CHAPTER II. 



FIRST YEARS IN SOUTH AFRICA. 



IN January, 1844, I found myself on board ship, 

 beating out against a tremendous adverse gale 

 across the Bay of Biscay, bound for the Cape 

 which we reached early in March. 



Cape Town in those days was a quiet, pros- 

 perous, but old-fashioned non-progressive place. 

 The coloured working population, principally of 

 Malay extraction, wore a costume of their own, 

 and looked wonderfully clean and well fed. There 

 seemed to be an entire absence of bustle or hurry, 

 and soon after the noontide meal every one turned 

 in for a comfortable " siesta," which possibly 

 accounted in some measure for the total absence 

 of that haggard, worn expression so observable in 

 most of the urban inhabitants of all classes at home. 

 A few substantial merchant firms, headed by cour- 

 teous well-bred gentlemen, transacted the exten- 

 sive wholesale and shipping business of the place, 



