The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-05-12
DEVOTION OF BOER WOMEN
TO WHAT THEY THINK 4 HOLT
 VAR.
How They Have Successfully Run the Farms in the Absence of the Men.

importance of this is easily realized when one considers that an army, as famous general said, is like serpent, for it moves on it's belly, Some light is
 thrown upon the splendid manner in
 which these Boer women have worked
 by a letter written from Pretoria by
 Douglass Story. Here is his descrip-
 tion of a Pretoria market:
 1.-TWO long rows of wagons stood axle
 deep in the mud, with their curtains
 rolled up and their interiors showing.
 In each was Boer woman, sometimes
 couple, and always youngster or two. | But there was no man, and people re- | trained from reference to the absentees.
 Gowned in black, with her salloW, Wrln- | lSled face set far back in her black kap-
 pie, the Boer woman sits on albundle or
 clothing in the hinder part of the Wag-
 on, eyeing the crowd, Before her on a wisp of straw are the eggs, pumpkins
 or potatoes she has brought to market, But there were other keen-eyed women
 on the market square that morning women who stood guard over heaped wagons of forage and heavy loads of po-
 tatoes in bags. Their immediate object
 was business, and I stood curlously by while the auctioneer disposed of their | bringings.
 Anxiety sat on every line of these
 womens rugged faces. They scanned | the crowd and rearranged the potatoes
 in the mouth of the bags, until the auc- l tioneer's quick hammer had cleared the | lot. Then they clambered silently into the wagon again and resumed their in- | terrupted toilet Crowded market square or solitary veldt brought no blush to their cheek. and they braided their hair in the full presence of the | townspeople, without sign of embar- rassment. Bushes are the luxuries of the rich and the grace of the eifete dwellers In towns. The veldt woman | has no use for such fopperies and de- | spises them.
 Meanwhile the potatoes and mealies were passing under the hammer, and I noted the prices they fetched in war time. I and other ignorant persons had
 predicted failure In the food supply consequent upon the absence of the men upon commando. We had reckoned
 without the Boer vrouw and a remarka-
 bly rainy season. Prices are lower to-
 day than have ever known them in the Transvaal. When Jameson crossed the border, four years ago, forage was f6 los per hundred bundles; to-day it is 25s per hundred bundles. Potatoes have
 fallen from 45s to 15s the bag. To its own astonishment, the Transvaal has emerged from the battle smoke an agri- cultural country
 Tn war time in the face of possible siege, prices in Pretoria are less than one-half of those current in Buluwayo. Forage is e3 l5s in Buluwayo, but only 25s in Pretoria; Boer-meal is sold at 55s in Buuwayo, but fetches only 25s in Pretoria. I saw bags of potatoes change hands to-day at 15s the bag, when the price in Buluwayo is go. Whatever else may fail them, the food supply is assured.
 The extraordinary favorable season which has marked this year of war has seemed to the Boer women a direct evi- 6ence of the hand of God. They remem- Der that the year of the raid was the backest in the countrys history, with it's miserable tale of drouth rnderpest and locusts; and they ioyousy proclaim the difference from this year of plenty. In every phase of this struggle one must recognize the religious fervor Of the people, and without full under standing of it no one can realize the forces at work within the republic The Transvaalers believe themselves engaged in a holy war, and the fact Is one which the statesmen who arrange the final settlement may not neglect
 Every night the people meet in the big church on the Kerk square, vast congregation of women and children with such of the men as can be present there. Wounded burghers from the front, and those on furlough sprinkle the audience. They attend the service as they would war council and esteem their predikant as they would we'll tried general. The war seems to have | burned out in great part the influences l of the gold rush. and the people are be- | come simple as in their pastoral days
 Meantime there is neither death nor | desolation in the silent dorps and farm houses. Boer women are carrying on | the work of their sons and husbands, d- | recting the Kaffir labor, and themselves | driving to market as goodly loads as ever were seen there in peace times. 1 But it is quietly done. There are va- | Noht bihain, oIlNi buSlyr uultuuultu veldtschoen to still the needless laugh | and to set the sad-eyed vrouw busting | about unnecessary duties when the chill dren grow noisy or the Hottentot kitch- en help shouts across the yard.
 They are not beautiful, these Boer women, nor promising candidates for | treatment, but I have seen enough to know their practical value in the land. On them falls the slow sorrow of the times. The politics of the war were in other hands, but the prosecu- tion of it rests in great part with the women. Had they not taken the direc- tion of the farms into their own hands, famine would now be staring the coun- try in the face, instead of well-filled granaries and forage sheds While the ladies of England have been employed devising comforts for the troops, the Boer women have busied themselves with getting in the mealies and digging up the potato crops. The same wo- mans heart beats with the same divine under the Boer vrouw's yfje as under the daintlest vestment from Worth.
 This is war of the CromWelian period. The men at the front may be degenerate Calvinists, may have all the n hn ttr,try I