Letters from the Cape, Lucy Duff Gordon [best new books to read .TXT] 📗

all fragrance and flowers, and much less wind. Mr. M-, of whom I told you, has been in every corner of the far East-- Java, Sumatra, everywhere--and is extremely amusing. He has brought his wife here for her health, and is as glad to talk as I am. The conversation of an educated, clever person, is quite a new and delightful sensation to me now. He appears to have held high posts under the East India Company, is learned in Oriental languages, and was last resident at Singapore. He says that no doubt Java is Paradise, it is so lovely, and such a climate; but he does not look as if it had agreed with him. I feel quite heart- sick at seeing these letters go off before me, instead of leaving them behind, as I had hoped.

Well, I must say good-bye--or rather, 'auf Wiedersehn'--and God knows how glad I shall be when that day comes!


LETTER XIII


Capetown, April 19th.

Dearest mother,

Here I am, waiting for a ship; the steamer was too horrid: and I look so much to the good to be gained by the voyage that I did not like to throw away the chance of two months at sea at this favourable time of year, and under favourable circumstances; so I made up my mind to see you all a month later. The sea just off the Cape is very, very cold; less so now than in spring, I dare say. The weather to-day is just like VERY warm April at home--showery, sunshiny, and fragrant; most lovely. It is so odd to see an autumn without dead leaves: only the oaks lose theirs, the old ones drop without turning brown, and the trees bud again at once. The rest put on a darker green dress for winter, and now the flowers will begin. I have got a picture for you of my 'cart and four', with sedate Choslullah and dear little Mohammed. The former wants to go with me, 'anywhere', as he placidly said, 'to be the missis' servant'. What a sensation his thatchlike hat and handsome orange- tawny face would make at Esher! Such a stalwart henchman would be very creditable. I shall grieve to think I shall never see my Malay friends again; they are the only people here who are really interesting. I think they must be like the Turks in manner, as they have all the eastern gentlemanly 'Gelassenheit' (ease) and politeness, and no eastern 'Geschmeidigkeit' (obsequiousness), and no idea of Baksheesh; withal frugal, industrious, and money-making, to an astonishing degree. The priest is a bit of a proselytiser, and amused me much with an account of how he had converted English girls from their evil courses and made them good Mussulwomen. I never heard a naif and sincere account of conversions FROM Christianity before, and I must own it was much milder than the Exeter Hall style.

I have heard a great many expressions of sorrow for the Queen from the Malays, and always with the 'hope the people will take much care of her, now she is alone'. Of course Prince Albert was only the Queen's husband to them, and all their feeling is about her. It is very difficult to see anything of them, for they want nothing of you, and expect nothing but dislike and contempt. It would take a long time to make many friends, as they are naturally distrustful. I found that eating or drinking anything, if they offer it, made most way, as they know they are accused of poisoning all Christians indiscriminately. Of course, therefore, they are shy of offering things. I drank tea in the Mosque at the end of Ramadan, and was surrounded by delighted faces as I sipped. The little boy who waits in this house here had followed us, and was horrified: he is still waiting to see the poison work.

No one can conceive what has become of all the ships that usually touch here about this time. I was promised my choice of Green's and Smith's, and now only the heavy old Camperdown is expected with rice from Moulmein. A lady now here, who has been Heaven only knows WHERE NOT, praises Alexandria above all other places, after Suez. Her lungs are bad, and she swears by Suez, which she says is the dreariest and healthiest (for lungs) place in the world. You can't think how soon one learns to 'annihilate space', if not time, in one's thoughts, by daily reading advertisements for every port in India, America, Australia, &c., &c., and conversing with people who have just come from the 'ends of the earth'. Meanwhile, I fear I shall have to fly from next winter again, and certainly will go with J- to Egypt, which seems to me like next door.

I have run on, and not thanked you for your letter and M. Mignet's beautiful eloge of Mr. Hallam, which pleased me greatly. I wish Englishmen could learn to speak with the same good taste and mesure.

Mr. Wodehouse, who has been very civil to me, kindly tried to get me a passage home in a French frigate lying here, but in vain. I am now sorry I let the Jack tars here persuade me not to go in the little barque; but they talked so much of the heat and damp of such tiny cabins in an iron vessel, that I gave her up, though I liked the idea of a good tossing in such a tiny cockboat. I will leave a letter for the May mail, unless I sail within a week of to-morrow, or go by the Jason, which would be home far sooner than the mail. I only hope you and A- won't be uneasy; the worst that can happen is delay, and the long voyage will be all gain to health, which would not be the case in a steamer.

All I hear of R- makes me wild to see her again. The little darkies are the only pleasing children here, and a fat black toddling thing is 'allerliebst'. I know a boy of four, literally jet black, whom I long to steal as he follows his mother up to the mountain to wash. Little Malays are lovely, but TOO well-behaved and quiet. I tried to get a real 'tottie', or 'Hotentotje', but the people were too drunk to remember where they had left their child. C'est assez dire, that I should have had no scruple in buying it for a bottle of 'smoke' (the spirit made from grape husks). They are clever and affectionate when they have a chance, poor things,--and so strange to look at.

By the bye, a Bonn man, Dr. Bleek, called here with 'Grusse' from our old friends, Professor Mendelssohn and his wife. He is devoting himself to Hottentot and aboriginal literature!--and has actually mastered the Caffre click, which I vainly practised under Kleenboy's tuition. He wanted to teach me to say 'Tkorkha', which means 'you lie', or 'you have missed' (in shooting or throwing a stone, &c.)--a curious combination of meanings. He taught me to throw stones or a stick at him, which he always avoided, however close they fell, and cried 'Tkorkha!' The Caffres ask for a present, 'Tkzeelah Tabak', 'a gift for tobacco'.

The Farnese Hercules is a living TRUTH. I saw him in the street two days ago, and he was a Caffre coolie. The proportions of the head and throat were more wonderful in flesh, or muscle rather, than in marble. I know a Caffre girl of thirteen, who is a noble model of strength and beauty; such an arm--larger than any white woman's--with such a dimple in her elbow, and a wrist and hand which no glove is small enough to fit--and a noble countenance too. She is 'apprenticed', a name for temporary slavery, and is highly spoken of as a servant, as the Caffres always are. They are a majestic race, but with just the stupid conceit of a certain sort of Englishmen; the women and girls seem charming.

Easter Sunday.--The weather continues beautifully clear and bright, like the finest European spring. It seems so strange for the floral season to be the winter. But as the wind blows the air is quite cold to-day; nevertheless, I feel much better the last two days. The brewing of the rain made the air very oppressive and heavy for three weeks, but now it is as light as possible.

I must say good-bye, as the mail closes to-morrow morning. Easter in autumn is preposterous, only the autumn looks like spring. The consumptive young girl whom I packed off to the Cape, and her sister, are about to be married--of course. Annie has had a touch of Algoa Bay fever, a mild kind of ague, but no sign of chest disease, or even delicacy. My 'hurrying her off', which some people thought so cruel, has saved her. Whoever comes SOON ENOUGH recovers, but for people far gone it is too bracing.


LETTER XIV


Capetown, Saturday, May 3d.

Dearest mother,

After five weeks of waiting and worry, I have, at last, sent my goods on board the ship Camperdown, now discharging her cargo, and about to take a small party of passengers from the Cape. I offered to take a cabin in a Swedish ship, bound for Falmouth; but the captain could not decide whether he would take a passenger; and while he hesitated the old Camperdown came in. I have the best cabin after the stern cabins, which are occupied by the captain and his wife and the Attorney-General of Capetown, who is much liked. The other passengers are quiet people, and few of them, and the captain has a high character; so I may hope for a comfortable, though slow passage. I will let you know the day I sail, and leave this letter to go by post. I may be looked for three weeks or so after this letter. I am crazy to get home now; after the period was over for which I had made up my mind, home-sickness began.

Mrs. R- has offered me a darling tiny monkey, which loves me; but I fear A- would send me away again if I returned with her in my pocket. Nassirah, old Abdool's pretty granddaughter, brought me a pair of Malay shoes or clogs as a parting gift, to-day. Mr. M-, the resident at Singapore, tells me that his secretary's wife, a Malay lady, has made an excellent translation of the Arabian Nights, from Arabic into Malay. Her husband is an Indian Mussulman, who, Mr. M- said, was one of the ablest men he ever knew. Curious!

I sat, yesterday, for an hour, in the stall of a poor German basket-maker who had been long in Caffre-land. His wife, a Berlinerin, was very intelligent, and her account of her life here most entertaining, as showing the different Ansicht natural to Germans. 'I had never', she said, 'been out of the city of Berlin, and KNEW NOTHING.' (Compare with London cockney, or genuine Parisian.) Thence her fear, on landing at Algoa Bay and seeing swarms of naked black men, that she had come to a country where no clothes were to be had; and what should she do when hers were worn out? They had a grant of land at Fort Peddie, and she dug