Ten Months In The Field With The Boers Part 19

At Johannesburg much more than at Pretoria, because the town is more English, the houses in the centre of the town are mainly offices, for all the inhabitants who are comfortably off live in the suburbs, either on the height beyond the fort, or at the end of Main Street, in the great park of Belgravia.

Most of these suburban dwellings are very expensive, and are comfortably and luxuriously arranged. A garden more or less large is considered an absolute necessity.

The majority of the population speculate and gamble, and it is not rare in times of peace to recognise in some barman or miner a gentleman who had dazzled the town by the magnificence of his carriages and horses a few months back. No surprise is felt by anyone, for the next 'boom' will perhaps make him a wealthy man of fas.h.i.+on once more.

I could quote the case of a young man I knew well who was twice a millionaire, and who, after having been ruined for the second time, was gradually building up a third fortune. He is very little more than thirty.

Johannesburg, however, is merely a city of pa.s.sage. Men stay here just long enough to make money, and directly this is done, they return to their own countries. The end and aim of everything here is to make money, and to make it quickly.

Based on this principle, and composed of a number of adventurers, the cosmopolitan society one finds here hardly offers a guarantee of irreproachable morality.

Antecedents are of little account, indeed. A merchant who has been convicted of fraud in France, here enjoys the consideration due to the 500,000 he has gained with the money he stole in his fraudulent bankruptcy.

I have even heard that some years ago the extradition of a rogue was the signal for disorderly scenes and an expostulatory address, because he had not been convicted of theft since his arrival at Johannesburg. He had made a considerable sum of money there, and was accompanied to the station by a number of friends.

No sketch of Johannesburg would be complete without a few words about the gold-mines.

I am no authority on the subject, but I will describe what was told me and what I saw; and as the engineer who was good enough to give me some information knew me to be ignorant, my precis will be a little 'Manual on Mining' for the use of novices.

In the first place, there is an essential difference between the manner in which gold is found in Wit.w.a.tersrand and in other districts, such as Klond.y.k.e, Senegal, or the Soudan. In the latter, the gold is in grains, either embedded between the frozen stones, or rolling in the beds of rivers. The auriferous mud is taken up and washed, and the gold is retained. Nothing could be simpler.

In the Rand, however, the working of the mines is purely scientific.

The mineral is found in blocks of quartz and silicious clay containing pyrites of auriferous copper and gold.

After calculating the direction of the reef, one must dig down to a greater or less depth to find it. Dynamite is then used to detach the gold-bearing quartz, which is brought to the surface. It has the appearance of very hard white stone, slightly veined with blue. It is carried off to the batteries in Decauville trucks, and there a crus.h.i.+ng-mill, which looks like a gigantic coffee-mill, and sledge-hammers combined into groups of five, reduce it to a very fine powder. A current of air spreads this powder over copper-plates covered with mercury.

A large proportion of the gold, about 60 per cent., amalgamates with the mercury, and once a fortnight the amalgam is sc.r.a.ped off. After fusion the mercury in the amalgam volatilizes, leaving a deposit of almost pure gold.

The residuum of the first process is afterwards poured into huge vats of from 10 to 12 metres in diameter, in which cyanide of pota.s.sium has been placed. A solution of cyanide of gold is thus obtained, and this is put into cases lined with strips of zinc, on which the gold is precipitated.

The 40 per cent. lost in the first process is thus recovered.

The gold thus collected is melted down into ingots, the transport and verification of which are the objects of interminable regulations.

So much for the scientific part. The rest is simpler.

The heavy labour is mainly done by Kaffirs or Zulus under the supervision of white miners who earn about twenty-five pounds a month, and live in the boarding-house connected with the mine.

The natives live in a compound where no alcohol is allowed. Their rations are given them, and they live on very little. Their ambition is to earn enough money to return to their native place, buy two wives, and do no more work; the wives work for them thenceforth. It takes them about two years to realize this dream. When the time is up, it is impossible to keep them in the mines.

The first year of working (1888) yielded about 1,000,000. In 1895 about 8,000,000 was extracted. Finally, from January 1 to August 31, 1899, the harvest was nearly 13,000,000. The net profits of exploitation are considerably diminished by the enormous expenses resulting from the dearness of European labour, and the heavy taxes imposed by the Transvaal Government on mining rights and on the importation of explosives.

At the time of my sojourn all the works were closed. In the town, as every hospital and ambulance was full to overflowing, the hotels were requisitioned for the sick. In front of the Victoria Hotel there were often strings of ten and twelve waggons bringing in the wounded.

Often at dusk a dray would pa.s.s, into which long, heavy cases of deal were furtively slipped.... The _avowed_ losses were terrible enough.

What were they in reality?

About the middle of December the War Office confessed to 7,350 men. At the beginning of February this number was doubled, and Buller's three attempts on the Tugela cost 1,046 killed, 3,785 wounded, and over 1,500 missing.

In March the numbers had swelled to 14,000. It was the unhealthy season, and sickness--enteric fever especially--made wider gaps in the English ranks than bullets. On May 10 over 18,000 men were missing, 5,000 of whom were dead.

On the Boer side the statistics are much more difficult to check, especially when one is confronted with such discrepancies as these: Rumours and reports stated the Boer losses at the Battle of Colenso, on December 15, to have been 8 killed and 14 wounded. But I find a report drawn up by the Red Cross Society in which the numbers are given as 77 killed and 210 wounded.

What is one to believe? In all ages belligerents have tried to conceal their losses, and this kind of juggling is, of course, much easier among incoherent groups like the commandos than in regular battalions.

One day--it was June 10, I think--all the police of the mines were requisitioned to transport the wounded from the station to the hospitals. There were a great many, and they had been forbidden to say whence they came; the police were also forbidden to speak to them on any pretext whatever. Had something very serious happened? We never knew exactly what it was.

Pretoria had been occupied on June 5. The news that reached us came at long intervals, after manipulation by the censor, and was often of the most fantastic order.

The police regulations were most stringent. Everyone was ordered to be indoors, at first by seven o'clock, later by 8.30. The streets and squares were guarded by troops. Jewellers' and wine-merchants' shops and bars were closed by order. No one was allowed to draw money without a permit from the military authorities, and a limit--of 20 a week, I think--was enforced as to the amount, unless a special permission had been granted.

Finally, residents in the town were required to get a pa.s.s and to take an oath of allegiance. Those who, like ourselves, had resolved not to do this, were obliged to hide like outlaws, to avoid being marched off to the fort, and thence to Ceylon. We give a reproduction of this police regulation[#] which was posted on the walls of the town.

[#] See pp. 216, 217.

A few days back a German had gone into Government Place at noon and hauled down the English flag. The sentry looked on aghast at first, and then began to question him.

'It has no business here,' replied the German, going on with his work.

He was arrested at last, and condemned to nine months' hard labour.

The life of inaction had become unbearable to me. At the end of June, still on the lookout for a means of returning to the front, I at last 'found' the papers of an English police-officer. And now for liberty!

V. R.

POLICE NOTICE,

1. All Civilians are required to remain in their houses between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6.30 a.m. unless provided with a pa.s.s signed by the Military Commissioner of Police.

2. No Natives are allowed in the town except such as are permanently employed within its limits.

3. All Liquor Stores, Bars, and Kaffir Eating Houses are closed until further orders. No liquor will be sold except on the written order of an Officer of Her Majesty's Forces. 4. All Jewellers' Shops are closed.

5. No Civilian is allowed to ride or drive, or ride a bicycle within the town unless provided with a pa.s.s signed by the Military Commissioner of Police.

6. Any person disobeying these regulations is liable to arrest, and will be dealt with under Martial Law.

By Order, FRANCIS DAVIES, MAJOR GRENADIER GUARDS, _Military Commissioner of Police._ JOHANNESBURG, 1ST JUNE, 1900.

POLITIE KENNISGEVING.

1. Alle Inwoners worden hierbij bevolen om in hun huizen te blyven van 7 uur 's avonds tot 6.30 uur 's morgens indien niet voorzien van een Paspoort, geteekend door de Militaire Commissaris van Politie.