664 THE KAP-TENT WAGON. 



been expanded by the introduction of a certain number of Free 

 Burghers with the right to cultivate the soil and rear cattle for 

 their own profit, the Company 'beinor the purchaser oi the pro- 

 duce. Of these Free Burghers Tas was one, and the chief interest 

 which historians have attached to his diary has been in the light 

 which it throws upon the subject of a dispute in which they 

 became involved with the Governor, whom they accused of 

 assuming a monopoly in his private interests. Another impor- 

 tant thing had happened. At the time when his diary opens some 

 twenty years had elapsed since the revocation of the Edict of 

 Nantes, and a certain number of expatriated Huguenots had 

 firmly established themselves as settlers at the Cape. They had 

 gone somewhat farther afield than the Free Burghers, but Tas 

 numbered certain of them amongst his neighbours, and one 

 gathers that they had already identified themselves with the con- 

 cerns of the settlement. To what extent they may have contri- 

 buted to the development of the wagon which was destined to 

 play so important a part in its ultimate form is, however, not 

 indicated. 



Nearly a century later, in October, I7Q7, Lady Anne Barnard 

 writes : — 



Last month has sent in from the country quantities of wagons chiefly 

 loaded with wine, butter, skins, feathers, and oranges; grain is sometimes 

 added as the farmers happen to have it. The wagons are very narrow, 

 about the size of a large pipe of wine, and long enough to hold three in 

 the length. 



As a pipe is of the capacity of about two hogsheads, the 

 carrying capacity of the wagon would appear to have been 

 doubled. By this time it would appear also that the owner of 

 the wagon drove it himself. Lady Anne Barnard says : 



They [the wagons] are drawn by sixteen oxen and driven by one 

 man, a Hottentot l>esides generally walking at the head of the first pair, 



the guiding Hottentot being thus distinguished by his nationality, 

 apparently, from the driver. Barrow, who travelled in a Dutch 

 wagon at this time, described the treatment to which he saw an 

 ox subjected, presenting the incident as evidence of Dutch cruelty. 

 By this time a detached settlement had been effected, with 

 the town of Graafif-Reinet as its capital, much intervening terri- 

 tory being waste, and there is abundant evidence that the tilted 

 wagon had fully established itself as a travelling home. It mav, 

 indeed, be said to have then attained, for practical purposes, its 

 final form. The process of its evolution cannot, perhaps, be 

 traced. The late John Bird says, in a paper on " Natal from 

 1846 to 1856," that its final perfection had been attained through 

 " long practice." Burchell, describing one which he had 

 acquired in 1811, says that "The framework of the tilt was 

 made of bamboo cane," that the sides or leeren were painted 

 on the outlside, but that the lower parts, called the onder stel, 

 were " well covered with tar." Symmetrically bent stinkwood, 

 tent-boogen (or hood-bows), and decorative painting through- 

 out, were to become objects of great importance ; but, perhaps. 



