Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/344

 any prizes Mr. Meek was born of English parents, but has never been to England. During the war he would not fight the English, and he would not fight the Boers, as his wife is of Dutch descent. So he left home, and went into Natal. His wife remained on the farm throughout the war, and was constantly surrounded by troops of the contending forces. Once, when they had an artillery battle, the shells flew over her house for hours; some of the shells fell in her door-yard, and, exploding, tore down fences and outhouses. Her children were away at school when the war began, and did not come home for eighteen months. Mrs. Meek managed to smuggle a good deal of the farm live-stock into Natal, where her husband received it and cared for it on land rented for the purpose. In smuggling sheep and cattle out of the country, Mrs. Meek's main reliance was the native foreman, the wretch who has six wives; he was as faithful and efficient as it is possible for a servant to be. Occasionally the English talked of sending Mrs. Meek to the concentration camp, and burning her house, but she was always able to coax them out of the notion She has a native cook, a man, and pays him a dollar a week. The native women do her washing and ironing, and do it very well, for a dollar a week; in addition, they clean and sweep Mrs. Meek has never heard of a divorce among the natives on the farm where she lives. The men of some native tribes are married in church, by a negro preacher; in such a case, they are compelled to pay two shillings for a license, but this civilized plan is so expensive and troublesome that it is not popular. Besides, when a man is married