The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, October 29, 1899, Page 21

OCTOBRBER 2999, Mis iel S Sal NEE THREE THINGS -FO&S, HILLS X REcaLL s AND PRETTY GIRLS ' E BOER GIRLS SHOOT TO HIT - OUR GRANDMOTHERS WHO LOADED RIFLES FOR THE MEN IN TIME OF WAR WERE NOT MORE SURE CF aim” other country of I [ ¢ \‘TWICE HAVE WE CONQUERED THE ROOI —NEKS, BUT THIS TIME | FEAR WE ARE DOOMED TO DEFEAT! -m hy” bo¥—short, stifr 1“] BROUGHT THESE TRINGS WITH ME FROM A FARM ~ SEE, THIS IS THE WAY THE “DOPPER” &IRLS POUND EALIES.”! e — through most of our veins, A .Boer s ters the traditions of his race if he w an Englishweman. & ruls, wear a two-plece garment. Bkirt end waist are both very simply made. r generation pattern igners for dress Y Bhe must acknowledgs that her coat falls hort of the chic French wrap; her hat £ comparison with the eI e if _he has mught to do with a The Boer household 1s a God- fearing, Bible-ablding one, commandments from one to ten are impressed upon the inmates. have intermarried largely among themselves. All the best familles are connected by one, sometimes two or Not & few of the younger neration have married foreignars, is is frowned upon by the conservati: Oom Paul’'s sons marris an English girl to his father’s everlast- e Boar* who are %o jooks clumsy in chapeau fashioned by a French modiste. Certainly 1 have had gowns made in £9ed a8 America, just as Miss Smith or Miss Jones forgive Visiting in Parls buys:. Parisian gowns. ¢ar to the But I feel at home in them. I would not wear such elaborate gowns In the Trans- vaal, but they far more closel our dress than the costumes nation has painted for us, A Mother Hubbard is frequen The most popular idea clot our c}o(hu after for this we #e to | I o becl Even the better informed have an idea that there is a great deal of Zulu blood B 1 stoutly deny this. French, loving and living up _to strait-laced principles of “the Puritans. Doubtless there are half-breeds in Africa, els of mixed -blood, just as_there in America “with Indl has even turned the leaves of any other do not : book on the:Transvaal. ‘The ‘“‘Story of an Afri most interesting, clannish, can have the re ‘with the natives 1 The Hottentots, the Kaffi; and the Zulus are our.servants. n it 13 discovered that I am & Boer, I am always tukcd Wwhether I have rea can Farm. e besn most widely read in Ame for I hear it mentioned on all sides, seldom . find & reader who or the erimsds and tation for in- can Farm” is It it is too bad that “Tant Sannie” should be grafted on for- ination as the type of all Boer 'ant Sannie, a colossus of fat, ignorant as a Kaffir, bull-throated, splut- tering coarse oaths, is no more a type of the Boer :women than Becky he American girl zs gowns and ribbor Bhe digcovers es to Parls she end laces and n hat the out of n, 80 much gdmiredat home, does But the B a o reach the Paris Iy e Boers do nz; pardon _inter- felns pectection, - Nathiog 4% the Mind, Qur mothers, aa ;folugling. Itis ing sorrow, How W = of all’ Engrishwomen. . I-appreciate Tant Sannie as a Mterary character. I do not resent her creation as most' Boers do. For I belleve that Oltve Schreiner did not draw’ her to typify our race. Bhe no'more felt need of asserting this than Dickens felt called upon to mention that ' Urlah Heep was not in< tended to represent all Englishmen. But, unfortunately, our race is so little known' that ‘the old and out-of-the-or- dinary characters of fiction have beem made to stand for the reality. ‘We 'must confess,that many of the Boer country customs are most accurately de- seribed In‘this tale.” I copy from a to leaf fluttering among. my things, clip: from the book because it so vividly de- scribes a country wedding. “Bride and bridegroom, with their at- tendants, marched solemnly to the mar- riage chamber, where bed and box are decked out In white, with ends of ribbom and artificlal flowers, and where on & row of chairs the party solemnly seat themselves. After a time bridesmald and best man rise, and conduct:in with cere- mony each Individual guest to wish suc- cess'and to kiss the bride and bridegroom, Then the feast is set on the table, and it is almost sunset before the dishes are cleared away and the pleasure of the day begins, E hing is removed from the great front room, and the mud floor, well rubbed with bullock’s blood, glistens like on of the assembly »oms to attire theme ssue clad ght rib- . The dancing be- gins as the llow candles are stuck up about the walls, the music coming from a couple of fiddlers in a corner of the room. - Bride and bridegroom open the ball and the floor is soon covered with whirling couples “By 11 o’'clock the children, who swarm in the side rooms. not to be kep qujet longer even by ches of bread an cake; there is a general howl and wal] that rises yet higher than the scraping o fiddles, and mothers rush from their part- ners to knock sm heads together and cuff little nursem and force the wail- ers down Into unoccupied corners of beds, under tables and behind boxes. “In half an hour every variety of child. {sh snore is heard on all sides, and it has become perilous to raise or get down & iom in any of the side rooms, lest & small ead or hand should be crushed. *“Now, too, the busy feet have broke: the solid coating of the floor, and a clou of fine dust arises that makes a yellow halo around the candles and sets asth- matic people coughing, and grows denser till to recognize any one on the opposite side of the room becomes impossible, and a partner’s face is seen through a yellow Tkt 12 o'clock the bride 13 led to the marriage chamber and undressed; the lights are blown out and the bridegroom is brought to the door by the best man, who gives him the key; then the door is shut and locked and the revel rises higher than ever. There is no thourat of slesp wunt{l morning.” ‘The country courtship is as unique as — Continued On Page ’rwenty-thrr ] {n white mu bons and br: