The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-02-16
FOuLD'S
MEDlCATEO ARSENIC
COMPLEXION SOAP.
r"e ut,.gr~r cuo, ~ ,,o,....
u - the Abandoned Dism"pa hin.
IN Kimberly.

rom the san francisco Chronicle
Johannesburg Dec. 81 left Cape Town
on the 10th. OF December. late at night. ina
a wild storm of sleet and wind and rain.
with the temperature low enough to war
rant the wearing of ones heaviest winter
clothes, and woke the next morning to
find the train rolling over baked and
sun-cracked desert in the midst Of mi
RACES. sand spouts, ostriches and things.
~ was the karoO. the vast table lying
between Cape Town and Kimberley
Barring the Ostriches and sand spouts.
inc karOo Is wonderfully like the country
about ogden. There is the same dry, red
earth, the same low hills with their out
crop OF reef and dyke. the same sparse
growth of gray bush. the same burnt-out
blue of cloudless sky. growing white
toward the horizon: the same rare towns
which in South Africa are built of mud
but which are precisely like the adobe
houses of the west Thus far the resem-
blance goes. If one saw only the earth
ana Sky, the gray bush and the clay-buiit
towns. one might easily fancy ones self
IN Utah or in Western Colorado. But ev-
cry now and then the progress OF the
tram tand an eNasperaungly slow prog
ress it Isl brings TO view the sight of
things Enthusiastically African; a herd of
ostriches trottng away from the track
with OutstretChed necks and half-ousn
wings. hOcks Of lOng-eared sheep. feeding
on heaven knows what and, above all
sand spoutS, waYering pillars of red cloud
Will IullllGl-SAAltu passes ana CAPITALS.
You reach Kimberley the forenoon of the
next day.
Kimberley is a dead town think this i'm
preston of abandonment, of lncipient de-
cay Is one Of the strongest impressions
have retained OF the town itself That ana
its ahtect fOrlOrnness, its mOurnful. Cod
forgotten air, its unspeakable hideotisness,
a rampant shrieking detonnity, an ugli-
ness beyond words. II Is a town built upon
the open plain: treeless dusty. The COM
binauon of abnormally wide streets and
abnOrmally low houses gives "A marvellous
impression of fatness. 1t is built entirely
of tin. Tin, I'm South Africa means gall
Vanized, corrugated sheet iron. With the
exception of the DE Beers office and the
government buildings ! cannot remember
a single house In Kimberley that was not
made of this abomnable stuff The rail-
road station is tin. the hotels are tin, you
buy your clothes. your groceries. your
boots in tin stores, you play billiards in
a tin club, you mail your letters in a tin
post office, and you-yeS, you do-you even
worship in a tin church. Imagine the heat
from all this mass of tin when the Their
mometer is at 100 degrees Imagine. IL you
can, the gay, diversified aspects that the
streets present, with never even a side
walk to break the narrowing monotony
OF the view with never a tree, never vine.
never so much as "a geranium growing in
tomato can to hide the staring ugliness.
You begin to see the natives here the
real pure-bloOded stock-kailirs, Basutos
Shangans-nOt the mongrel Hottentot-
Dutch Malay Of the Cape, and splendid
lOuhlilE ltllOMH Aity are 100. I Gu see lht IN
in all degrees Of barbariansm. from the
compound Basuto Of the mine, gambling
furiOusly at curious and savage Varia-
tiOn of the game of checkers, and kept a
practical prisoner during the period Of his
contract, to the little pckaninny Of the la
ter generation on his way to school whist
ling DAISY Bell" and carrying his books
his geography, slate, etc, on his head.
1t is a cosmopolitan place. 1t has not
grown; it has been built. All the eX-
tremes of civilization have been dumped
down upon this corner In the vast karoo
and they have not, as yet, blended to
form any distinctive feature anything
characteristic or typical, except that this
want of anything Characteristic is. per-
haps the best Characteristic of all For
instance in ones hotel bedroom one sees
the printed announcement that "Timn"
is at such and such an hour, while at the
same time ones Washing-stand is deco
rated with blue tiles representing the
birthplace of Oliver Wendell Holmes. The
Englishman has brought over his polo po-
square, in the center of the town. they
are jostled against and crowded by the
clumsy bullock wagons Of the Kafiirs
from the surrounding country
The bullock wagons, by the way are
features of South Africa. one meets with
them continually, crawling along the old
trade route by the side of the railroad.
or crowded into the market squares of
all the larger towns They are immense
wagons of English make, half their length
covered by hood Of canvass and drawn
ny no less IMAM eighteen ledUt muscular
oxen, with horns of enormous length; at
the side walks the driver a KafIir, with a
long whip on the end Of a bamboo pole,
while a second. called the foreloper. leads
the first pair. Just what purpose Is serv-
ed by these huge carts IS not easily dis
covered, for as yet, L have never seen
them carry so much as a wisp of hay.
When three of these carts get together
in market place 1t is as though one were
looking out upon herd of oxen
Ven you shall see die oft Kimberley Che
pronounced IL Camerlay) mine, den shall
you see die grossest hole ever in die
ground ge-dug." The old Boer trader of
the Merriam Castle had thus spoken
weeks before, and the ink of my sigma
ture was not yet dry on the pages of the
hotel register before / went out to look
for the biggest hole in the ground in the
world. One does not have far to GO 1t is
in the heart of the town, If such a cheer
less, gloomy town as Kimberley can be
said to have heart and you come upon
IT al at once and long before you are ex-
II is better than Niagara, better than the
Coliseum, one Of the biggest things mag
sides. perpendicular as those of a house
suddenly yawning at the end of q street
deep as an ocean. figures can give one
but a poor idea of the kopje. Even the
very sight of II, big as 1t appears Is de-
ceptiVe; one-half way down the sides OF
this gulf, this extinct crater 0or il is
abandoned noW), is the shaft house of the
DE Beers mine, and while ! stood leaning
over the rail that has been very thought
tully put around the kopje / was watch
ing what thought to be the head of q
kaft1r moving to and fro about the ma
chinery of the hosting gear, but as 7
watched the head divided itself, as II
were, in two, and on a sudden ] realized
that what / thought was the head of one
man had been the bodies of two; and this
was only half down the pit.
one OF these men Travelled up the sides
OF the kopje 10 its lips, and the hoisting
gear brought into use during the tran
sit was very unique IT was a car
large four-wheeled fiat car, drawn up and
let down by wire cable, but instead Of
running upon solid tracks IL ran upon
two cables admirably answering the
same purpose Indeed the whole affair
was a compromise between an inclined
railway and an elevator.
Aside from its immensely the kopie has
another attraction. This lies in the color
OF its eartns. Diamonds are found in
what is called sand and white limestone.
seen at close quarters this blue dirt IL
not blue at all but nasty slate gray.
across the gulf of the kopje it becomes
the color of distant mountains, the color
Of lakes on gray October days. The
earths In the kopje are all colors; the
white, yellow, and blue of the "payh the
deep red of the surface ground; the green
Of the rotten quartz the ochre and burnt
sienna of the deep levels, and the bright
orange OF the sands. Fancy for yourself
the walls Of a bottomless pit built OF ali
these crowding coiors that at such DIS
lance blend and harmonic and rssn mo |
zach other Ike the bitumen end Of an ar /