The Conquest of the Desert 



on 300 men are kept constantly employed in 

 repairing and extending the various canals." 

 • •••••• 



The Kakamas labour colony is a credit to the 

 Dutch Reformed Church, and stands a splendid 

 monument to the greatest thing that life holds 

 out for any man, or sect, or nation — the up- 

 lifting of humanity. But, to my mind, the 

 greatest thing you will find at Kakamas is the 

 genius that first led out the furrow, 1 tunnelled 

 through those granite walls, laid siphons under 

 the river-bed, and can, with a child's touch, 

 hurl a roaring cataract into the Orange, or send 

 it softly speeding to the fertile lands twenty 

 miles below. From the far-off leaping Malet- 

 sunyane comes a thousand miles of the rushing 

 river, and here you have it met with, played 

 with, conquered and controlled. 



Mr Johann Jacob Lutz, the builder of the 

 Kakamas irrigation canals, is the son of a Swiss 

 missionary who was sent out to South Africa 

 by the Rhenish Society. He was born at 

 Williston, Cape Colony, and after a varied 

 career trekked northwards to Upington. Here 

 he remained for several years helping Mr 

 Schroder, the missionary of whom I have spoken, 



1 Irrigation canal. 

 86 



