Harry's Tales: In Deed, Nothing Happens Here
Harry Wroth tells of the night a boarding house caught fire, and no fire hoses were to be found.
Many years ago my work involved regular monthly visits to the Deeds Office in Cape Town. We were busy describing district boundaries for publication in the Government Gazette and this gave us access to original Title Deeds.
It was noticeable that original farms in the Bredasdorp area were usually circular or just over semi-circular with a long straight side. This was because the original quitrent owner could acquire all the land that he could enclose with beacons while riding a horse for one hour. The straight sides occurred when he was running short of time and made a dash for home or first beacon. Missing the deadline would mean the loss to him of his opportunity to acquire land. This was in the days of the Dutch East India Company and the Cape was a Dutch colony.
Up Calvinia way and eastwards the farms were quadrangular in shape with boundaries virtually running in straight north-south and east-west lines. The beacons were marked by an hour's horse ride in the direction of selected cardinal points of the compass. They were usually longer on the east-west line.
When the British took over the Cape Colony from the Dutch they sent out land surveyors to measure up the new addition to the Empire.
Imagine the scene. A British land surveyor, newly arrived from England, finds himself on a far, out-lying, isolated farm with a job to do for his regal employers. He cannot speak the language of his hospitable hosts. His hosts, the owners of the farms, in most cases, do not like the new setup, nogal, to be British Citizens .....vragties! So how can they permanently voice and record their objections for posterity. At the end of the survey the Rooinek (literally) surveyor would ask the name of the farm from the owner. Back would come "Skilpadtepel!" or some such ridiculous or obscene name. Translated Skilpadtepel is Tortoise Tits! Tortoises are reptiles and thus do not have mammary glands. The name is there forever on the Title Deed.
The translator with the surveyor must have played along with the owners. And why not?
Railway lines and roads do not follow the same route to a given destination because railways are restricted by gradients and minimum curves. This is particularly so on the Cape Town to Bitterfontein line. It is the route to but mostly from the diamond mines of the North-Western Cape and contrary to Grey's Elegy
"Full many a gem of purest ray serene
the dark unfathomed caves of oceans bear"
the diamond industry and IDB (Illicit Diamond Buying), have made this trek either humourous or tragic.
In 1954, my wife, baby daughter and I took up temporary accommodation at the Clanwilliam Hotel. Our large room was on the ground floor at the end of a long passage. The owner, an old friend of my wife's family, told us that nothing ever happened in the little town. The travelling circus came to the railhead at Graafwater, thirty kilometers away, every second year. In winter there was rugby and in the spring, the flowers. A lot of fruits, especially citrus, were grown in the district. It was the centre of the rooibos tea growing and packing industry.
It was a Sunday night and before dawn on Monday a large double storied boarding house, two doors away, burnt down. During the early hours the whole town was there, either to help or just watch the event. Early arrivals dashed down the road to the municipal offices to collect the fire hoses. But alas. The the long hoses were missing. It was rumoured amongst the onlookers that the firehose lengths had surely been stolen and cut up.
In subsequent days I noticed that most donkey carts in the district had comfortable wide drawing harnesses across their shoulders. The poor donkeys were indeed well hosed! Most farmers had sturdy driving belts between the diesel engines and water turbine pumps. It was a case of to hell with the fire we need the straps!
The owner of the hotel related the following tale to me.
In the very room that we occupied, some six months earlier, three young men had spent a night. Two days after they left the owner received a visit from the South African Police. They had come to search the room in which the three young men had slept. They were searching for diamonds.
The search was unsuccessful and they departed empty handed. A month later the Police IDB called with one of the three young men. The Police, the owner and some of his staff had, in the interim, all had their hands on the elusive diamonds.
The young suspect showed the Police where they were hidden. Wrapped in cotton wool in the hollow brass doorknobs!
