elixir vita, and the only true philoso
phers' stone. It is the only golden key that fits the
wards of every lock, and flings open the doors of the
Celestial City. It lifts the soul above the pressures
of care, and undermines all "roots of bitterness." It
casts out of the soul the fear that hath torment, and
makes man perfect in love. Under its power " old
things pass away, and all things become new."
Jesus Christ Himself is the "one thing needful." He
came into the world that we might have life, and that
we might have it more abundantly. "He that hath
the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son shall
not see life, but the wrath of God abideth upon him."
(3) The one thing of desire. — "One thing have I
desired of the Lord," says the psalmist, "and that
will I seek after."
The one thing which the young ruler lacked was
the one thing needful ; and the one thing needful,
which Mary had chosen, was the one thing which the
psalmist desired.
Life, whether natural or spiritual, is a thing of
desire. Desire is born of life, and life of whatever

DESIRE A THING OF LIFE. 225
kind seeks its appropriate food. Natural life seeks
natural food, and spiritual life seeks spiritual food.
As mind is prior to matter, so life is prior to, or
exists before desire. The kind of life that animates a
man is determined by his desires. " As new-born
babes desire the sincere milk of the word, that they
may grow thereby," so all who are born of God hun
ger and thirst after God. Prayer as desire is said to
be the " Christian's vital breath, the Christian's native
air." No man can be animated with the life of God
without prayer. The man who is born of God soon
finds the way to the throne of grace. As no man
can measure the interval between the rising of the
sun and the going away of the darkness, so no one
can determine an interval between the beginnings of
Divine life in the soul and the desires of that soul
after the things which are unseen and eternal. The
man who is begotten again into a lively hope by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead at once
sets his affections upon things above, and seeks the
means by which to grow in grace.
Where what is truest and deepest and most enduring
in human nature has been quickened and brought up
to sit with Christ in heavenly places, there the soul
desires to be. So it was in the experience of the
sweet singer of Israel. The house of the Lord was
for David the tabernacles of grace and the gate of
heaven. He thus expressed himself : —
" How lovely is Thy dwelling-place,
O Lord of hosts, to me !
The tabernacles of Thy grace
How pleasant, Lord, they be !

2 26 THE ONE THING OF EXPERIENCE.
" My thirsty soul longs veh'mently,
Yea faints, Thy courts to see :
My very heart and flesh cry out,
O living God, for Thee."
There David beheld the beauty of the Lord, and was
changed into the same image from glory to glory,
even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
(4) The one thing of knowledge or experience. —
" One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I
see" (John ix. 25). As man is possessed of a three
fold life, so three kinds of knowledge are possible to
him : knowledge of matter, knowledge of mind, and
knowledge of God. We gain our knowledge of mat
ter, or of the natural world, almost exclusively by the
senses. The senses not only tell us of its existence,
but of its qualities. We know what is hard and soft,
cold and hot, sweet and bitter, long and short, light
and heavy, by our senses.
We never confound matter with mind or mind
with matter. We seldom, if ever, doubt the testimony
of the senses. Even the lower animals know the sea
as different from the solid land. The bees never
alight or seek honey on artificial flowers.
There is a higher kind of knowledge, however, than
that which is furnished by the senses, viz., the know
ledge which we derive by the exercise of our mental
faculties. While our senses are generally sure and
sufficient guides in the region of matter, they are of
no use in the region of mind. Only mind can know
mind. We know that mind is not matter, and that
matter is not mind. As all the attributes of mind
must be denied of matter, so all the attributes of

THE ONE THING OF ACTION. 227
matter must be denied of mind. Every man is con
sciously certain that his body is not his soul, and that
his soul is not his body. Though body and soul are
intimately connected, they are, as to their origin,
nature, and destiny, essentially different. This we
know or believe by the exercise of our minds. But
there is a higher kind of knowledge still ; and that is
the knowledge referred to by the man who was born
blind, and who said, "One thing I know, that, whereas
I was blind, now I see." This man represents those
whom God by His grace takes from the kingdom of
nature and plants in the kingdom of His Son, or
into whose heart He shines, giving the light of the
knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ. Those who are thus translated from dark
ness to light can no more doubt the reality of the
change than the man who said, " Once I was blind,
now I see." They know what they were, and they
know what they are. Their knowledge in this
respect has not been derived through the senses, nor
is it a logical deduction from the exercise of reason,
but it is a demonstration of the Spirit. They them
selves are satisfied that it was brought about " neither
by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of the
Lord." They esteem it most precious. It is Christ
formed in them the hope of glory, and they henceforth
count all things but loss for His sake.
(5) "This one thing I do" (Phil. iii. 13).— The
one thing of action. — Solomon tells us that "the eyes
of the fool are in the ends of the earth." Even wise
men may not be wholly free from the weakness that
comes from divided hearts and unsteady aims.

2 28 THE POWER OF CONCENTRATION.
Even Christians may be charged at times with a
certain degree of mental vagrancy and instability of
moral purpose.
Paul could never be charged with a double mind.
Both before his conversion and after it he was a
man of undivided aim and action. After his conver
sion, all his powers, mental, moral, and physical,
were specially focussed and directed to Christ that
he might hear His word and do His will. He
largely imbibed and manifested the Spirit of Him
who said, "It is My meat and My drink to do the
will of Him that sent Me." Whether preaching the
Gospel or founding churches, or writing epistles to
the saints, whether at home or abroad, among
friends or among foes, in liberty or in bonds, the
glory of Christ was the alpha and omega of his life.
Think of his spirit and words as he parted with
the elders at Ephesus : " Bonds and afflictions abide
me. But none of these things move me, neither count
I my life dear unto me — that I may testify the Gospel
of the grace of God." Again at Cesarea : "What
mean ye to weep and to break mine heart ? for I am
ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jeru
salem for the name of the Lord Jesus."
Verily, Paul was a consecrated man. What Sir
Isaac Newton by concentration became among
philosophers, Paul, by faith and energetic action,
became among the early followers of Christ.
By consecration and concentration God still gives
power to the faint, and to them that have no might
He increaseth strength. Let a man, however strong,
scatter his energies, and he becomes comparatively

A MIXED AUDIENCE. 2 29
weak. As men who love God, truth, and righteous
ness, let our motto be, " This one thing I do." What
ever our hand findeth to do, let us do it with all our
might ; let us " Work while it is called to-day, for the
night cometh, in which no man can work."
This sermon led to several lively conversations in
the course of the week. The audience, with respect
to creeds and churches, was a strange mixture.
Besides Roman Catholics and Jews, nearly all the
Protestant Churches were represented. One or two
of the followers of David Hume and of George
Combe, two or three Agnostics, and one pronounced
Positivist, were present at the service, so we after
wards learned, and one or two of these sceptical
gentlemen seemed never to grow weary of discus
sions. A native of Scandinavia, and a strong be
liever in the philosophy of George Combe, and also
in the teachings of Auguste Comte, was very per
sistent in offering us the benefit of his opinions.
Every morning between six and seven o'clock he
was sure to meet us on the hurricane deck for the
purpose of renewing the previous day's discussion,
or to start some new subject for argument. A few
of the other passengers came to know of this, and
they very often came to listen to us, and sometimes,
they took part in the discussion. We may in another
chapter, if our space permits, give an abstract of
these discussions, or rather friendly conversations.
In sailing round the coast, we added considerably
to the original number of our fellow-passengers.
At one of the ports, the Hon. Chief Justice, Du
Toit, of BremersdOrp, Swaziland, and Mr. Von, a

23O AN EARLY COLONIST.
magistrate of Biickstorm, South African Republic,
came on board, and we had very pleasant conversa
tions with them. We were greatly impressed with
the evident superior character and powers of the
judge. He seemed a man whose intellect was direct
and strong, whose mental vision was clear, com
prehensive, and serene, and the whole man as fine a
specimen of a sound mind in a sound body as we
had seen in Africa or anywhere else. He told us
that he had graduated at Edinburgh University, and
that he was not a stranger to Scotland. The only
minister in Scotland to whom he could refer by
name was the minister of Free St. George's, Edin
burgh, Dr. Whyte.
At Port Elizabeth, Mrs. C. discovered by some
means that she had some relatives living at Grahams
town, and she resolved to go and see them, but I
turned so ill as to be quite unable to leave my cabin.
Instead of personally visiting them she sent a
letter expressing her regret that she could not see
them, and requesting to be informed as to their wel
fare. Before the Dunottar Castle left the Bay of
Port Elizabeth, she had a letter in reply, containing
the sad news that the son of her mother's sister had
died there about two years ago. This son, I under
stand, was among the early settlers in the Colony, and
one of the pioneers of its Christian civilisation. After
his death, his minister wrote a letter to the widow,
of which the following is an abstract. It speaks so
much for the character of the writer, as well as for
the person about whom he wrote, that any statement
of the nature of an apology for its insertion here may

A WORTHY ELDER. 23 1
reasonably be regarded as superfluous or unneces
sary : — Zuurberg, 15th March, 1888.
Mv Dear Mrs. Hoggan,
I am greatly shocked by the news of the departure of
your dear husband from this life. I hardly know what to say to
you, for I feel just like Job's comforters, who, when they saw his
great grief, simply sat down beside, and for seven days never spoke
a word. I knew your dear husband well. He was a very humble
man ; very meek, very modest ; and one who always sought for the
things that make for peace. He used often to come to my house
at night, and many is the hour he has spent in my study, and
many is the prayer we have breathed together there. I little
thought when I saw him last (just a month ago) that he would be so
soon called away — for he looked well, said he felt well, and had
more work than he could manage. The only thing he complained
of was the distance from his house to his place of business. He
was a very true man in every sense of the term. I saw him in his
troubles, and he was submissive ; I saw him in his joys, and he
was full of the goodness of God; I saw him at our Session
meetings, and he always shone at our devotional meetings. I
never once heard him engage in prayer without hearing him offer
special petitions for "our dear ones." He was very tender on
this point. His prayers were always short and to the point. I am
one of those who have lost a true friend by his death. He loved
Christ, and his whole character illustrated the life of the
Crucified One. I am sure he has gone to a state of infinite bliss.
He was a faithful disciple ; a true exponent of the Gospel. I shall
ever think of him as a man who, by the grace of God, was en
abled to do that which commended the Gospel to others. We
shall all miss him sorely. He was gentleness itself, and his desire
was to influence others for good. He remained true to his Church,
and by his presence at all times in the house of God, set an
example to others. What can I say to comfort you then?
Nothing but this : Think of your dear husband as having in
herited the promises. He is with Christ, which is far better.
That being the case, keep very near to the Saviour, and tell Him
all your griefs. I commend you to God, and to the Word of His

232 OFF TO CAPE TOWN.
grace, and with much sympathy with you and your family in this
the hour of your grief. I am, yours very sincerely,
(Sgd.) JOHN A. CHALMERS.
This letter speaks much for the minister who
wrote it, no less than for the elder referred to in it.
Were all the ministers, elders, and members of the
different churches in the Colonies of the same spirit,
and were their number increased a thousand-fold, we
might have good ground to hope that some of
the Rev. Mr. Baxter's predictions would soon be
fulfilled — that " Ethiopia unto God would soon
stretch out her hands."
On leaving Port Elizabeth, the so-called " Liver
pool of South Africa," we encountered a stiff sea
breeze, which culminated in a storm, but beyond a
little sickness felt by a number of the ladies, no one
seemed to be alarmed. The Dunottar went on her
way, ploughing the ocean billows like a giant in
his majesty, or as if utterly regardless of winds and
waves. In due time we reached and entered the
harbour of Cape Town, where we remained for about
three days. Those of us who had become a little
home-sick were then quite willing to depart, and
know the best or the worst of the voyage to Ply
mouth. As the hour of our exodus drew near, the docks
and decks of the steamer became somewhat as a
" Donnybrook Fair." So many passengers with
their friends came on board that we had hardly
standing-room. We had around us for a time the

MESSAGE TO A MOTHER. 233
Rev. Mr. Russell, of the Scotch Presbyterian Church,
and his assistant, the Rev. Mr. Taylor, and also the
Rev. Mr. Forbes, of the Congregational Church.
We were pleased to act as a kind of connecting-link
between several " Sons of the Rock " at the Cape
and their parents and friends at home, not only in
Stirling, but in Glasgow, Partick, and elsewhere.
Messrs. Crawford, Stewart, and Duncan Campbell
were quite sure that they had done the right thing
in going to the Cape, for since they left auld Scot
land they had enjoyed health, and their worldly
prosperity had steadily advanced. One young man,
who had left his home years ago in a "fit of anger,"
but who has since undergone a change for the better,
said "he would esteem it a great favour if we would
call and see his mother, and give her a letter which
he placed in our hands." The message of the letter
might be expressed in the following lines : —
" Take this letter to my mother,
Far across the deep blue sea ;
It will fill her heart with pleasure,
She'll be glad to hear from me.
How she wept when last we parted !
How her heart wa"s filled with pain,
When she said, Good-bye, God bless you,
We may never meet again.
" Take this letter to my mother,
It will fill her heart with joy ;
Tell her that her prayers are answered,
God protects her absent boy.
Tell her to be glad and cheerful,
Pray for me where'er I roam,
And ere long I'll turn my footsteps,
Back towards my dear old home.

234 A FAREWELL HYMN.
" Take this letter to my mother,
It is filled with words of love :
If on earth I'll never meet her,
Tell her that we'll meet above,
Where there is no hour of parting,
All is peace, and love, and joy ;
God will bless my dear old mother,
And protect her only boy."
We could not help having a feeling of profound
respect for the lad who could thus remember his dear
old mother. May the Lord bless all such lads,
whether at home or abroad !
As the Dunottar Castle crept out of. the docks,
a large multitude of people, of all sorts and sizes,
followed us round as far as they could go, and then
began to sing a hymn. The hymn was strange to
our ears, and no one could tell us what it was, but,
so far as we could make out, it had these words in
the refrain or chorus, "God be with thee, till we
meet again."
I am sure all of us on board were much pleased to
hear that hymn, while we at least re-echoed its prayer
on behalf of all our friends and all God's Israel in
Cape Colony.

CHAPTER XX.

HOMEWARD BOUND.

CHARACTER SKETCHES.
F farmers ought to know the different
kinds of soil they have to cultivate,
and if all artisans, mechanics, masons,
joiners, etc., should be familiar with
their different tools and the character
of the materials on which they ex
ercise their skill and labour, so ought
men to know each other, in order to be true co
workers, or to avoid unequal yokes and unnecessary
conflicts. Perhaps more than fifty per cent, of life's failures
are largely owing to our culpable ignorance of
human nature. How many parents in relation to
the training of their children, and how many teachers
in relation to their pupils, act often as those who
beat the air for want of attention to the facts that
there are essential differences of human character as
well as "diversities of gifts," and that both require
differences of administration. Some men seem to
have been born with such qualities of heart and head

236 ROUND MEN IN SQUARE HOLES.
as will cleave to them in spite of all eradicating
efforts. These qualities will render them fit for cer
tain positions or situations in the world, but they
utterly unfit them for others.
Men ignorant of these qualities, or who lack the
faculty of discernment, are given to place the " round
man in the square hole." How often are men
chosen for offices in the Church and in the State for
which they are utterly unfit. They have neither the
mental dignity nor the moral character requisite for
such positions. Parents aspire to give their sons a
first-class education, that they may become ministers
of religion. They have an eye to the " living," as it
is called, and they think that education can fit them
for it. The sons themselves may long and pray for
such "livings," even as the Hebrews longed and
prayed for the inheritance of Canaan, but in respect
of character they may be as unfit for these "livings"
as the Hebrews were to inherit the land of Canaan
when they came out of Egypt.
Education and character are two very different
things. Some school and college educated men
may be as those described by the poet —
" A set o' dull, conceited hashes,
Confuse their brains in college classes !
They gang in stirks, and come out asses,
Plain truth to speak ;
An' syne they think to climb Parnassus
By dint o' Greek ! "
This description can never be applicable to men of
character.

UNITY AND VARIETY. 237
DIFFERENT KINDS OF CHARACTER-NATURAL
CHARACTERISTICS.
During the last twenty years at least we have
been trying to discover how far the physical forms
and faces of men may be regarded as true expres
sions of their inward natures. During the last ten
years we have had special opportunities of studying
human character or the natural characteristics of men
in different parts of the world, as well as of verifying
or modifying the theories we had formed as to how
far the human body may be an index to man's mental
or intellectual character.
On board the Dunrobin Castle, going to Natal,
and specially on board the Dunottar Castle, coming
home, we had clear evidences of the unity and
variety of human nature. The practical Anglo-Saxon
and the speculative German, the courageous Roman,
or one who might pass as such, and the peering
Greek, the plodding Scandinavian and the vivacious
Frenchman, the money-grasping Jew and the
subtle Ethiopian, not to speak of Arabs, Italians,
Egyptians, and Persians, were daily within the scope
of our vision. In these representatives of different
nations, peoples and tongues, we beheld a sameness
with a difference, a family resemblance amid many
shades of variety. The unity in variety which we
see in the kingdom of nature, in earth and air, sea
and sky, in the trees of the forest and flowers of the
field, we saw exhibited more or less fully every day
among our fellow-passengers. It was impossible to
doubt that we were all as of one blood, or that we all
had a common consciousness as to hunger and thirst,
R

238 OUR COMPANIES.
heat and cold, pleasure and pain, but outwardly not
two of us belonging to the same country, or even of
the same family, were exactly alike.
In character, natural disposition, moral tone and
temper, we might be somewhat as Cain and Abel in
the family of Adam, or as Isaac and Ishmael in the
family of Abraham, or as Jacob and Esau in the
family of Isaac. In personality or sense of power
some of us might be as the man who said, " If I find
not a way over the Alps, I'll tunnel through them,"
while others might be as the men of our Lord's day
whom He characterised as "children sitting in the
market place, and calling unto their fellows."
These types of human character belong to no par
ticular country or age ; nor can we say that our com
panies on board the steamers were in any special way
their antitypes.
We have met with men whose raiment might be
said to be their only apology for manhood, or to whom
Pope's words might well apply : "No characters at all."
Some men seem to be always in a state of babyhood
- — " Ever learning, and never able to come to a know
ledge of the truth." Their knowledge at the best is
borrowed, and bears as intimate a relation to their
hearts as their hats bear to their heads ; their minds
seem to be as confused as old furniture shops. No
doubt the best of men are but men at the best, but
these have no regard whatever to the " Order which
is Heaven's first law," and hence whilst they grow in
body they are as invalids in mind, whose food is milk
and not strong meat.
Those of our race who greedily devour the draper's

SUPERFICIAL CHARACTERS. 239
shop and the milliner's show windows, and who daily
appraise themselves by means of the mirror, cannot
have but a butterfly existence. These may be the
world's oddfellows ; they cannot be of those who are
chosen out of the world to be "epistles of Christ."
Their character is very much in their clothes. They
follow their utilitarian proclivities as surely as the
eagle follows its scent for prey in the desert. Self
in one form or another is their daily song. Their
creed is based upon the sayings of their very aged
sires, rather than upon any proverbs of Solomon.
The weather-cock on the steeple is not more variable
in its movements than they are in their opinions.
Their ups and downs of temperament are as variable
as those of the barometer with the changes of the
weather. The man who proposed to measure the
moon for a suit of clothes would be more successful
than he who would undertake to predict what these
persons would say or do in the course of a day.
Everything of the nature of knowledge or instruction
goes through and past them as wind through the
foliage of a tree, or as water falls through a riddle.
There is another class, a little higher, perhaps, in
the intellectual scale, but essentially of the same
order of character.
This class will have you to regard them as the
lineal descendants of Solomon. They are not- of
those who believe that they are made of glass ;
neither do they believe that they should make an
apology for their existence to the first beggar they
meet. They do not regard life and its issues as
some men do an old almanac. No ; and yet, as our

240 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS.
old friend Stowell Brown once said, "their estimate
of life, by the uses they make of it, would lead us to
believe that the farmer might more reasonably weep
for the loss of his ass : the loss in such a case would
be more sincerely felt, and his dog, if it died, would
be more missed."
This class of men are ever ready to deal " mighty
blows to phantoms of their own creation, to waft a
feather or to drown a fly." They are as the soldiers
who boast of great exploits when they are in the
barrack yard, or as the sailors with whom there are
none to compare when at the harbour, or at their
own fireside. The swagger and important airs of
these fellows are about as sure an intimation of their
emptiness as the noise of the drum is of its hollowness.
These and similar classes may be said to belong
more or less numerously to all countries. For the
real work of the world and for the conflicts of life
they are as " hewers of wood and drawers of water."
The prominent characteristics of modern European
nations are generally well known.
The Germans, for example, have been regarded as
a speculative people. They are not so vivacious as
the French, nor so practical in character as the
English, but they are full of unwearied toil in the
regions of music and mysticism. The Irish, again,
have been regarded as a lively people. They are
not so inward as the Germans, nor so outward as the
French. They are full of borrowed thoughts and
ready-made opinions. Like the French, they may
be free from mental laziness, but they are not all
ready to dance at a " Donnybrook Fair."

MRS. SIDDON S OPINION. 241
The ancient Greeks were regarded as a cheating
people. The poet, when expressing his personal
fears, " Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes" (I fear. the
Greeks even when they bring their gifts), might be
quite sure that they were not all as Nathanael, but yet
there might be some Greeks who were not as Jacob
when he stole his brother's birthright.
The Scots have been regarded as a canny, cautious,
calculating kind of people. No doubt we live in a
land of hills and mist-covered mountains, where fogs
for days lie heavy and winds for days blow fierce,
but Scotsmen are not all alike. If in general we
are slow, in general also we are sure. Mrs. Siddons,
however, could not appreciate this, or anything
short of a sky-rocket brilliancy. While calling the
people of her own country "lumps of animated
clay," she called those of Edinburgh, whom she
failed to move, " dead lumps." She must have
thought that mercury was the only thing of use in the
world. Edinburgh, no doubt, is a grand city, but Edin
burgh is not Scotland, and the people of Scotland
are not all stiff and starchy. There is a difference
amounting almost to a contrast between the people
of Edinburgh and those of Glasgow, and between the
peoples of Glasgow and Edinburgh and those of
Aberdeen. The peoples of the counties of Aberdeen
and Fife are about as different from those of Renfrew
shire or of Lanarkshire as are the Scots from the
English and the English from the Irish.
What are the possible or probable causes of these
differences ?

242 A LESSON FROM THE POINTER DOG.
CAUSES OF DIFFERENCES.
However numerous and various the forms of life
may be, life must be held as something prior to the
form, and as the secret of its growth or development.
Life in man or beast, tree or flower, must precede,
and be the cause of the form.
If we go back in thought to the beginning of
things, we will have to say that matter in all its
forms is an expression of mind. The created
universe is a visible expression of the mind and will
of God. It is God's thought in material form. It is
not a dubious matter with us whether the oak made
the acorn or the acorn the oak.
Men take their physical forms and degrees of
strength and forces of character from certain primary
or hereditary conditions. These primary conditions
among men are very much what the instincts of the
pointer dog are when first taken to the field. Though
absolutely ignorant of what is required, it becomes
equal to it when the opportunity is given. This,
however, refers to the origin of physical habits in
man rather than to what is moral or mental.
In the early ages men were called by certain names
because of something connected with their birth,
their form, or physical appearance. Some men were
called Brown and others Black ; some were called
Green and others Gray ; some were called White
and others Blue or Yellow; some were Long .or
Lang, others Short or Little ; some were Strong and
others Armstrong ; Shanks, Longshanks, and Cruick-
shanks. All this may be obvious enough. It is when

PHYSICAL CAUSES AND EFFECTS. 243
we enter the domain of moral and spiritual causes that
our chief or insuperable difficulties in accounting for
differences of character appear. For example : Who
can fully and satisfactorily explain the cause of differ
ence between the first man's two sons ? Why was
Cain so different in character from his brother Abel ?
or, why was Jacob so different from his brother
Esau ? or, why was Isaac so different from Ishmael ?
We find similar differences among our Lord's early
disciples ; and we refer to them not because they
were singular or unique, but because they are better
known or may be better understood.
With respect to physical causes accounting for
physical differences, much might be said of
geographical locality, much of climate, and much of
the quality and quantity of food. Each of these has
its corresponding effects.
It has been said in effect that the statistics of
France point to a somewhat curious analogy between
the amount of natural light enjoyed by the people in
their early years and youthful manhood, and the
measures of their after intellectual illumination and
physical strength. It has been observed that in
Kentucky and Virginia, in the United States of
America, men and women are more muscular, have
stronger bones and bodies, than the men and women
of other States. The explanation of this difference
is, that underlying the surface of the land in Kentucky
and Virginia there are lime rocks, and that the water
is everywhere impregnated with the lime, the sub
stance from which bones are made.
The ancient Greeks were strong believers in the

244 VARIOUS OPERATIVE CAUSES.
plastic powers of locality, climate, and natural
scenery. They believed that the physical formation
of their country had as much to do in making them
what they were as the abstemiousness of the Egyptian
priests had to do in making them renowned men of
science. It can scarcely be doubted that the physical
character of a people is largely determined not only
by geographical locality and climate, but also by the
food they eat in its various quantities and qualities,
and also by the liquids they consume, whether from
the malt-barns or the moorland burn. The people
who live on the raw products of the soil, who live to
eat rather than eat to live, who are daily exposed to
the scorching rays of an African sun, cannot be very
strong either in body or in mind. They naturally
grow up to be a contrast to those who feed on sub
stantial and well-prepared food — food, it may be, that
smells of the granite, and who are also often exposed
to fierce blasts from snow-clad mountains.
It has been alleged that the children of drunken
parents are more likely to become the victims of in
temperate habits than the children of sober parents.
It has also been alleged that a lamb, if brought up
on goat's milk, will acquire the goat's climbing pro
pensity. It has also been alleged that if a mother,
who is naturally of an amiable disposition, gives her
child to be nursed by one of an opposite disposition,
the child will manifest the character of the nurse.
There are still far more subtile causes than these
accounting for the mental, moral, and spiritual
varieties of mankind.
Affinities of constitution, early training, social

PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS. 245
environment, foods, drinks, geographical locality and
climate, may account for many of the differences
which exist among men as to bodily bulk and physical
strength. Physical effects may be traced as a rule
to physical causes.
Physical causes may indicate to some extent how
some men are naturally sour and others sweet in
temper, or how some are generous and warm, while
others are cold and reserved ; how some men will look
at you as if you were a leper from India, or shake
hands with you by means of two fingers, while others
will shake your whole arm, reminding you of the
handle of a pump on a frosty morning.
Mere physical causes, however, can never account
for the blush of shame on the countenance or for the
pallor of fear on the face, or for the flash of anger
contracting upon the brow, or for the sensation of
pleasure sparkling in the eye. These are visible
signs of things signified not in the region of flesh and
blood, but in the region of the soul. How comes it
that a single word coming from the lips of a speaker
and entering the souls of two or two thousand
hearers by means of the physical ear is fraught with
such a variety of effects ? To so many it comes as a
mere sound, to so many in word only, and to so many
more in power that thrills the soul and leads to
action. Two hundred or two thousand men, out
wardly alike, similarly dressed and equally well edu
cated, may stand gazing upon a beautiful landscape
or upon some famous picture, and yet only a very
small number, perhaps fifty, are impressed by it.
How is this to be accounted for ? Not by anything

246 BACON'S IDOLA, ETC.
that is visible or about the men, nor by anything
that is different in their mental capacity or intellectual
nature, but rather to something in the character of
their inner nature. They all see the same object, but
they do not all perceive. But how comes it that
human desires, dispositions and tastes differ so
much ?
What Bacon has said about the idols of the tribe,
of the family, of the cave, of the theatre, and of the
market-place, may go far to explain why tastes and
temperaments differ. That esprit de corps, which
belongs to artists and artisans, to ministers, doctors,
and jlawyers, to every clique, club, coterie, and
corporation, has something to do in creating different
tastes or ideals, and these tastes or ideals lead men
to different trades and professions.
External events, social or domestic circumstances,
the character of our parents, friends, and companions,
have a moulding influence upon the mind, and the
mind affects the heart, and both heart and mind
affect the body. Our outward and inward natures
act and react upon each other every day.
Any painful event that produces sorrow in the
heart, or any critical circumstance of life that creates
mental agitation, or any uncertain event that creates
fear or leads to apprehension and excitement, is sure
to tell upon the nervous forces of the body. Thus
the body becomes the "mind's mirror," a revelation
to thoughtful observers of the inner man.
Reflection, faith, conviction, aspiration, love, hope,
are the chief factors in the formation of human
character. When these factors or forces take pos-

SEEING AND PERCEIVING. 247
session of the soul, the soul of a Jacob may become
as Israel, or a Saul of Tarsus may become as Paul
the Apostle. Under these plastic forces the body
becomes what the well-tuned instrument is to the
musician, or what the ship is to the captain, or what
the pen is to the ready writer, — an obedient servant.
The body takes direction, form, and expression from
the soul. In writing an epistle a good pen is not to
be despised, but no one requires to be told that a letter
worth reading is not so much the work of the pen as
of the hand that guided it, and not so much the work
of either hand or pen as of the mind.
But to read the body as an expression of mind and
moral forces, one must have a certain kind and
amount of light. Merely looking at men will not
enable us to know what their characters are. A
telescope, a pair of spectacles, and a mirror may be
very useful things, but they are of no practical
use to one in a dark night.
We may look at the "mind's mirror" in society
every day ; or we may have to deal with men in the
market-place, in the exchange, in the shop, and in
various circumstances of social life, but if we have
not in some measure grasped the principles of
physiognomy we shall be as those who walk and
work in the dark.

THE " MIND'S MIRROR," or MARKS of DIFFERENCES.
(1) Here is a man with a round, ruddy, plump and
plain face ; he is a man about five feet in height, has

248 TYPICAL MEN.
auburn hair, somewhat curly. These are often the
marks of one without art, cunning or craft ; who
lacks force of will, decision or determination ; who,
under great fear, or by impulse, may do exploits,
and yet may startle or shrink back with dread at the
sight of his own shadow.
(2) Here is another man, with long face, prominent
chin, large forehead and Roman nose. These are
often the marks of one who surmounts difficulties,
who, if he cannot find his way over the Alps, will
tunnel through them. He has brains enough to
comprehend fully, and faith enough to put down his
foot firmly, and courage enough to go on steadfastly.
" When duty whispers low, Thou must,
His soul replies, I can.''
This man represents those who come, and see,
and conquer in all departments of human labour,
commercial enterprise, and stern conflicts. He repre
sents men, not mimics, persons, wot parrots. He has
inherited the natural forces which make for a well-
developed muscular form, — heavy shoulders, broad
chest, and well-set limbs. He belongs by nature to
the race of such men as Sir William Wallace, King
Robert the Bruce, Napoleon, Wellington, and
Washington. Like the ancient Spartans and
Romans, he is not specially characterised by much, if
any, refinement of manners or delicacy of speech.
(3) Here is a third man, type of many, with a face
not round and yet not long, with a brow not broad
and yet not narrow, with a clear, sparkling eye, and
with a long, sharp nose. These are often the marks

TYPICAL MEN. 249
of one who is artful, cunning, or crafty. Lacking
Roman energy, he will prefer to go ten miles round
than five miles direct to accomplish his object. He
will much rather deceive you than grieve you ; he
will conceal the cat's claws in velvet paws to extract
your secrets, without rousing your suspicions, and
when he has obtained them and is out of sight, he
will chuckle over your simplicity. The Greek,
because he lacks energy or force of character, will do
what a Roman would never think of doing. Hence
the poet's warning, " Beware of the Greeks even
when they bring their gifts."
(4) Here is a fourth man, typical also of many, with
full-sized face, large features, wide nostrils, and
peering eyes from under a heavy brow. The some
what large nose and wide nostrils, broad at the base,
and the eyes, somewhat contracted or sunken in the
head, indicate powers of thought, force of character,
and plodding perseverance. The closed mouth and
compressed lips have given the nasal organ its
Roman bridge !
(5) Here is a fifth man, typical of a large number,
with small features, a snub nose, round face and
small, winking eyes. He is superficial in thought,
limited in judgment, rather confused, fitful in disposi
tion, and never very reliable. He reminds us of
three of the four classes of hearers in the parable of
the sower, and also of the man of whom it was said,
" Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel." Lacking
concentration, his eyes are in the ends of the earth,
and he walks with his mouth open as if to catch the
flies. When you speak to him he invariably looks

250 TYPICAL MEN.
not to you but to his nearest neighbour, for he
thinks, speaks, and acts as his neighbour suggests.
Lacking personality, he is sure to be with the crowd
and do as the crowd does. If the mob should shout
' Hosanna,' he will do so also, and if the mob should
shout ' Crucify,' he will do the same. The snub-nosed
man is altogether a wee man. He is never dignified,
never magnanimous. His short step and mincing
motion are in harmony with his measures, mental
and physical. He is usually very positive in his
opinions and dogmatic in his assertions, but, of course,
nature teaches him to make the best of what he has
got. (6) A sixth typical man is one with slanting brow,
peering eyes, and a long, concave nose. In some
respects he resembles in character the pug-nosed
man, but in other respects he is superior. If he is
a bad man morally, he is "fit for stratagems ancl
spoils," but if he is in heart a good man, he may be
very useful. He should never be trusted as a leader,
however, for in a moment of danger he is ready to
fail or to come short on the threshold of success. He
lacks latent power. If the world or the church sus
tain him on the wave of popularity, he will live and
thrive, but if circumstances go sorely against him, he
may burst all reasonable bonds and grow angry, or
he may take the advice of Job's wife, " Curse God,
and die."
(7) A seventh typical man has large, rolling eyes,
usually a sallow complexion, and a convex nose.
This man is as shrewd in business matters as he is
penurious in his disposition. He is ever gathering

GAIT AND GESTURE. 25 1
when and what other men throw away as useless,
and what he gathers he converts into gold. Adam
Smith might characterise this man as a "money-
loving and a money-making animal." This typical
man is a Jew, but not inwardly. He may be a
Hebrew of the Hebrews, but he is not an Israelite.

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.
If we would read Nature's revelations of character
fully, we must not limit our reading to the form of
the head and features of the face, to the eyes, lips
and nasal organs, but extend our observations to
the whole man. Man's various gaits and gestures,
his manner of speaking and his ways of laughing,
as well as his modes of locomotion, should be duly
considered. With respect to modes of locomotion, it
may be noticed that a striding gait reveals a man of
earnest mind and definite purpose. The toddling
gait reveals a person of little or no personality, a
childish person. The lurching gait may be acquired,
as in the case of the sailor at sea, but when it is not so
acquired, or is natural to a person, it indicates either
innate conceit or a bullying disposition. This gait is
common among the Zulus and Kafirs of South
Africa. Sometimes it may be the result of a too
heavy body for the limbs, and in that case it fails to
be a mark of character. The straight forward or
firm gait indicates a man of strong character and
force of will. The firm and regular step means

252 SPEAKING AND LAUGHING.
solidity and stability. A person having this gait
usually means what he says and says what he means.
Speaking and laughing in certain ways are also
marks of character. A strong disposition to speak
and fluency of utterance are not, as a rule, charac
teristics of those who solve our problems and make
our best laws. The ho-ho mode of laughter marks
a man of health and hope, while the te-he mode
marks a man of limited thought and feeble passions.
We have thus far referred to differences of char
acter and to some of the causes by which they are
produced, and also to a few of the marks by which
different characters may be known. We would urge
men to study the subject for themselves. For
fathers and mothers in the home, for teachers in the
school, for masters in relation to servants, and ser
vants in relation to masters, yea, and for ministers of
the Gospel, the subject is of vast importance. Says
one, — " To master an event, study men ;
The minutes are well spent only then."
" The man of men who knoweth men,
The man of men is he,
His army is the human race,
And every foe must flee."

CHAPTER XXI.

PEN PORTRAITS.
SUR company on board the Dunottar
Castle homewards might be charac
terised as a strange heterogeneous
mass, certainly not as a company of
saints or of sages. The majority
had come from the gold and diamond
fields, and seemed to have gold and
gambling on the brain. It would be difficult, if not
impossible, to characterise them by the common laws
or rules of physiognomy. They seemed to be as
aliens and foreigners to these rules, or as those
described by Pope, as having " No characters at all."
Their love of gold and of gambling, and perhaps
their gross ways of living, had largely destroyed the
common" traces of hunrariity. Expressions of mental
dignity, moral character, and manliness were but
dimly given in their forms and faces. "Who is
that ?" said a passenger, who had not come from the
desert of Kimberley, as one of the gambling fraternity
passed by. " I do not know," was the reply. " I

254 GAMBLING PROPENSITIES.
have been informed," continued the passenger, " that
he is the son of an English lord." " He may be so,"
replied the other, " for aught I know ; certainly
he is ugly enough to be one !" " My reason for put
ting the question," said the passenger, " was that he
reminded me very much of a young man I had seen
some years ago at Monte Carlo." No one on board
the ship could equal that fellow as an auctioneer ; he
had an admirable " gift o' the gab." Every day for
weeks, immediately after the vessel's log was marked,
he appeared in a prominent place on deck, and auc
tioned the sweepstakes at a wonderful rate. We
had no special regard for our gambling fellow-passen
gers, but they had attractions, we were sorry to
observe, for a large number of men, and a few of the
fair sex on board. We tried to while away most of our
leisure hours on board conversing, sometimes with J ews
and sometimes with Germans, and occasionally with
men and women of other countries. We would not
regard these men, whether English, Irish or Scotch,
Jews or Germans, as adequately representing the
men of the countries to which they respectively be
longed, but each of them had sufficiently those traits
of character which belong in a special sense to the
men of the different countries referred to. What
these special traits are I will endeavour to show.
The Englishman. — The Englishman is a giant, — so
at least he believes ; and what is any man without
belief? He has never been able to regard himself as an
infant or an orphan on the door-step of the universe.
He cannot regard himself as a fallen leaf waiting to
be tossed to and fro by the winds and waves of

THE ENGLISHMAN. 255
circumstances. He believes in principles which are
mental and moral in their nature and eternal in their
character and duration. He has embraced these
principles, and they have made him great. There is
a good deal of Roman energy, along with a good
deal of Roman bounce, in his character. His
faculties of conception, forethought, and circumspec
tion are not always equal to his powers of action.
His powers of thought are not so deep, original, and
comprehensive as they are superficial and smart,
intense, and stirring. He is never without a sturdy
sense of independence, nor is he often backward in
showing it. He is deeply sensible of the importance
of law, has great respect for it, and is most conserva
tive of the things which law secures and regulates.
He hates every kind of living that has even the
semblance of "beating the air." He eats well.
" My word," said one, "see how that fellow eats! "
He also sleeps well, and is healthy. We could afford
to dispense with his little airs of superiority, and we
could also afford to despise them, without saying that
we did so. The Englishman is a mighty man, in
Asia and in Africa, in India and in China, and in
many other parts of the world, but he ought to own
that the strength of his arm and the greatness of his
conquests have been largely derived from the
chivalry of the Norman and the manliness of the
Celt. The Irishman. — The Irishman has more versatility
in his character than the Englishman. His more
lively imagination, buoyancy of spirit, and sense of
humour, make him either a good lover or a good

256 THE IRISHMAN : THE GERMAN.
hater. Where his powers of intellect are fairly
balanced with his powers, of passion, you may be
reminded of a Duke of Wellington or a Lord
Wolseley. As a rule the Irishman is light-hearted,
and sometimes very funny. He moves between the
extremes of intense joy and intense sorrow, but in his
greatest joys there is an element of grief, and in his
intensest sorrow there is the silver lining or the rain
bow of hope. It must not be supposed that the
Irishman is a simpleton, when he seems to speak and
act as one ; perhaps then he is more a Jacob than a
Nathanael, and you might do worse than keep your
eye upon him.
The German. — The typical German is a man of
many good parts. He may occasionally remind you
of such men as Leibnitz, Kant, Fichte, Schelling,
and Hegel, in the sphere of philosophy ; of such men
as Reinhard, Schleiermacher, Paulus, and many others,
in the sphere of theology ; he may recall such
qualities of heart and head as characterised the
Emperor William and his son Frederick, and such
men as Bismarck. He may lack the Frenchman's
vivacity, the Dutchman's stiffness, and the English
man's practical common sense ; but he has other
qualities which make him second to no other
as a factor in the civilisation of Europe. He is
fond of books — mystical, metaphysical books — and he
has the knack of making things in general, especially
things which are somewhat ambiguous, as clear as
mud by his powers of reason. In some things,
especially in theological matters, he puts the cart
before the horse, but this is a kind of stupidity that

THE JACK TAR AND THE JEW. 257
belongs to most men outside the kingdom of light.
Mr N. was a kind-hearted fellow, but he had no
kindness to spare for the Jew. He could not help
hating the Jew, and showing it by his words and looks.
The Jew naturally, resented this, and there were
sometimes rather serious quarrels. They sometimes
reminded us of the story that is told of a poor
ignorant sailor who went to a church in London for
the first time in his life, and heard a sermon on the
sufferings of Jesus. The minister told the audience
how the Jews had persecuted and crucified Jesus ;
and Jack, with his usual sense of fairplay, felt that
the Jews must have been a cruel-hearted people. On
leaving the church and walking along the street, his
companion said to him, " Bill, there is one of them
Jews." Jack at once accosted the Jew, saying, "Are
you a Jew?" "Yes," replied the Jew. "Then it
was you," said Bill, "that crucified Jesus, who was
so good and kind." " No," replied the Jew; " it was
my forefathers." " No, no," said Bill; "come on,
you rascal, and I'll give you a thrashing! " Between
the German and the Jew on board the Dunottar
Castle we had more than once to act the part of a
mediator. "Why, Mr N., do you cherish and mani
fest such a spirit towards the Jews ?" " The Jews,"
he replied, "are the source or cause of nearly all our
troubles in the Transvaal. Many of them know me
as connected with a Society in the Fatherland which
is opposed to them, and they consequently hate me.
They are a mean lot." Mr N.'s judgment was not
always the clearest or strongest part of his nature.
He was often inspired to speak and act neither by

258 THE JEW.
the spirit of the Gospel, nor with the wisdom that
guides a practical statesman.
The Jew. — Were Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to
return to earth, we would be most unwilling to blame
them if they failed to recognise as their children in
affection and spirit those Jews who still say, "We
have Abraham to our father." Well might the patri
arch exclaim, " La, la, la ; they are a degenerated
race." There has been a gradual languishing of those
lofty endeavours which characterised the patriarchs,
and of those intellectual and moral powers which
have exalted and dignified other nations. The
modern Jew, whether among the hills and plains of
Syria, or in the rag stores of London, or upon the
gold and diamond fields of the Transvaal, is no more
like Abraham than the modern Italian is like the
ancient Roman. His love of gold has greatly re
duced his Abrahamic' nobility of thought, and
rendered his love of God and of religion generally
more a withered form than a vital reality. Mr. E.
had not the high forehead, nor much of the aqui
line nose that would satisfy Napoleon's conditions as
to bulk, nor much of the subtle mouth, which often
intimates, by its restless play, the thoughts which pro
ceed from the lips, and so we mistook him for a
friend of our own in the Island of Skye ! " No, no,"
said Mr. E.; "lama Jew, and I was born in Austria.
I am a dealer in gold and silver and precious stones."
We had long and interesting conversations with Mr.
E. and his wife, chiefly on the subject of religion.
Both attended Divine service on the Lord's day,
and seemed to be interested. While professing to

AN INTERESTING STORY. 259
be Jews in religion and loyal to the laws of their
church, they were not unwilling to be informed, or
to hear all that we had to say about Jesus.
We have reason to believe or hope that our con
versations with these Jews may eventually, under
the Divine blessing, lead them to embrace Jesus as
the only promised Saviour.
The Conversion of a Jew. — One day, as stated by
an eminent American divine, a Jew was seen enter
ing a Christian church and listening with evident
relish to a Gospel sermon. As he remained in the
church after the congregation retired, the minister
went to him and said, " Sir, I presume I am address
ing one of the children of Abraham." " You are
quite correct," said the stranger, "and I will try in a
few words to explain why I am here." The following
in substance was the stranger's explanation : — " He
was a man of means, of high social standing and
superior education. He had lived many years in
London, and there his wife died, leaving him to care
for their only child. The girl was handsome, clothed
with beauty as with a mantle ; she was highly
educated, could read and speak fluently several
languages, and was of a very amiable disposition.
The father naturally loved her, and she loved him.
At the age of seventeen she became unwell. The
bloom of health faded from her cheek, her eye lost
its lustre, her strength decayed, and she was at
length confined to a bed of sickness, which proved
to be her bed of death. One day, when she was
very ill, the father entered the room, and she held
out her wasted hand to him. He having taken her

260 THE ELOQUENCE OF A DAUGHTER.
by the hand, she said, ' My dear father, do you love
me?' 'My child, you know that I love yob, — -that
you are more to me than this whole world.' ' But,
father, my dearest father, do you love me?' The
father at this point could not answer. She then said,
' I know, my dear father, that you have ever loved
me, that you have been the kindest of parents, and I
tenderly love you. Will you grant me one request,
O my father ! it is the dying request of your daughter;
— will you grant it ?' ' My dearest child, ask what
you will ; though it take all of my property, whatever
it may be, it shall be granted. I will grant it.' ' My
dear father, I beg you never again to speak against
Jesus of Nazareth.' The father was dumb with
astonishment. 'Jesus,' continued the girl, 'has
manifested Himself to me on this sick-bed. I believe
He will save me, and I feel that I am going to be
with Him. I entreat you, dear father, get a New
Testament, that tells of Him ; and I pray that you
may know Him, and that when I am no more you
may bestow on Him the love which you have hitherto
given to me.' Soon after this the girl died, and
the father was greatly distressed. The first thing he
did after committing the remains of his sweet
daughter to the dust was to procure a copy of the
New Testament, and now, says the divine, he is
numbered among the meek and humble followers of
the Lamb." This story, so far as we could remem
ber, we related to Mrs. E., and she seemed to be
greatly impressed by it.
The Scandinavian. — The Scandinavian professed
to be a sceptic. To him everything was uncertain.

THE TYPICAL SCEPTIC. 2 6 1
But he was not, as we ventured to suggest, inspired
with a love for truth or a sincere search after it. He
preferred to hang somewhere in the air, like a spider
in its web, balancing himself between the pros and
cons of every argument, moving only when he was'
moved, and was at length no more advanced, no
more enlightened, than he was when the discussion
began. The typical sceptic questions everything*
and believes nothing. He never forms a creed, is
never convinced, and all that he ever knows is that
he knows nothing ! There is no satisfying of the
sceptic with the result of an argument or the out
come of an investigation. This seemed to be the
chief mental characteristic of our Scandinavian friend.
In proportion as any man fails to love truth for its
own sake, or loves to know with certainty what is
true, so will he fail to be happy. The mind forces
or the moral nature will become weak, and he will
doubt that he doubts. The sceptic as a rule lacks
common sense, and is only what is called a sensible
man. Common sense involves not only sense, but
reason to judge aright, whereas ¦ the sensible man
hears but does not understand, sees but does not
perceive. The sceptic is half-brother to the scandal-monger,
who lives and moves in an atmosphere of mean
passions, and desecrates talents which ought to be
exercised for higher and better ends. The aim of
the scandal-monger is not to exalt and ennoble our
ideas of human nature, but to desecrate them, or
reduce them by vile insinuations and unsparing
invective. The sceptic, Satan-like, takes pleasure

262 THE SCANDINAVIAN.
in making ruins. Where he cannot hope, jto argue
with success, he looks, on with a sarcastic sneer.
For those who profess to believe in anything beyond
the horizon of time and sense, or to find consolation in
the hopes of the Gospel, his face may beam with a
sneering ridicule and scornful disdain. The reader
must not suppose that all this is meant to apply
seriously to our Scandinavian friend. We only
mean these remarks to apply to sceptics in general.
Our Scandinavian friend professed to be a follower
of Auguste Comte, the founder of the religion of
humanity, of whom it is said that, "When a boy he
quarrelled with his teachers, when a man he quarrelled
with himself, and when a married man he quarrelled
with his wife." His aim was to make a religion
without God and immortality, which proved a harder
task for him than the making of bricks without straw
to the old Hebrews. The Scandinavian might think,
as most other sceptics think, that, as he was not very
clever himself, he should be found in fellowship with
such characters as the Marquis of Queensberry,
Frederic Harrison, George Eliot, and young Clifford,
who with his own hand wrote the following epitaph
for his tomb : " I was not ;. I lived and loved ; I am
not. The Scotsman. — We approach the study and ex
press our views of this character with some diffidence.
He walks the deck of our floating castle as " monarch
of all he surveys, whose right there is none to dis
pute." You see a shrewdness in his looks, a mixture
of simplicity and stern boldness sparkling in his eye, a
warmth of heart beaming from his countenance, and

TYPICAL SCOTSMAN. 263
a calculating self-reserve in his manner of speech and
action. The process by which he comes to believe
may be slow, but he is always sure, because his
convictions are always his own. The typical Scots
man never walks on borrowed stilts ; and he never
seems to be what he is not. He means what he
says, and says what he means. Though cool and
calculating in his nature, he is not without energy and
enthusiasm ; and when he sets his heart upon a thing,
a point to be reached, he finds the way to it. He
has a constitution that bears up under the severest
toils, a courage that dangers cannot daunt, a fortitude
that reckons sufferings a triumph, and the energy
that works on even in face of despair. Whether as
a soldier or as a sailor, or as a missionary, or as an
artizan, or as a common labourer, the typical Scots
man is brave and persevering.
A mean fellow once accosted the late Sir James
Simpson, intending to vex him by reminding him of
his humble pedigree, and said, " I remember you
when a boy carrying bread and biscuits to my
father's house." " Indeed," replied Sir James, "had
it been you, you would be carrying scones to this
day." There are professors in our Universities to-day
who were once as humble in worldly circumstances
as the late Sir James Simpson or the late Dr.
Livingstone. There are ministers in all our churches,
who could be named by the score, who were at one
time as poor as Gideon or as homeless as Moses, or
as great toilers as Paul. The Scottish character for
self-command and forethought, for strong faith and

264

SANDY AND MRS. SIDDONS.

plodding perseverance, may be equalled, but it can'
hardly be surpassed.
" Sandy's " stiffness is exceptionable. His spirit
and manner mark an extreme trait of Scottish
character. If you tell " Sandy " that his house is on
fire, he may look at you and say, "I'll see about it."
" Sandy " may go and hear a Mrs. Siddons in the
Music Hall, Edinburgh, and after hearing and seeing
the best that a mortal can do, take out his snuff-box,
give it the orthodox knock on the lid, take a snuff,
hand the box to Donald, and then say, " Well, that's
no' bad !" This trait belongs especially to a few men
who were born and brought up in the neighbourhood
of hills covered with perpetual snow. Scotsmen
as a race hate meanness ; as a people they are
magnanimous.

CHAPTER XXII.

LIFE ON BOARD THE "DUNOTTAR
CASTLE ;"
TENERIFE, MADEIRA.
!HE voyage from Cape Town to
Madeira might be regarded as
almost a purely pleasure excursion.
There were no high winds and no
furious waves to disturb the onward
progress of the Dunottar Castle, and
so we advanced so many hundred
miles every day as upon a sheet of glass. The heat
of the tropics was the only thing that any one com
plained of. Everything also was favourable to all
kinds of innocent amusement and recreation. Young
men and maidens, old men and matrons, as well as
the boys and girls, occupied many hours almost
every day with a variety of games, racings, and
dancings. In the evenings, immediately before the
sun disappeared, the decks and saloons were brilliantly
lighted with the electric light, and became one gay
scene of amusement till 10 o'clock. General Rigid-
man and Mrs. Starchy, Mrs. Haughty and Miss

266 METAPHORICAL THAW.
Dazzle, Mr. Stiffback and Mrs. Grundy, fell through
the ice of formality at the first dinner table, and we
never saw them again ! The thaw of kindly feeling
and good humour every day prevailed. That healthy,
plump, Irish matron, who wore a pair of gold spectacles
and so many diamond rings, and who insisted upon
calling a certain individual " Uncle," did much to
keep down the starchiness of a few. The sonsy
Captain and Mr. B., the M.P., could not at times
restrain themselves. The priests on board?, though
in the tropics, were not tropical in their manner.
Priests and Protestant ministers, Members of
Parliament and scribes of the "fourth estate," health-
seekers and diamond diggers, wealthy farmers and
mining speculators, doctors and bankers, lawyers and
legislators, men of all sorts and sizes, from different
countries and of various professions, joined together
in bonds of a temporary kinship, and vied with each
other how to make the voyage agreeable to all. We
were not all alike, I am sorry to admit. Some things
were lost during the voyage, which were never found
again. One gentleman lost a gold watch and chain,
which he valued at .£150, and the thief was not dis
covered ; but the gentleman, it was alleged, was not
wholly blameless.
The first day of the week was invariably kept with
the utmost possible decorum. At 10.30 a.m. the
bells were rung, and soon the large saloon was well
filled with a number of the officers and passengers.
On two Sabbaths the Rev. Father Pullar conducted
the service and preached. One day the subject of
his discourse was " The Sinlessness of Jesus." He

DISCOURSE BY A REVEREND FATHER. 267
reasoned admirably to show that Jesus was different
from all other men in so many particulars, and
specially in this, that He was without sin. Among
men in all ages, and in all nations, the sense of sin
has been an acknowledged fact. Jesus is the only
exception. History, science, and philosophy, as
well as Scripture, were used to prove that Jesus must
have been God — God manifest in the flesh. On the
evening of that Sabbath the Rev. Mr. Knaggs, Lon
don, delivered an eloquent sermon from the words,
" There was no more sea." After the service that
evening we had a conversation with the Captain,
who, among other things, told us incidentally that he
belonged to one of the Ayrshire Covenanters named
Peden. The following Lord's Day, divine service
was again conducted by the Rev. Father Pullar, but
there was a much smaller audience. He preached
from the text, " All things work together for good to
them that love God." The sermon was good, but
the audience was not quite so sympathetic as on the
previous Sabbath. In the evening I preached to a
specially large gathering from the words, "He
brought them into their desired haven." We were
pleased to see present not only the Captain and
most of the officers, Mr. B., M.P., and his lady, the
Rev. Father Pullar, and the Rev. Mr. Darrell, but a
number of those who were not unwilling to be
regarded as Agnostics. The sermon was rather
hurriedly written during the voyage, but I promised
that if ever it should be printed, it would be printed
in this volume as it had been written and delivered
that evening.

268 ANCIENT AND MODERN NAVIGATION.
THE VOYAGE OF LIFE.
" He bringeth them unto their desired haven." —
Psalm cvii. 30.
In the text and context we have a description of a
stormy sea voyage. The Mediterranean sea, though
comparatively tideless and calm, had latent powers
which no. sailors could afford to despise ; and when it
manifested these powers, every man would be as
ready, to cry to his God for protection as were those
who manned the ship in which Jonah essayed to sail
to Tarshish. The sea has no respect of persons.
In all ages it has placed the best as well as the
worst of men in jeopardy. Even Jesus was tossed
by the billows and drenched by the spray. of the
Sea of Galilee ; and Paul, His great Apostle, was no
stranger to the perils of the deep.
A seafaring life, in modern times, is comparatively
free from the difficulties and dangers which beset it
in ancient times. While the voyager in any of our
Atlantic liners may not be wholly exempt from a
little sea-sickness at times, or from the reeling and
staggering to which the Psalmist refers in the context,
he has advantages to which voyagers in ancient times
were utter strangers.
There is hardly any comparison between the ships
of ancient Phoenicia and those of modern times.
The vessels which sailed to and from the Piraeus at
Athens, or from the seaports of Asia Minor, or the
corn ships of Alexandria, were but as tiny timber
toys in comparison with the huge iron vessels which
now sail upon the Atlantic.

HUMAN SCIENCE NOT EVERYTHING. 269
Modern science and art have done great things for
us, both in respect of ship construction and the means
of navigation. The modern mariner has acquired
such a knowledge of earth and air, sea and sky, that
he can go thousands of miles from the sight of land,
and yet steer to the port of his destination with al
most all the directness of an arrow from the bow, and
with all the confidence of one who moves forward
upon iron rails. Give him to behold the sun by day
and the stars by night, his chart of the ocean and
his rightly-poised compass, and he will steer for his
desired haven without any hesitation.
It was not always so. May we therefore boast be
cause of our superior advantages ? Can we reason
ably regard our science and art as in any sense sub
stitutes for Him who holds the sea in the hollow of
His hand, and of old guided the tempest-tossed
voyagers to their desired haven ? Verily not. " Let
not the wise man glory in his wisdom, nor the mighty
man in his strength." There are mysteries connected
with the sea which human science cannot explore or
explain. There are euroclydon tempests which no
amount of nautical knowledge can foresee and dan
gers which no human skill can avert. Fourteen
days of gloomy heavens and fourteen nights of star
less skies are as possible to-day upon the bosom of
the Atlantic as they were when Paul tossed amid the
billows of the Adriatic or when he suffered ship
wreck upon the Mediterranean. That these things
are possible, and that human science and skill are
powerless to avert them, and that the stoutest hearts
in these circumstances may quake and cry unto the

270 HUMAN LIFE A STORMY VOYAGE.
Lord for deliverance, could easily be demonstrated
from the history of modern shipwrecks. But we pro
ceed to deal with the text and context as representing
certain aspects of human life.
(1) I remark, in the first place, that human life
is compared to a stormy voyage. — When first we
breathe we are launched upon the ocean of time.
From that moment our course whether straight
or crooked, the voyage whether turbulent or calm,
the journey of life whether long or short, is ever
onwards towards that haven where the wicked
cease from troubling and the weary are at rest.
Our barks are frail and perishable at the best.
Our souls, such as they are, great or small, good
or bad, wise or foolish, dwell in frail taber
nacles of clay, whose foundations are in the dust.
Every day we journey into the future as blind men
or as those who walk in the dark. We know not
what a day or even an hour may bring to pass. The
future is about as dark and trackless to human
pilgrims as the depths of ocean are unknown and
trackless to the mariner. The wisest of men are
.•ever in the neighbourhood of " hidden dangers,
snares unknown."
No course of life which men can adopt in this
world can be wholly free from storms, or is far removed
from dangers. In the mental as in the material
world there are fogs, and what can human science
and power do in a fog ? The sun for days may
withhold his light, and the stars for nights may refuse
to shine. The winds may become contrary, the billows
.may become fierce, and the floods may lift up their

LIFES TROUBLES. ' 27 1
waves and make a mighty noise. At times all things
natural, moral, and spiritual may seem to be against us,
and our deepest thought maybe expressed in thewords
of the patriarch, " All these things are against me."
No sooner are some men launched upon the ocean of
time or circumstances, than fathers and mothers for
sake them, relatives become fickle and friends become
false, "One day kind, the next day leave us."
Health fails them, worldly possessions vanish, and
their best hopes prove no better than ropes of sand
or than an anchor that is either not long enough or
strong enough to keep them from drifting.
Men thus tossed about amid the billows of adverse
circumstances may naturally feel as those who reel to
and fro and stagger on board ship in a stormy sea.
Where human science has no power to penetrate, or
where human wisdom and wealth cannot afford the
means of relief, men may readily surrender themselves
to a state of stoical indifference or abandon themselves
to feelings of despair. Men who are ignorant of God's
revealed will, or who greedily devour almost every
book but the Bible when brought into stormy circum
stances, are apt to be angry or to " curse God, and
die." Men, whose god is gold, or self, or the world,
or the powers of human science, or who may be as
ignorant of God's ways of Providence as the birds
are of the message that runs along the wires upon
which they are perched, when pressed by the storms
of adversity, become as those bereft of reason. Men
whose wills have not been trained to bend like the
willow, will readily break with the storm. When
domestic sorrows, or social disturbances, or com-

272 THE CAPTAIN OF OUK SALVATION.
mercial disasters, or physical pains come to them,
their reason may begin to reel, or they mentally
stagger and fall as the drunk man. These men have
not yet learned in the school of Him who said, "In
the world ye shall have tribulation." They do not
know as yet that —
" The path of sorrow, and it alone,
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown."
These have not yet the character of those referred to
in the context. Those referred to in the context are
not as "the fool, who says in his heart, There is no
God," but rather as Job when the floods of adversity
threatened to overwhelm him, or when he said,
"Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him."
When they reel and stagger like a drunken man, and
are at their wits' end, then they cry unto the Lord,
and He bringeth them out of their distress.
(2)1 remark, in the second place, that those whom
God saves or brings unto their desired haven are
related to Christ somewhat as ordinary voyagers are
related to the captain of the ship in which they sail. —
There is a wonderful unity in variety exhibited in
such a vessel as this. The vessel from stem to stern
is a unity, and the captain commands the vessel,
with all her variety of passengers, all her officers,
men, and means, towards the desired haven. The
voyagers may be very varied in respect of their homes
in the world, their ultimate destinations and in respect
to the countries to which they belong, and their
spheres of life and action, but meanwhile we are
bound to this vessel, and to the port of her destina-

NO MUTINY. 273
tion, by chains of thought and desire which we would
not have snapped. On board this ship we are
prisoners of hope. Our faith in the captain's know
ledge of the laws of navigation and powers of com
mand, our faith in the ship's stability, and our hope
with respect to the port that leads to the land of
many mansions, or to our varied homes, make us as
one family. Is not this a faint emblem of the Church
of Christ, concerning whom it is said, —
" God in the midst of her doth dwell,
Nothing shall her remove,
The Lord to her an helper will,
And that right early, prove."
Does this not, at least, dimly represent the radical
relationship between Christ, "the Captain of our
salvation, "and those whom He brings at length unto
their desired haven ? Between Christ and His people
there can be nothing of the nature of mutiny. He
may give orders during the voyage which they can
not fully understand, and directions which, to sense
and reason, may be hard to obey ; He may deal
with them as He dealt with Paul when he prayed
three times for the removal of the thorn in the flesh,
or as He dealt with the sisters of Lazarus when they
besought Him to come and prevent the death of
their brother ; and all these things may not be joyous,
but grievous. But, notwithstanding, they will love
Him and cleave to Him, as the limpet to the rock.
Whatever trials and sorrows may be to others, their
* " Trials make the promise sweet,
Their trials give new life to prayer."

274 TYPICAL EXPERIENCES.
These things were typified in the history of the
early disciples. You remember when Jesus con
strained His disciples to get into a ship and cross to
the other side, that is, to the other side of the sea of
Galilee (Mark vi. 45). They were constrained,
mark you, evidently implying that they were unwill
ing or reluctant to go. They went, however, and
that night they encountered a fearful storm. Although
they were fishermen, and had been accustomed to a
seafaring life from their earliest years, they were
baffled that night to reach the opposite shore. They
toiled in rowing, we are told, the whole night, and
made little or no progress, because the wind was
contrary. This to some men may seem a matter of
no great importance. But I say it was typical of
what often happens, and especially in the experience
of those with whom God deals effectually. In the
case of the early disciples, it was intended to be
as the" root to the fruit, as the life to the body, as the
key to the lock, as fire to, the fuel, as the fountain to
the stream. It was intended to teach them not only
that in the path of duty they would meet with a
stormy opposition, but also that without Christ they
could do nothing. In the fourth watch of the night,
or about three o'clock in the morning, very likely
when they were in their extremity, they saw what
they thought was a spirit coming towards them, and
they were paralysed with fear. By that time, how
ever, their sense of self-sufficiency was gone ; they had
measured their powers with the storm, and were
conquered. By the discipline of that stormy night
and the gracious intercession of Him who was upon

THE ONLY SAVIOUR. 275
the shore, they had reached that state in which God's
grace was made sufficient for them,. and His strength
made perfect in their weakness. As soon as they
recognised Him He entered the ship and brought
them safely to the desired haven.
(3) I observe, in the third and last place, that the
Person referred to in the text, or who saves Israel in
all ages, is Jesus Christ.— What He did of old He
does still, for He is the Redeemer from all evil. He
brings His people in from the wilderness of nature
and brings them up in the kingdom of grace, and
when they are meet to be partakers of the heavenly
inheritance, He brings them home to the kingdom
of glory. He who of old took the Hebrews out of
the land of Egypt and brought them into the land of
Canaan, who turned back the captivity, of Israel in
Babylon, and brought them home to Jerusalem,
now brings His people from the east and from
the west, from the north and from the south, and
gives them an abundant entrance into their desired
haven. In no case do they bring themselves. No vessel
has yet been known to steer its own course across
the trackless sea. You might reasonably regard my
statement as absurd were I seriously to affirm that
this steamer could go from any of the ports of
Great Britain to any of the ports of South Africa
without the power that comes from knowledge and
wisdom behind the helm. There are men, however,
who seem to imagine what is even more absurd.
There have been men, and there are men still, who
think they can establish a righteousness of their own,

276 MYSTERIOUS STEERING.
or be saved by their own self-originated, self-regu
lated, self-sufficient merits. As no mere mechanical
arrangement — steam power or wind force — can be
sufficient to move a vessel over the waves to a
desired haven, so no man, whether Jew or Greek,
learned or ignorant, rich or poor, can steer his course
over the restless ocean of time, and enter heaven at
last, without Christ. Of Him, the incarnate Truth,
we must say or sing, —
"lam the way, the truth, the life :
No son of human race,
But such as I conduct and guide,
Shall see My Father's face."
There is much that is mysterious to an ordinary
voyager in the course and steering of a ship at sea.
In the course of a sailing vessel there is a great deal
of indirect steering. In order to avoid some invisible
rocks or some banks of sand, to get fresh supplies
of food and water, or in order to catch the breeze,
the captain may have to give orders that will seem
at variance with the way of progress. At such times
it may seem to ignorant voyagers as if the ship were
going backwards rather than forwards. But things
are not always as they seem. From the time the
ship leaves the harbour, till she reaches the port of
her destination, that port is ever present to the
captain's mind, and however strange his orders and
actions may seem at times to be, they are never
inconsistent with his aim to enter that port.
This so much illustrates the Christian life that the
poet has expressed it thus : —

"TO YONDER SIDE." 277
" How strange is the course that a Christian must steer,
How perplexed is the path he must tread ;
The hope of his happiness rises from fear,
And receives his life from the dead."
Another poet refers to it thus :—
" When first the Saviour wakened me,
And showed me why He died,
He pointed o'er life's narrow sea,
And said, — 'To yonder side."'
" Yonder side " means home ; not the sheltered rock
or the quiet bay, not a temporary refuge or a road
side inn, but home — the desired haven. But " To
yonder side " means under-currents and cross seas,
stern conflicts, and contrary winds, —
" Many a sorrow, many a tear."
It may mean thirty or forty years' discipline in the
wilderness of circumstances ; it may mean being
shunted off the rails of active life by misfortune, or
laid in the chamber of sickness by accident ; but
whatever it may be to the Christian at present, it
means eventually eternal redemption. The poet
thus describes the voyage of life : —
" ' Now launch the bark,' the Saviour cried,
The chosen twelve stood by,
' And let us cross to yonder side,
Where the hills are steep and high.'
" Gently the bark o'er the water creeps,
While the swelling sail they spread,
And the wearied Saviour gently sleeps
With a pillow 'neath His head.

278 "TO YONDER SIDE.'
" On downy bed the world seeks rest —
Sleep flies the guilty eye —
But he who leans on the Father's breast
May sleep when storms are nigh.
" But soon the lowering sky grew dark
O'er Bashan's rocky brow —
The storm rushed down upon the bark,
And waves dashed o'er the prow.
" The pale disciples trembling spake,
While yawned the watery grave,
' We perish, Master — -Master, wake —
Carest Thou not to save?'
" Calmly He rose with sovereign will,
And hushed the storm to rest.
' Ye waves,' He whispered, ' Peace ! be still ! '
They calmed like a pardoned breast.
" So have I seen a fearful storm
O'er wakened sinner roll,
Till Jesus' voice and Jesus' form
Said, ' Peace, thou weary soul.'
" When first the Saviour wakened me,
And showed me why He died,
He pointed o'er life's narrow sea,
And said, ' To yonder side' "

TENERIFE.

The following day (Monday), we were all on the
outlook for Tenerife. Early in the morning we
were within a hundred miles from it, and at 9 o'clock
a.m. there was nothing of the nature of terra firma

A GRAND SIGHT. 279
visible. Shortly after that hour there was a sudden
and general rush to the front of the vessel, as if
some one had fallen overboard. "What," said one,
" are they all running to see ? Is it a passing ship,
or is it a whale?" "No," was the reply, "it is
neither a passing ship nor a whale, but it is Tenerife,
one of the largest of the Canary Islands." Notwith
standing the general excitement, I own to have been
somewhat sang froid or apathetic, but as Mrs. C.
claimed to have been the first to see it, I had to
yield and go with her to look at it. " Don't you see
it?" "No, I do not. You must," I said, "be as those
who looked at the lion in Trafalgar Square, London,
and believed that they saw its tail wagging, proving
that men often see* what they wish to see." At
length we actually saw Tenerife. We had been
looking at it all the time, but at first it looked like a
cloud. We were still in the tropics, and could not
believe that it was possible to see a mountain covered
with snow within a hundred miles of us.
Tenerife is about 12,250 feet above the sea level.
We had seen nothing in all our rambles so magnify
cent, nothing so grand in appearance, since we last
gazed upon the Alpine heights of Switzerland. On
coming nearer and seeing it more fully, we felt as if
its magnificence dwarfed our Dunottar Castle. The
mountain slopes running down close to the sea were
covered with various plants, green shrubs, and a rich
verdure. The graceful palm reared its head above
the thickets, while the little hills and dales were
covered with vineyards and fruit trees. The whole
scene was in striking contrast to our immediate sur-

280 ARRIVAL AT MADEIRA.
roundings. We learned that the word Tenerife
was derived from the ancient dialect of Palma—
thener, signifying a mountain, and ife, white— and
that the whole island was about sixty miles in length
and thirty miles in breadth.
Of late years the island of Tenerife has been
attractive to a large number of Europeans or Eng
lish-speaking invalids. Many have sought and found
there the conditions of rest and restoration to health
which they failed to find elsewhere.

MADEIRA.
Another day's sailing brought us to the bay of
Madeira. The houses of Madeira are not very large,
nor very numerous, but they have all a cosy appear
ance. The town, built upon the slopes of the hill,
reminded us of the town of Syra, in Greece. The
climate of Madeira is said to be superior to that of
the Riviera, and is more uniform throughout the year
than that of the Delta in Egypt. As a health resort
it is more popular, perhaps because more convenient,
than Tenerife. The hotels and boarding-houses are
sufficiently numerous, commodious and comfortable,
and it cannot be said that the prices are very exorbi
tant. The population of the town is said to be about
140,000. Hundreds of men and women are said to
be living at Madeira because they had too much
money, or were too stupid to know its proper use
and to act on the laws of moderation in their own

EXPERT DIVING BOYS. 28 1
countries. They have been shunted away to that
island home, among strangers, to learn, as by force,
what they should have learned as rational and respon
sible agents elsewhere. This much at least we learned
from some who had been there for a few months, and
came on board the Dunottar on their way home.
We were not very long in the bay till we were
surrounded with a host of boys and young lads in
small. boats, shouting in the best English at their
command that they would dive for sixpence, and
pass underneath the ship to the other side for a
shilling. It was marvellous to see these young lads
diving for a silver coin, going down a long way and
bringing it up, sometimes in their teeth, sometimes
between their toes, and sometimes in their hand.
One little fellow offered to dive from the highest
part of the hurricane deck for a shilling. A gentle
man agreed to give him a shilling. Up the boy came,
and when he was ready to jump the shilling was
thrown down. Down the boy went after it, and soon
reappeared on the other side of the steamer, with the
shilling between his teeth.
On turning away from these boys and their
exploits, we found our steamer converted into some
thing like a bazaar or fancy fair. We found around
us on the decks almost everything that was beautiful
and costly in Madeira. There were cane-made
chairs, all sorts and sizes, cabinet boxes and pretty
baskets, various articles of jewellery and of em
broidery, little dogs and birds in cages, all offered
for sale^ A number of the articles were bought for
about one half of the prices sought for them.

282 PARTING WITH FRIENDS.
We were sorry to part with a number of our fellow-
passengers at Madeira. Mr. B., M.P., and his lady,
with their servants, went off here ; also the Rev. Mr.
Knaggs and his devoted spouse, and a few others,
who had resolved to make sure that the winter would
be over and gone before they went home to old
England. We who went on learned by experience
that they had acted wisely. Not only had we to
contend with a jiorth-east gale, which made some of
us to stagger and wish for the end of the voyage, but
we had to endure a piercing cold wind that made us
shiver from head to foot. Any other vessel in the
gale through which we passed would have been
tossed as a plaything by the waves, but the Dunottar
passed over them and through them as a giant in his
strength. The big waves on each side of us were
thrown back as if terrified and subdued by the
Dunottar 's very presence.

CHAPTER XXIII.

MISCELLANEOUS.

HE grand object of travelling,"
says Dr. Samuel Johnson, "is to see
the shores of the Mediterranean.
On these shores were the four great
Empires of the world,— the Assyrian,
the Persian, the Grecian, and the
Roman. All our religion, almost
all our law, almost all our arts, almost all that sets us
above savages, has come to us from the shores of
the Mediterranean." If this be true, the use of our
travelling to the shores of South Africa must have
been to "regulate imagination to reality, or instead
of thinking how things might be, to see them as they
are." We cannot say that we went to the land be
yond the "line" expecting to see anything very sur
prising, or anything very grand. What we did see,
with the "light we carried with us to see," we have
endeavoured to make known to our readers.

284 BUSHMEN AND HOTTENTOTS.
WHAT MAY HAVE BEEN, AND WHAT IS.
Before we went to South Africa some one tried to
assure us that we would see quite a number of
strange things, or all things contrary. All the trees,
plants, flowers, birds, would be such as we had never
seen before. The earth and the sea would appear
in strange colours and sparkling beauties ; and in the
sky we should behold such constellations as are
never seen in northern climes. It was alleged that we
would see " wool growing upon the heads of men,
and hair upon the backs of sheep," men with their
hair long, and women with their hair short ; women
tilling the land and building huts, while men, as their
lords, looked on, smoking tobacco.
These strange and contrary things Dr. Living
stone and others may have seen, and many similar
things still more strange, but they have nearly all
disappeared — especially the terrestrial things — from
the gaze of the modern traveller.
The Bushmen and the Hottentots were the
strangest specimens of humanity we ever saw. Al
though the majority of the Bushmen are to be found
in the more desolate parts of the karoo, and among
the most inaccessible hills and valleys of the Colonies,
some of them may be seen at times within the more
civilised parts of the country. Of all races or tribes
we ever saw, they are perhaps the least intelligent-look
ing. The Hottentots seemed to be little better than
the Bushmen. Both tribes* mentally, morally, and
otherwise, seem to be at the extremes of the human
scale. The Bedouin races of Syria, and the abori-

ZULUS AND KAFIRS. 285
gines, or Fellaheen, in the Delta of Egypt, as well as
the races of Arabia and on the banks of the Nile,
seemed to us to be much higher and more hopeful
than either of these tribes. Originally nomadic,
like the Midiartites in the days of Gideon, their
movements are now circumscribed by other and
more powerful races. They are still notorious
thieves, and will not scruple to murder when they
think it necessary to do so in order to accomplish
their purpose. In 1652 they had large flocks of
sheep and oxen, but now their stock is very limited.
They live on the raw products of the soil, and
on certain kinds of food obtained by stealing.
While strongly sympathising with those who seek
to preserve the aboriginal tribes against the domi
nant and destructive powers of certain classes of
Europeans in South and Central Africa, there is
little ground to hope that these aborigines will ever
become factors in the coming Christian civilisation of
Africa. It is otherwise with the Zulus and Kafirs. We
are not prepared to homologate the philosophy of
Miss Colenso's efforts in seeking the liberation of
the Zulu Prince from St. Helena and his exaltation
to power in Zululand. His exile in St. Helena,
along with others, may seem to be a hardship at the
present time, but, in the interests of Christian
civilisation, it seems to us to be necessary. There is
a strong disposition on the part of the native races to
combine to overthrow the " white man's " reign over
them, and if they get a chance they will try and do it.
The native races are said to be very lazy. They
u

286 SUGGESTIONS FOR JOHN BULL.
can work, but they won't if they can help it. " Here
and there," says Froude, "the farmer in South Africa
makes a fortune, but generally the whites will not
work, because they expect the blacks to work for
them.. The blacks will not work, because they
prefer to be idle." Hence the ubiquitous presence
of John Chinaman. John Chinaman, however, will
join with John Zuluman and John Kafirman to try
their united strength with John Bull's army, unless
John Bull learns to put down his foot a little more
firmly than he has done.
There should be no unnecessary tenderness shown
to the natives of the Colonies. The Zulus and
Kafirs are very apt to misunderstand the legislation
that is provided specially for their advantage. We
question the wisdom of a professedly Christian
Government making laws in favour of polygamy, or
making rules by which a people, naturally indolent
can indulge their laziness. Had the British Govern
ment, thirty years ago, put down their foot, and
given the same laws to the blacks that they have
given to the whites, there would be less difficulty in
dealing with the natives to-day. The sooner the
British Government do away with their present
tentative measures the better.

SECRET OF NATIONAL GREATNESS. 287
THE FUTURE OF SOUTH AFRICA.
Every one seems to believe that there is a great
future in store for South Africa. We have no reason
to doubt this. But that great future, come when it
may, will depend less upon its gold and diamond
fields, its sheep, wool, and ostrich farming, and other
branches of industry, than upon the moral tone of
the people, and their right training of the young in
the fear of God.
Our hopes for the future of Africa are based firmly
upon their right relation to the Gospel of Jesus
Christ, the hopes which it is fitted to inspire, and
the fruits which faith in Christ never fails to yield.
The foundations of true success, commercial pros
perity and political power, can only be laid in the
moral character of the people. The foundations of
Africa's future greatness are now being laid in the
nurseries or in the homes and schools of the Colonies.
God will bless and prosper the nation that shows its
love and devotion to Jesus Christ.
A community or nation that acts the selfish part of
the rich man in our Lord's parable, must be held as
a stranger to the first principles of true progress. If
the people of South Africa, because of greed for gold
or diamonds, allow their Lazarus, — that is the
heathen, — to lie and die at their gate, they will find
that "withholding more than is meet tendeth to
poverty." A selfish, worldly community can never
truly thrive.
The poor woman who had only a morsel of food
for herself and her son, and was about to starve to

288 A MESSAGE PERVERTED.
death, might naturally regard the man of God as un
reasonable when he said to her, " Make me thereof a
little cake first, and then make for thee and thy son."
It was well that the woman complied with that
demand. Let the Church at home and abroad learn
the principle that underlies that transaction, and go
and do likewise. Let her support and extend the
cause of Jesus Christ, and verily God will bless her,
and the nation through her instrumentality.
" The earth her fruit shall yield,
Our God shall blessing send.
God shall us bless ; men shall Him fear
Unto earth's utmost end."

STORIES WORTH RECORDING.
Among the many stories recited in our hearing on
board ship the following may be taken as speci
mens : — THE PERVERSION OF A MESSAGE.
It is alleged that the modern "brilliant French
man " had engaged to deliver a lecture in West
minster Abbey, and that he had to announce the
subject of it by means of the telegraph. The sub
ject, as stated by him in the French capital, was,
"The Influence of Rome on the Formation of
Christianity." It was published in London as " The
Influence of Rum on the Digestion of Humanity."
This story may apply to the ritualist.

BISHOPS WITHOUT BREECHES. 289
AN EFFECTUAL REMEDY FOR GHOSTS.
A gentleman, on visiting one of his friends in the
country, found that the house at the time was so full
of other visitors, that there was no room or bed for
him unless he agreed to go and sleep in a room that
was haunted by ghosts ! When some of his lady
friends heard that he had gone to sleep there, they
were greatly amazed at his daring. " Did you not
see the ghosts?" they asked. "O yes," he replied,
" I saw the ghosts the very first night, but I asked
them for a subscription in support of missions, and
they never came back." The reader may apply this
story as he pleases.
Here is one more story from a Scotsman with re
ference to the hardships of missionaries : —
BISHOPS WITHOUT BREECHES.
Two well-known bishops in South Africa were
out one hot summer day visiting the people at their
kraals. While returning to their homes in the after
noon, they had to pass each other on the same road.
When they came in sight of each other, they stood,
gazing, each wondering who the other might be.
At length they resolved to proceed, and on coming
sufficiently near to recognise each other, the one
said, "Why did you stand so long behind the
bush ?" " I stood," was the reply, " to put on my
trousers. Why did you stand so long?" " I stood,"
he answered, "doing the same thing." "These
bishops," said our friend, "might be hard-working

29O A " SAUT STORY.
missionaries ; they could not have been orthodox
Highlanders." CELTIC HUMOUR.
At one of our evening concerts on board the Dun-
nottar Castle, a gentleman of Celtic extraction was
requested to recite the story of " Donald and Dugald."
On the principle that a
" Little nonsense now and then
Is relished by the wisest men,''
he agreed to do so.
Some years ago, he said, two Highlanders, known
by the Christian names of Donald and Dugald,
entered into the following conversation : — " Dugald,
I thought you had gone to service." " O yes,"
said Dugald, " I was away at service." "You have not
stayed long, Dugald." "No." " Perhaps the people
warna kind to you ; perhaps they didna gie ye yer
meat." " O aye, they gave us oor meat. When I
went, there was plenty of braxy, saut enough no
doubt, and we ate the braxy. Then the maister had
a coo that he tried to sell at a' the markets, and he
killed and sauted the coo, and we ate the coo.
Then there was a soo that was drooned, and he
killed the soo, and sauted the soo, and we ate the
soo. Then there was an old woman that died, an
old woman about the four score, and the maister sent
me awa' for anither bag o' saut, and I just cam' awa'
hame!"

A CELT S OBJECTION.

291

THE OLD GRAND GAELIC LANGUAGE.
An Englishman was invited to a social gathering
of Highlanders. In the course of the evening he was
asked to propose a toast. He thought he could not
do better than give his Celtic friends the benefit of
his eloquence on behalf of the grand old Gaelic lan
guage — the language, he assured them, which had
been spoken by Adam and Eve in the Garden of
Eden. To be sure !
The Highlanders were jubilant. All but one man
rose to their feet to do honour to the toast. The
man who did not rise was asked by one of his
brethren the next day why he did not respond. He
looked daggers, and declined to give any answer.
But the man pressed him for his reason. " Why did
y'll no rise last night and say, Hip, hip, hurrah ?
Why did y'll no rise?" " Dear me! did y'll no see
that if it was ta Gaelic that was spoket in ta Gar
den o' Eden it must have been the lanage o' the
teevel ! and that ta Teevel was a Hielandman ; and
she wouldna like that at all, whatever."

¦ ^ jSf*4 -

1 ..fwurifi.
*• ^.*»— *
CHAPTER XXIV.
ARRIYAL AT PLYMOUTH;
DAYS IN LONDON.
HERE was no need for the firing of
guns to announce our arrival at Ply
mouth, for the time had been duly
calculated by means of the telegraphic
message which had been sent from
Madeira. • The boat to carry off
Her Majesty's mails was soon by
our side. The mail bags, nearly a hundred of them,
of different sizes, and all apparently full, were
speedily got on board the small steamer. Then
followed the luggage, and then the majority of the
passengers ; and off we went to terra firma. On
board the little steamer we learned that the storm
through which we had passed after leaving Madeira,
on the whole so gently, had produced several cases
of shipwreck. We could see evidences of these
wrecks in the neighbourhood of the Eddystone
Lighthouse. We were surprised to see the houses as well as the
A LADY S INGENUITY. 2*93
hills and fields around Plymouth covered with snow.
What a contrast all this suggested to what we had
experienced in the tropics. We could see a large
number of sheep, with their lambs, lying amid wreaths
of snow quite dead. The farmers had been unable
to protect them or to supply them with food, and so
the poor things had to starve to death.
On reaching the shore and the custom-house, the tug
of war began in securing our luggage from the hands of
the porters and a host of inquisitors. These custom
house inquisitors seemed as if determined to make
thorough work in searching for diamonds, and what
not, among the contents of the boxes and bags. It
took them fully three hours to complete their
examination, and by that time most of us were tired
waiting. Seven of us, who had been on specially
friendly terms during the voyage, took possession of
a commodious and comfortable first-class compart
ment ; and as the train accommodation seemed to be
somewhat limited, one of the ladies, in the interests
of an invalid, had recourse to a somewhat novel ex
pedient to keep all others out. The lady got hold of
a small parcel and dressed it up like a baby. This
she held in her arms as she stood in the carriage
door, and dandled so adroitly that any who might
covet a seat in our compartment were scared away.
A glimpse of the baby and the possibility of "matri
monial music " were enough. Had there been fewer
than seven ladies present we might have had the
courage of our convictions, and have said, " What a
dodge!" If, however, it could be shown that the
end in any case justifies the means, it might have

294 DAYS IN LONDON.
done so in that instance, and the lady might have got
a vote of thanks ; for the invalid sister got what she
needed, — a recumbent position on the seat all the
way to London.
The other ladies in the compartment were Mrs. W.
and her niece, a sweet, smart damsel, and Mrs. T.,
belonging to Ladysmith, South Africa, on their way
to join one of Messrs H. Gaze & Sons' parties for
a tour in Italy ; also Mrs. H. and' her lovely daughter,
from Cape Town, on their way to visit friends in
Scotland. On reaching Paddington Station, London, we
drove to our friends' home in Chelsea.

DAYS IN LONDON.
Several of our week days in the great Metropolis
were spent somewhat aimlessly, from park to picture
gallery, from monuments to museums, from cafes to
cathedrals, and some more directly in the way of
business. We endeavoured to make the best possible
use of our Sabbaths. We spent our first Sabbath
forenoon in St. Columba's Church, of which the Rev.
Dr. M'Leod is minister. We saw nothing Episco
palian or ritualistic in the services. The character of
this church or building, and of the services, with the
exception, perhaps, of the choir of boys leading the
psalmody, were out and out Presbyterian. Among
Dr. M'Leod's intelligent and devout hearers we

PRESBYTERIAN AND EPISCOPAL CHURCHES. 295
observed the Right Hon. Lord Balfour of Burleigh
and Mr. James Campbell of Stracathro, M.P.
In the evening we had something like a Sabbath
day's journey through one of the parks to hear the
Rev. Dr. Donald Fraser, of Marylebone. Dr.
Fraser's church is large, and not unlike Dr.
M'Leod's in construction. Outside the building, and
in the lobbies, we observed on all the boards with
intimations the word " Sunday." This we took to
be a name for the Lord's Day. Some people, it
seems, must call things in Rome as the Romans call
them. On entering the church, we observed a num
ber of Scripture passages painted behind the pulpit.
When the Doctor came in he lifted a Bible and read
a few passages of Scripture, and while he did so the
people stood in their pews and bowed their heads.
" Mirabile /" we said to ourselves; "is this not an
innovation in a Presbyterian church ?" What next
must be borrowed from Judaism or from an infantile
age of the Christian Church ? The Doctor's locks
have become silvery since we last saw and heard him
in Glasgow, more than thirty years ago, but other
wise his " eye has not become dim, and neither has
his natural force greatly abated."
On one of the week days we accompanied our
friends to St. George's, Bloomsbury, and heard the
Rev. Mr. Boyd Carpenter. This venerable-looking
clergyman delivered one of the most philosophic,
and yet eloquent, addresses we have ever heard, on
the words, "No man hath seen God at any time."
Nothing better* we thought, could have been given
to a class of highly-cultured students, or to a company

296 THE CITY TEMPLE.
of learned theologians. As we looked round upon
the audience, about fifty in all, and mostly ladies, we
thought there must be other flowers than those of
nature which are
" Born to blush unseen,
And waste their sweetness on the desert air."

A VISIT TO THE CITY TEMPLE.
We paid a visit to this temple of Nonconformity
on a Sabbath morning, and also on a Thursday, and
heard the Rev. Dr. Parker on both occasions. We
had reason to believe that Dr. Parker was regarded
by many as a kind of intellectual giant, and that his
oratorical powers were of a high order. In neither
of these respects were we disappointed by what we
saw and heard. Dr. Parker seemed to us to be a
man of vast and various resources. He is above the
average in practical sagacity. Here is something
characteristic of his off-hand remarks : "I am heartily
glad the Pope is coming back to England. This is
just what is wanted. Only the Pope can now do us
good. Our prayers are languishing for > want of
persecution." Such remarks, thrown off in the course of his
sermons, as if unconscious of their far-reaching signi
ficance, reminded us of what was said of the sons of
Issachar. The Doctor may be conscious — too con-

APING EPISCOPACY. 297
scious at times — of his own importance, but in spite
of that, which is his peculiar weakness, his powers of
thought and expression are far above the average.
His Thursday services, sustained for more th^an
twenty years, are proof of his superior abilities.
His powers of imagination are wonderful. These,
wisely controlled, constitute one of the chief secrets
of his popularity. Were Dr. Parker less of an
Arminian in doctrine, he would be even more power
ful and generally more popular as a preacher.
We did not like so much aping at Episcopacy in
his services, especially on the Lord's Day. The
blowing of trumpets and other instruments, the solo
singing and the Amening of the choir, were more
than we expected in a Congregational church, and
especially amongst a people able to appreciate the
intellectual pabulum supplied by Dr. Parker. In
preaching the Doctor seemed to be conservative of
his physical energy. Neither by voice nor by
gestures, which were sometimes inimitable, did he
preach so -as to exhaust himself. At the extreme
end of the church we lost whole sentences and their
connections. In the main lobby of the church the
most striking personage we saw going in and coming
out was one of the representatives of Caesar, — a
policeman in full uniform. " My conscience," as the
Bailie says, we thought the extreme Dissenters were
far beyond the need of Caesar.

298 TWO GREAT MEN.

SPURGEON AND PARKER.
We were sorry to learn that Mr. Spurgeon was
unable to preach on any of the days of our stay in
London. We heard with much regret that the
renowned preacher of the Metropolitan Tabernacle
was beginning to show signs of physical infirmity.
We have long regarded Mr. Spurgeon as the greatest
evangelical preacher of our time. He may lack
much of Parker's intellectual powers, but we, and
thousands in all parts of the civilised world, are pre
pared to give him the palm for spirituality of mind,
supreme devotion to our Lord, and evangelical fer
vour. Parker is a man for the people, a man who
has an eye for the winning boat and too often on the
lines of self-sufficiency ; Spurgeon is out and out, and
at all hazards, for Christ. Both, however, are great
men and greatly needed. Long may they live, and
long may their respective bows abide in strength.

DR. BARNARDO AND WORK AMONG ORPHAN
CHILDREN.
One evening we went to see Dr. Barnardo's
rescued children in Exeter Hall. This was a grand
sight. The hall was well filled with children from
the Homes. Apart from the speeches delivered on
the occasion, which were excellent in thought and
eloquent in expression, and the thrilling songs of the

DR. BARNARDO AND HIS WORK. 299
children, we felt, whilst listening to Dr. Barriardo
himself, that we had no words sufficiently expressive
to characterise the importance of the work in which
he is engaged. The work, even negatively con
sidered, can hardly be over-estimated. The rescuing
of so many thousands of children from conditions
of utter neglect, and restraining them from careers
of vice, are surely parts of a work for which society
generally ought to be grateful. These children are
not only lifted up from conditions of utter neglect
and misery, but they are prepared for positions of
usefulness and honour in the world. Dr. Barnardo,
as a man of practical sagacity, of Christian zeal and
full of tender regard for the objects of his mission,
seemed to us to be singularly well fitted for all parts
of the work, and should be liberally supported. We
have utterly failed to see any ground for the allega
tion made or implied in the columns of one of our
leading newspapers that Dr. Barnardo and those
associated with him are acting so as to interfere with
the obligations of parents. Dr. Barnardo, Mr.
Quarrier, and others, seem to us to receive and care
only for such children as are utterly neglected by
parents or guardians.
Now that the State has begun to act on a principle
of parental obligation in the matter of free education,
might it not, with prospective advantages to itself,
extend its fostering regards to these neglected
children ? The principle is largely acted on in the
United States of America, and why not in Great
Britain ?
Before long our Legislature may be forced to con-

300 CLOSING WORDS.
sider how best to deal with classes of parents and
criminals who cannot support themselves, much less
those who are morally dependent upon them. Un
less this is done, the proverbial straw may come to
the State when remedial or preventative measures
are too late. The liberty of the subject in the case
of many seems to us to be only a farce.
The proverb, " Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera," applies
no less to the State than to the individual, — Help
yourself, and Heaven will aid you.
As our space is now fully exhausted, we must bid
our readers farewell. Although our leave of absence
extended to six months, we were glad to be able to
return home and resume work at the end of four
months. As we turned our footsteps in the direction
of home, we felt as if " unspeakably obliged " to
praise God, from whom all blessings flow.

?-*-

^

•^

•*EI]SIj3.*

<^".^L

kci

n
«rl — w-a.

WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

Through Egypt, Palestine, and Syria.
220 pp., Illustrated.
' ' This handsome volume of 220 pages is one of the clearest, most engaging,
and useful works of its class which we have as yet perused. The pen portraits
given of the excursionists are so vivid ; the sketches of their escort and of their
camping incidents are so graphic ; the localities visited, with their Scriptural
associations, are so well described, and the whole narrative is so distinct
and intelligible that the reader feels himself to be one of the party. We
heartily commend the book to Bible students." — N. B. Daily Mail.
"We have read it throughout with unabated and growing interest." —
Brechin Advertiser.
Dr. Charles Rogers, in a letter says — " The book is interesting from the first
sentence to the last, and, for my own part, I have been so charmed and edified
that I have been unable to lay it aside till I had read it throughout. Your
sermon at Nazareth is a gem — clear, forcible, telling, and full of matter. The
descriptions, generally, are artistic. In publishing the work you have done
important service, and a service which (unless I greatly err) will be fully
recognized." "A more frank, entirely natural, swift-flowing, and readable as well as
amusing book on Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, we have not read. The perfect
spontaneity of the book has all the charm of a good letter, and is not
unfrequently more interesting and even profitable than a carefully-studied
production. " — Christian Leader.
"This is a thoroughly enjoyable volume." — Greenock Telegraph.
"This is a very pleasantly- written book." — Glasgow Herald.
"Dr. Campbell is one of the most intelligent of travellers, and a graceful
descriptive writer."- — Scottish American Journal.

Through the United States and Canada.
260 pp.
" This is a most interesting book. It is thoroughly readable." — Scotsman.
"The narrative all through is exceedingly interesting. " — Stirling Jottfnal.
"We have in this book an independent account of American institutions,
and the manners and customs of the people are portrayed for us in a variety of
ways, with originality and effect. The worthy doctor makes a capital
traveller. While the volume will prove of practical service to intending
X

v-'sitors to America, the author giving many valuable hints on matters of no
little importance to travellers, the fair and impartial spirit in which Dr.
Campbell writes regarding American institutions, and the care he takes to be
accurate, give his book a character and standing which will gain for it a good
position among works of reference on the United States." — Stirling Observer.
"Dr. Campbell writes in an easy and graceful style, and details his own
impressions and opinions. His book is a safe one in the hands of intending
visitors or emigrants. It gives in its pages the impressions of an educated
Scottish gentleman, and really gives more truthful information concerning the
United States and Canada than many works of greater pretensions." — Scottish
A merican Journal.
" We have read this book with the greatest pleasure. It is quite a gem of
its kind. The author has seen things for himself, and sets them before our
eyes with a rare sympathetic and pictorial power. Dr. Campbell takes a
worthy place along with Charles Kingsley in his ' At Last ' and ' Bean
Underhill in his trip to the South- West. ' It is indeed pleasing to find one
amongst us with some of the wit and humour of the late Norman Macleod for
the delineation of scenes of real life at home and abroad. Those who read
this book will have a most exquisite feast of fresh and instructive observation."
— Alloa Advertiser.
" We can vouch for the general accuracy of the information given (in this
book), which is always conveyed in a lively, racy, and interesting manner. Dr.
Campbell is a most trustworthy and companionable guide, and to anyone
purposing a visit to the places mentioned, or wishing information regarding
them, we can cordially recommend his volume. " — Dundee Advertiser.

Through Classic and Bible Lands.
2 79 PP-> Illustrated.
" This is the third volume which Dr. Campbell has published within the
last four years. The superior vivacity of the form in which he communicates
his information gives the book a charm. His notes on Asia Minor and Greece
are particularly fresh and valuable." — N. B. Daily Mail.
"This volume is most interesting and instructive, and is beautifully
illustrated. We commend it to the favourable attention of Sabbath school
teachers, who will find it very useful. " — Brechin Advertiser.
"Dr. Campbell succeeds in imparting freshness to his narrative by the
fidelity with which he describes what he himself saw of persons as well as of
places ; while a double value attaches to his observations on Asia Minor and
Greece". — Christian Leader.
"The Rev. Dr. John Kerr Campbell has added another to his pleasantly-
written books of travel. This book will be read with a fresh enjoyment by all
who know his former books. To those contemplating making a tour of the
places here described, the volume should be welcome as a guide-book of more
than ordinary interest." — Scotsman, January 9th, 1888.

"We have seldom read a more pleasing and engaging book. Its solid
merits and healthy, stimulating power make it worthy of a place in every
household and public library." — Alloa Advertiser.
"The author of this book writes easily, graphically, and, eloquently; his
information is exact ; and with the requisite enthusiasm are allied sound
discrimination and shrewdness of observation. His sketches of character and
incidents of travel are very entertaining. On classic grounds, Dr. Campbell
writes like a scholar and a man of literary culture." — Ardrossan and Saltcoats
Herald, January 20th, 1888.
"As a vivid, racy, instructive, and luminous volume, it occupies a high
place." — The Bulwark, February, 1888.
' ' Dr. Campbell has the art of arousing the interest of the reader in whatever
theme he chooses to discourse. His descriptions are clear, full, and complete.
In a comparatively brief space he manages to convey a wonderful amount of
information. The volume is specially interesting for what it tells us concerning
Asia Minor and Greece. We can cordially recommend this volume to readers
everywhere. It does not contain a single page which can be regarded as dry
or artificial, and no one can peruse it without being benefited and strengthened
in their views of both religion and life." — Scottish American, February 15th,
1888. " Those who have read Dr. Campbell's previous works of travel will expect
to find in this volume entertainment and instruction, and they will not be
disappointed." — The Northern Whig.

Pisgah Glimpses and Gospel Gleanings.
308 pp., Illustrated.
" This is a fresh method of imparting instruction in Biblical history, and Dr.
Campbell has made the most of it. " — Scotsman.
" This is the best of Dr. Campbell's books." — Christian Leader.
" We cannot too strongly recommend this casket of brilliant gems." — Alloa
Journal. The Literary Critic says: — "The Rev. Dr. Campbell's latest work will
more than justify his existence and position as a leading light, and teacher in
Divine things. Forming as it does an excellent guide for the earnest student
into the spirit and meaning of Divine truth, it will long be perused by many
with real pleasure and profit."
The Dundee Advertiser of October 2nd, says :— " Dr. J. Kerr Campbell of
Stirling, whose books of Travel on the Holy Land and elsewhere, have long
delighted a large circle of readers, has published a new volume of reminiscences.
The book is written throughout in an easy and fluent style. The author has
examined with intelligence the scenes that came before him in the Land, and
he has the art of relating his adventures without any tedious prolixity."
" The Stirling Observer says : — " The author gives a very graphic account
of what he saw in Palestine, and both it and his ' Gleanings ' are written in an

attractive and popular style, which at once engages the attention, and sustains
the interest of the reader to the close. The chapters are short and pithy, and
the breaking of them up into sections is a great help to the ordinary reader, and
good for reference as well. The numerous historical allusions, and especially
the sound Christian doctrines enunciated in the book, make it more than one
of passing interest. "
The Belfast Evening Telegraph says : — " It is a marked feature of this,
as of all Dr. Campbell's books, that the reader is wooed away from everything
around him, and is soon wrapped up in the scenes which the Doctor so vividly
describes. He feels as if treading the same ground with the Doctor — elevated
when he is elevated, charmed when he is charmed, climbing up the same hills,
sitting by the same wells, meeting with the same experiences and individuals.
There is a great liveliness in the author's descriptions and meditations, and,
wedded as they are to fine English, the perusal of ' Pisgah Glimpses and
Gospel Gleanings ' is attended with much pleasure as well as profit. "
' ' This volume, from the pen of Dr. J. Kerr Campbell, will be as welcomed
as any of its forerunners. The author shows in how many particulars the
present condition and customs of Palestine illustrate the Bible. Numerous
illustrations add to the attractiveness of the volume." — The Christian World.

Life Problems.
276 pp.
' ' In this volume, some of the leading questions of the day are discussed in
a fresh and popular style." — Christian Leader.
" These lectures are excellent. The style of the author is telling, and the
interest of the reader is well sustained throughout." — Greenock Herald.
"The author of this acceptable volume is well and favourably known by his
graphic books of travels. It is satisfactory to find the leading questions of the
day examined by a writer of the mental grasp and scholarly attainments of Dr.
Campbell. " — Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald.
"Dr. Campbell in these lectures discourses with great fluency and no little
power. Those who turn to these lectures for religious edification will not be
disappointed. " — North British Daily Mail.
"Throughout these lectures we find evidences of wide reading, great
catholicity of thought, and a manly grappling with important and perplexing
questions." — The Scottish American.
" It would be difficult to praise this book too much. Its intrinsic wealth
and first-rate workmanship combine to give the reader the highest pleasure.
It is quite a literary and spiritual luxury — full of thoughts of rare excellence
and inspiring power." — The Alloa Circular.
"This book deals with the subjects discussed in a comprehensive, able,
convincing, and frequently eloquent manner."— The Brechin Advertiser.