LIFE ON A MOUNTAIN FARM. 95 



I believe, the young male bird is yellowish-brown 

 in colour, has black wing-feathers, and is rendered 

 conspicuous by the brilliant orange shoulder-patches 

 from which the bird takes its name. Mr. Layard, 

 in his " Birds of South Africa," mentions the 

 difficulties the male bird of this species labours 

 under when he has donned his breeding plumage, 

 by reason of the inordinate length of his tail. 

 Children are enabled to run him down ; he cannot 

 fly against the wind, and in wet weather, knowing 

 his helplessness, he stirs not out of the bushes that 

 hide him. Moreover, the Kaffir children stretch 

 well-limed lines across the fields ; thus numbers of 

 these birds are snared by their tails becoming 

 entangled in the sticky lines. I have frequently 

 heard these statements verified by residents of the 

 Eastern province and Kaffraria. Here is one more 

 striking example of the troubles of matrimony, from 

 a male point of view. The male orange-shouldered 

 bunting, in his breeding plumage, no doubt, freely 

 admits to himself that, in his case, " marriage is a 

 failure." 



There are one or two families of Boers residing 

 like ourselves within the deep recesses of the 

 Witteberg. They are of the poorer class of Boer ; 

 their holdings do not extend beyond the usual 

 Dutch farm of a little over 6,000 acres (3,000 

 morgen), and, buried in some far-off recesses of the 

 hills, their existence is even more isolated than our 

 own. Sometimes we have to call in upon them in 

 the way of business, sometimes we ride out to 

 Swanepoels Poort and see the one or two families 

 of Stols settled there. They are a strange, taciturn, 

 rugged race, but when you know them, and if you 



