200 HOME LIFE ON AN OSTRICH FARM. 



learns to exercise much patience ; for, if the girl is 

 pretty, or the father who always has a keen eye to 

 business observes that the swain is very devoted, a 

 high price is fixed ; and the bridegroom-elect has to 

 work for years, like Jacob for Rachel, till he has 

 accumulated the required number of cows. 



Daughters, being such a profitable source of capital, 

 are of course much valued by the parents ; to whom, 

 besides, in that sunniest of climates, a large family 

 brings none of the cares and anxieties which it entails 

 on the English labouring-man. The more children a 

 Zulu has, the better he is pleased ; the birth of a girl 

 especially being welcomed as gladly as is that of a son 

 among the Jews, and indeed among Orientals generally. 



English people settling in the Cape Colony usually 

 start with a strong prejudice in favour of the coloured 

 race. They think them ill-treated, bestow on them a 

 good deal of unmerited sympathy, and credit them 

 with many good qualities which they do not possess. 

 By the time they have been a year or two in the country 

 a reaction has set in ; they have discovered that the 

 negro is a fraud ; they hate him, and cannot find any- 

 thing bad enough to say of him. Then a still longer 

 experience teaches them that the members of this 

 childish race are, after all, not so bad, but that they 

 require keeping in their places treating in fact as you 

 would treat children twelve years old. In intelligence, 

 indeed, they never seem to advance much beyond that 

 age. You must, of course, be just with them ; but 

 always keep them at a distance. Above all, never let 



