LIFE ON A MOUNTAIN FARM. 97 



mining element into the Transvaal will induce far 

 greater changes, and a speedier transformation in 

 life and thought among the Boers there than in the 

 Cape Colony, which for the present lies unnoticed 

 by the invading British element, in the rush 

 northwards to the gold-fields. 



The Boers are superstitious to a degree. One of 

 the Stols's, living out beyond Swanepoels Poort, was 

 for some time driven almost out of his mind by what 

 he considered ghostly manifestations. At all times 

 of the day, and especially at meal times, stones, 

 dung, and other filth were thrown into his house ; 

 windows were mysteriously broken, strange noises 

 were heard, stones and garbage came flying on to the 

 table at meals, and yet nothing could be discovered 

 as to the origin of the manifestations. At last the 

 poor man became so worried and nervous about the 

 "spook," as he called it, that he went almost in 

 tears to our neighbour at Riet Fontein — the late 

 Mr. J. B. Evans — and implored his assistance as a 

 magistrate. Mr. Evans sent to the nearest town for 

 a policeman, whom he quartered at Stols's farmhouse, 

 rightly thinking that the perpetrator of these high- 

 jinks would be shortly discovered. For some time 

 the policeman watched in vain, so well was the 

 game played, but at length the culprit was unmasked. 

 The eldest daughter of the farmer himself was 

 caught in flagrante delicto, and confessed that she, 

 and she alone, had wrought all this miserable 

 deception upon her own parents. Her punishment 

 at the hands of the enraged father was, I fancy, 

 pretty exemplary, and the ghostly visitations never 

 again returned. It is a curious thing that this 

 peculiar species of deception, more common at one 



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