Daily independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 188?-1915, 1911-09-27
LIFE ON A BOER FARM
NOT INVITING FROM AMERICAN
POINT OF VIEW.
Woman Traveller Describes the Mo.
notony and Discomforts Sho
Found in the Agricultural Re-
qions of South Africa

An American woman travelling In
South Africa was detained by floods
and compelled to spend month on
Poer farm.
The first nights monotony," she
writes In Health Culture, was broken
by the roaring OF ostriches under our
windows. We thought 1t was n tame
lion.
The farmer and his family lived
chiefly on sour bread and sour
SKINNED milk. was therefore hun
cry most of the time and the ripe
figs hanging in clusters were pretty
alluring. After pushing back the
skin OF the fig and enjoying the soft
irult with its tropical taste | had q
refreshing nights sleep. only to awak-
en- In the morning pretty well scared,
for my tongue was so swollen and
black that | could not talk
The Boer wife laughed and enjoyed
my discontinue and explained that
the skin OF the fig had numerous fine
thorns and | had not been careful
to remove IT when eating.
When told the farmers wife
that | liked buttcrmilk In quantity l
noticed that had cuprul or so given
me, but she threw II by the pailful to
the pigs. They were OF far more con.
sequence to her than |. for they would
stay longer with her and were her
familiars. | was not.
Then again. when va. !:dngry
for butter on my bread. a white clam
I1N ,INafu
fat was handed to Inc. and could
not allow the farmers wife to see me
CULVER. She sold her butter I'm the
village close by at rs cents pound,
more or less. Sour bread and green
Strawberries (plenty OF them) were
considered good enough.
The l5oer family was one OF the
wealthiest of their kind. There was
not ripple OF fun or exuberant life
In anything but the live stock. Con-
versat4on was dead langungo-un-
known
The women are mute beings. ac-
ceptlng their destiny with d deep
Stiffness. The wife gives .f Ter
strength 10 the limit, and dies alter
giving birth to n dozen or more chill
drew. To make way for vile number
| two. who gives another dozen chill
dren to her country. Her adobe house,
with its dirt floor made OF anthill clay
mixed with beef gall Is n Cha,IDer OF
horror to an Amerivan tTayell2I
THE farmer depends upon his ten
to eighteen children, Of all sizes, to
help him. KafHr as an employe
fgs Il. III
blows. Yet that Kaflir Is the hired
man In the mines and elsewhere in
South Africa The white man as n
day labOrer Is a general failure. He
cannot he worked In drOvcs like the
KaiIir from the interior. whose Ian
guagc, I'm clicks and vowel sounds, Ia
hardly human.
"Thc BOcr is not long Iiy"i one
seldom met an aged Boer OF the old
stock Dom Paul Kruger. who was
rs years old when he died. was an
exception. Hatred toward the Uit-
lander and the lust Tor gold and power
was what kept the fires OF life burn.
Ing at white heat within hiTn.
ITO stem the elements alone In Ar.
rica takes the Gloutest heart FeverB
assail the discouraged and underfed
home boy. The easily forded streams
become rivers. like swirling Niagaras,
In few hours and the terrific thun-
derstOrms paralyZe one sensitive to
electrical Influences.
There is no pretty Hlilc. fer.on
streak In the sky which The rmateur
photographer ran catch On his film,
but the air Is charged with electricity
10 appalling In It's violet hucd and
deep orange earthbound clouds that
one has TO come TO a complete stand.
still whether walking or riding on tho
open vcldt. so as not to attract tho
ribbonIike lightning playing around
him and venting It's fury on any NOV.
ing object"