The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1899-10-27
SOUTH AFRICAN IDIOMS
IN THE WAR DISPATCHES

| lehluiildT WOTuS ana expressions iulOfndtlC
to the locality from which they may have
| been written. The occurrence of such ''uit-
| landische" terms will be frequent in the
dispatches which will record the strife be-
tween England and her stubborn neighbor,
| South Africa, for that country has patois
| all its own.
We therefore propose to furnish our read
ers with a glossary simply illustrating the
| terms which are most likely to find their
way into the war correspondents ink
| horns. from the dust of the dry African
"veldt." And this (the comprehensive
term for all open country there-and not
merely 1.-THE plains'D will do to start with;
Withdrawing as we are with de Afr1-
| kaanische taal," and not with what the
| "Boers" (meaning farmers, and nothing
more) call "pront hollans' correct Euro
pean Dutch we properly spell this WORD
with final 1t" because phonerically the
word is in Africa "felt'-even though the
books spell it ''veldt.''
Velschoens-Some people mistakenly con-
meet with the above word the term
| "velschoens" and spell this, which stands
| for the farmer-made skin shoes-which are
| only one degree removed our mecca
| sins-with an added "dt," under the i'm
| preston that the word means shoes for the
| weld.
| Boer Taa-A werd as to pronunciation:
| AS remarked the 'Boer taal' is not the
| "nederlamsche'' of today, but patois the
| body of which consists of archaic Dutch of
the seventeenth century, eked out by adap-
tations from French, Spanish, Malay and
some native words. The vowel sounds are
td,a 7 ~, aft 10
But, in many instances, "a" is "ah,' so
| long-drawn-out that it ought properly be
| written "a"-and l always write 1t so in
| "Afrikander," to express the drawl which
a Boer always uses in that word.
| Kwaaie-This also appeaes in the word
"kwaaie,' immortalized by Uncle Powl,
| when he described the Great Queen as
| "eene kwaaie vrouw" Pundits in three
continents ran their heads against the
Phrase-mostly in vain-for 1t was used as
a term of respectful awe. In its archaic
and therefore Krugerian sense-it is the
explicit equivalent of dread lady"
OF the consonants, only two need be
mentioned tx" and "g." The first, when
terminal has the sound of "ck,'' and we
often, therefore, so spell it. 1hs g is
gultteral, so vibrant as nave no repre-
sentative equivalent by English lettering
even "cn (Scotch) in 'Ioch' hardly
reaches it, as uttered by a plainsman; XII
thought of deep in the lJhroat-might con-
vey the idea. The proper name George"
as used by them, has precisely the sound
of a violent effort to remove a bit of tough
phlegm from ones throat
UIT-Ihds is one of the most puzzling
syllables for the Ang,o-Saxon reader to
master; a favorite pronunciation is "weet."
Its sound in Transvaaler's mouth is ex-
actly as we say eight in English; e. g.,
Uitlanders, ''eight-landers.
SPRUIT-Even in South Africa itself THE
Saxon tongue boggles at this "uit, and for
'spruit.' a brook CIR streamlet, most of
them say "spro1,,;'' nevertheless, the Beers
always pronounce it ''srr-eigft."
Some physical features of landscape like
ly ito be presented to their readers by the
news writers in ''taal'' words are shown in
the following commentary:
RAND-Any long, rolling hill-range is a
rand-more specifically the grassy ridge
itself of suoh formation. Cats Rand, and
Witwa,ter's Rand are Illustrations.
kOPJE-Pronounced Hoppe = designates
isolated hills, especially such as are round,
and have pointed tops.
KOP-This is larger-it must be an dso-
lated mountain peak to attain the dignity
of a kop. To be a 'spitz-kop," the peak
must be high, sharp and oraggy.
Berg CIR Bergen-These signify extensive
mountain ranges-as the Mamalliesbergen,
the Drakensberg and the Verzaamelbergen.
Hoogte-To descend to the lower features
of the landscape, say from the top of
Majuba 'kop,' we come down the grassy,
rock-stTewn "hoogte," or brae-side, and
find ourselves in Laign's Mex
Nek-This means the rounded hollow of
the dip between any two peaks of mount
ain chain. But do make the error of con-
founding the mex with the "pass.'
Laing's Mex is a pass, because the road
goes over it. but there are "neks" which
are not passes. Talking of necks, an os-
trich put his long neck through the window
of the little hotel that, of old, used to nes-
tie under Majuba in Laing's Mex, and over
the neck of this scribe, annexed the beef
steak off his plate but that's another story.
Kloof-If, however, we were upon a
mountain which offered us no easy .'boogte'
to descend by, we should have to scramble
down some narrow and rugged "kloof." A
kloof is precisely what, in America, we call
a canyon, and as with the word canyon, so
also the word kloof may, with equal pro-
priety be applied to a deep, narrow cut in
a plain, or lever, narrow pass in rocky
country, to a rift Cor ascending Valley
in mountainside. Thus the word specih-
| cally means quite other than a hollow be-
| tween two hills" some ill-informed Bos-
| ton writer has explained it lately.
Krantz-As We scramble down the wind
| ings of our "kloof'' we may come in sight
| of the .'lorantz' of some betting kop above
| us. 'Krantz' is the ring of abrupt cliff,
| which 'wreaths' the brow of the charac-
teristic ''kop" of South Africa. Rensburg's
| Kop, on the road over Quatulamba, from
| Natal to Harrismith, in the Free State (and
| which, will, most probably, figure in the
| account of some fight SOON is good ex-
| ample of partly ''krantzed' kop. The per-
| feet krantzes, however, are in Basutoland.
VIEY-sThe kfoOf we have been treading