The San Francisco call., 1897-01-24

and implements to conduct smithy.
blacksmith as tutor was secured. This
was six months ago, and now the nuns
have Just begun TO do their own black
smithlng. They have thus proved not
only their equality with man, but their
superiority 10 him, because when the
blacksmith. disregarding his religious en-
vironment and the respect due to the
noble women, went on prolonged drunk
he was incontinently .fired" out of the
settlement.
The Dominican farm is one of the most
attractive sights OF the Cape Colony. It's
management, for system and intelligence,
is unsurpassed.
In a paratively new country such
attention to details as the sisters give to
their agricultural operations seem to their
slow-going Boer neighbors work of su-
pererogation, to the English it appears
too inickv, and to the native Katfir and
Hoitentot helpers it seems akin to the
miraculous, and fills them with awe.
Tae visitor who rides to the farm from
! King Williams Town before he reaches
the confines OF the Dominican domain be-
| holds from distance brown-clad femin inc
| figures hoeing. plowing, cultivating, prun-
| ing and grating in the orchards, or per-
| haps nun mounted on horse driving
| strong g-limbed oxen to water. At close
range the most incongruous thing in the
appearance of Sister of st. Dominic as
| she is on her South African farm is her
ruddy, rosy, tanned face, so different from
| the bloodless white face that seems insep-
arabic from the visible character OF nun.
! This natural bronze was we'll earned.
! Day after day the nuns have toiled at the
forge and in the fields, and exposure to
the fierce African sun has gradually
changed them from pale-faced. delicate
handed convent women to brawny, hard
handed laborers.
But the feminine blacksmiths of the
| Dominican Convent farm are the stars
The personality and expertness of the
| hammer-swinging nun ever seems to con-
| tinue to exercise sort OF fascination over
| the rest of the sisterhood. for they go out
of their way while about their daily tasks
| on the farm to look in, even if but for a
moment at their hard-working sisters
A recent visitor to the Sisters of st. Domi-
mic, who had the good fortune to possess q
letter OF introduction from a Bishop to
| of his visit as red-letter day in his diary.
The abbess proved to be a woman endowed
with uncommonly good sense. She was
practical and her personal spirituality was
so aided and tempered with a knowledge
of human nature and an ability to per-
ceiye the humorous side of things that she
captiyated the visitor. Neverth eless. she
imbued him with deep respect for her un-
deriving and Indefeasible determination
to serve God by doing good to her fellow
mortals.
After drive about the farm in species
| of buck wagon behind a spirited stockiIy
| built young horse upon tour OF inspec-
ton OF mines, fruit trees and growing
crops and an occasional chat with some
Sister, perhaps leaning lightly and pic
| turesauely on hoe, the abbess remarked.
Now, / suppose you will not be willing
to conclude your inspection without visit
| ing our b, h,4eSsmith-shop."
The revelation as to the enlargement of
woman's sphere TO the extent of including
blacksmithing was, in one instance at
| least, startling. Tethered to a strong
oaken rack in the center OF the shop was
draughthorse, whose big bones and
shaggy fetlocks proclaimed a Flemish
strain in his blood. Nail box beside her,
q nun was bent over, with the horses
"nigh" hind foot over her knee, and with
| a redhot horseshoe held with a pair OF
tongs was fitting the shoe to the hoos.
The abbess family smiled at the uncon-
cealed startling effect created on the vis-
itor, and the nun just then dropping the,