A Rip Van Winkle of the Kalahari

Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari,
by Frederick Cornell

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Title: A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari Seven Tales of South-West
Africa
Author: Frederick Cornell
Release Date: June 22, 2007 [EBook #21899]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A RIP VAN
WINKLE OF THE KALAHARI ***

Produced by Charles Klingman

A RIP VAN WINKLE OF THE KALAHARI AND OTHER TALES
OF SOUTH-WEST AFRICA

A RIP VAN WINKLE OF THE KALAHARI AND OTHER TALES
OF SOUTH-WEST AFRICA
SEVEN STORIES
BY
FREDERICK CARRUTHERS CORNELL

CAPETOWN: T. MASKEW MILLER LONDON: T. FISHER
UNWIN, LTD.

CONTENTS
PREFACE

A RIP VAN WINKLE OF THE KALAHARI INTRODUCTORY I -
THE BLUE DIAMOND II - DEAD MEN IN THE DUNES III - THE
SAND-STORM IV - THE PANS AND THE POISON FLOWERS V -
I LOSE INYATI VI - THE CRATER THE PLEASANT BERRIES
SLEEP AND THE AWAKENING VII - THE COUNTRY OF
CRATERS, THE PATH OF SKULLS, AND THE SNAKE VIII - THE
CATACLYSM THE PRIESTESS "LOOK AND FORGET" IX -
FORTY YEARS! THE AWAKENING

THE SALTING OF THE GREAT NORTH-EASTERN FIELDS,
BEING AN EPISODE IN THE LIFE OF DICK SYDNEY,
PROSPECTOR
CHAPTER I
II III IV V

THE FOLLOWER

THE PROOF

"BUSHMAN'S PARADISE"

"THE DRINK OF THE DEAD"

THE WATERS OF ERONGO

PREFACE

MOST of these stories were written on the veldt; at odd times, in out-
of-the-way prospecting camps, in the wilds of the Kalahari Desert, or of
that equally little-known borderland between Klein Namaqualand, and
Gordonia, Cape Colony, and what was at that time known as German
South- West Africa.
Four of them appeared a few years back in The State an illustrated
magazine now unhappily defunct; the others, though written about the
same time, have never been published.
And now, time and circumstances have combined to bring the scene in
which they are laid most prominently before the public.
Through the dangerous and difficult barrier of the desert sandbelt that
extends all along the coast, General Botha and his formidable columns
forced their way to Windhuk; from the remote lower reaches of the

Orange River other troops steadily and relentlessly pushed north; and
even to the east the well-nigh unexplored dunes of the southern
Kalahari proved no safeguard to the Germans, for Union forces invaded
them even there: and all eyes in South Africa are to-day turned towards
this new addition to the Union and the Empire.
Whilst imagination has naturally played the chief part in these tales, the
descriptions given of certain parts of this little-known region are
accurate, and by no means overdrawn; at the same time, though they
treat principally of the dangerous and waterless desert, it must be borne
in mind that although the sand dunes form one of Damaraland's most
striking features, yet it is by no means altogether the barren, scorching
dust-heap it is popularly believed to be.
For once the sand region bordering the coast is traversed, and the
higher plateau begins, vegetation and water become more abundant, the
climate is magnificent, and cattle, sheep and goats thrive; whilst in the
north much of which remains practically unexplored there is much
fruitful and well-watered country teeming with game, and akin to
Rhodesia, awaiting the settler.
Mining and stock-raising are the two great possibilities in this new
country, where water conditions are never likely to allow of extensive
agriculture being carried out successfully.
But above all mining! For much of the country and especially the north
is very highly mineralized. Copper abounds; tin and gold have been
found and there can be but little doubt that the former will eventually
be located in abundance and, above all, the diamond fields of the
south-west coastal belt have since their discovery in 1908 added
enormously both to the value of the country and to its attractiveness.
To refer again to these tales; the description of Rip Van Winkle's ride
through the desert, the sand-storm, the huge salt "pans," and indeed
most of the earlier incidents, have been but common-place experiences
of my own in the wastes of the southern Kalahari, slightly altered for
the purposes of the story. Even the "poison flowers" exist there and no
Bushman will sleep among them, beautiful as they are. And lest the

huge diamond in the head of the "Snake" in the same story be
considered an impossibility, let it be borne in mind that the Cullinan
(enormous as it