Kafir Stories | Page 6

his arrival, the magistrate sentenced him to receive twenty-live lashes with a cat o' nine tails on the bare back, and to pay a fine of five pounds, being five times the value of the slaughtered sheep according to Gert Botha's computation. In levying the fine, the two cows which he had given as lobola were seized--much against the will of old Dalisile. Out of the proceeds, Gert Botha was paid the value of the sheep, and Kalaza received fifteen shillings, which he, in company with Jim Gubo, spent the same day at the canteen.
Sibi, the dog, hung about the gaol howling, until he was driven away with stones. He then returned to his master's hut, and howled there all the afternoon and through the night. Next morning, Gert Botha's son Andries shot him.
Maliwe received his twenty-five lashes, and was discharged from prison, after his back had, under the superintendence of the District Surgeon, been well washed with brine, to prevent evil results. Neither under the flogging nor the pickling did Maliwe exhibit the slightest sign of the torture which he suffered.
On the same evening Maliwe went to a certain tree, just at the back of old Dalisile's huts, and gave a long, low whistle, which was the established signal between himself and Nalai. Unfortunately, however, Nalai did not hear him, but her two big brothers, Kawana and Joli, did. Old Dalisile, anticipating Maliwe's visit, had kept Nalai out of the way, and put his two sons to watch. These fell upon Maliwe and smote him so hard with their kerries, that he lay for a long time senseless on the ground. When he regained consciousness, he limped quietly away.
He has not since been heard of in the neighbourhood.
THE FUNDAMENTAL AXIOM.
The wild ass of the desert knows, By inborn knowledge, friends from foes. The tame ass of the village browses Contentedly between the houses. He has no foes, he has no friends, He toils and eats until he ends.
But this time, Fate, on grim jokes bent, A wild ass to the village sent. Oh, what a tempest shook the village, 'Twas worse than flood, or fire, or pillage!
Now if an ass I needs must be, The desert's joys and pains for me.
Broodigrass.
I.
It was evening. In the old mission house the frugal supper was over, and the missionary, his wife, the two lady-teachers, the eleven native female boarders and the native probationer, all knelt down to prayers. The eleven boarders and the probationer had come in at the sound of the bell, the eldest boarder leading, and the probationer bringing up the rear.
A few seconds later, the old black housemaid and cook combined strode heavily in and knelt down just inside the door. Prayers over, Miss Elizabeth Blake, the senior lady teacher, sat down to the harmonium and played the first few bars of a hymn. Then the little congregation stood up and sang. They kept good time, and their singing was fairly in tune, but the voices of some of the native girls were very harsh and shrill, and somewhat spoilt the general effect. The probationer, Samuel Gozani, led the singing from his place close to the instrumentalist. The choir stood facing the right-hand end of the harmonium, and the leader stood just on Miss Blake's left hand, and to see the choir he had to look over her head. The hymn happened to be Luther's "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott"; it was sung in English, but the Reverend Gottlieb Schultz, the missionary, forgetting the English words, drifted into the original German at the second verse, rather to the detriment of the performance. Miss Blake sang out her clear, simple soprano tones, very rich in the low notes. She was a handsome girl, rather stout, with blue eyes and dull yellow hair. Her face was somewhat pale from overwork and want of fresh air. Altogether, she had a strongly Teutonic look, and was, in fact, almost an exact counterpart of what her German mother had been at her age. Of her Irish father she showed absolutely no trace in either appearance or character.
Whilst the hymn was being sung, the probationer's earnest eyes rested as often on the yellow-haired girl at the harmonium as on his particular charge, the dusky choir. The eleven girls stood in a crescent, some modest and demure enough, but others looking bold, their wanton, roving eyes and generously developed figures being much in evidence. The youngest girl might have been twelve years of age, and the eldest twenty. The latter, a girl named Martha Kawa, was of a much lighter colour than any of her schoolmates, but her physiognomy was of the usual Kafir type. Her father was an Englishman, and her mother a Gaika Kafir; she had passed her childhood in a native hut,