Johanna Brandt

“ He glanced through them all without examining them, merely putting the mark of the censor on them and assuring Hansie that they would be forwarded that very day.
No seven weeks could have been longer or more full of suspense than those which followed, and the excitement at Harmony when in due time a square white envelope in the well-known hand arrived from Holland can better be imagined than described.
With what anxiety it was opened and how eagerly examined before the hot iron was applied! how keen the delight when nothing legible was found, even on the closest inspection! ”

“ Now, Hansie had firmly made up her mind not to be drawn into argument with him again, but this question took her so much by surprise that she flared out with:
"Don't you think the English ought to give in? Why should the Boers give in? We are fighting for our own, and England is fighting for what belongs to another. Why should England not give in?"
With some asperity he answered:
"I suppose it is a question of 'Eendracht maakt Macht,' or whatever you call it."
"Eendracht maakt Macht?" she exclaimed. "I really fail to see the connection." ”

“ Mauser's time was soon to come, for the soldiers, setting a strong trap to catch a wild cat which was nightly plundering them of their meat ration, caught Hansie's beloved Mauser instead, killing her instantly.
No reproaches from her mother were added to her keen remorse as she bent over the motherless kittens, whispering: "I will care for you, as she would have done; but oh, remember this, that honesty is the best policy, and all is not fair in love and war." ”

“ The garden, heavily laden with the burden of luscious fruits and blooming flowers, was a scene of beauty and riotous luxury impossible to describe; and as the different fruit trees bloomed and bore their rich harvest in rapid succession, each after its kind—apricots, figs, pears, plums, apples, peaches, and, last but not least, the noble vine with its great bunches of purple and white—Hansie and her mother revelled in the wealth of Nature's extravagance from morn till eve. ”

“ Mrs. van Warmelo and Hansie kept guard all night in the dining-room. Every time Carlo barked outside they sprang up in alarm, their hearts throbbing, their breath held up in listening suspense, but nothing happened; and when day broke and the glorious sunlight flooded the garden, all their fears vanished, and they felt as if they had been harbouring spies all their lives. ”

“ How can we let them know that Harmony is being watched? How shall we get through the anxiety and suspense when we begin to expect them again? Naudé's last words to me were, 'We shall be with you four weeks from now, when the moon is young again.'"
Hansie looked thoughtful, but brightened up again immediately.
"We have always the sign on the gatepost to fall back on, you know, mother dear, but I hope it won't be necessary to put that up. In the meantime let us watch developments. We have nothing to be anxious about yet, and when the time comes we shall know what to do. ”

“ I shall not dwell upon the glorious victories of the first months, the capture of armoured trains, the blowing up of bridges, the besieging of towns, the arrival in Pretoria of the first British prisoners and the long sojourn of British officers in captivity in the Model School—from where, incidentally, Winston Churchill escaped in an ingenious way—and the crushing news of the first Boer reverses at Dundee and Elandslaagte. ”

“ Mrs. van Warmelo was a "voor-trekker," a pioneer, in every sense of the word. As a girl of fourteen she had left Natal with her parents and had "trekked," with other families, through the wild waste of country, into the unknown and barbaric regions in which she was destined to spend her youth.
She had watched the growth of a new country, the building up of a new race. She had known all the hardships and dangers of life in an unsettled and uncivilised land, had been through a number of Kaffir wars and could speak, through personal experience, of many adventures with savage foes and wild beasts. ”

“ Two days pass, three, four, and no English officer appears, no search is made for contraband of war in Oom Gerrie's house; but every time the door is opened or a footstep heard on the verandah, Oom Gerrie may be found with one hand plunged in a basin of water, while with the other he adjusts his spectacles.
Poor Oom Gerrie!
He gives up his trade in despair at last, for after all it does not pay, but as long as the old man lives he will be forced to listen to the question:
"How is the boot-making trade?" ”

“ In nine cases out of ten the earnest request of the women to their men was to fight to the bitter end—not to surrender on their account, but to let them die in captivity sooner than yield for the sake of them and their children.
Perhaps I may be allowed to say here that when Hansie was in the Irene Camp as volunteer nurse she knew nothing of the work of the spies.
Love and pity drew her to the scene of suffering.
The British did not count the cost when they began the system of gathering in the Boer families, any more than they did when they began their "walk over" to Pretoria. ”

“ There was no doubt that Harmony was directly in the line of fire, and as the great shells went shrieking and hurtling through the air, the very earth seemed to shake with the force of each explosion.
Mrs. van Warmelo hastily packed a few valuables into a hand-bag, and fled into town with her daughter, leaving their dinner standing almost untouched on the table. On their way to town, they found many terrified women and children huddled under bridges for safety. ”

“ Wounded and suffering they lie on their last bed of pain. Friendless and alone they await the untimely end of their brief but glorious career. Longing, with all the weakness of the human heart, for one last look of love, one reassuring clasp from a tender woman's hand, they prepare themselves to meet the death they have faced so often and so manfully in their heroic struggle for liberty and independence. ”

“ Though their addition to the British ranks undoubtedly weakened our strength to some extent, their inborn respect for the Boer would have prevented them from ever rendering valuable services to the English. How we laughed, my sister and I, when, on the railway journey from Pretoria to Cape Town, we saw the line patrolled by hundreds of these natives, with gun in hand, stark naked except for a loin-cloth and a bandolier! So much waste of ammunition! No, the arming of the natives would have been the last thing to induce the Boers to surrender. ”

“ Slowly he drags his weary limbs across the veld, hesitatingly he presents himself, falteringly he proffers his request. A moment's hesitation and the family circle opens to receive him, its members crowd round him with words of comfort and small deeds of love. They are not doing right, but they will do well. Nothing is left undone to restore and refresh the exhausted fugitive, who soon finds himself in a perfect haven of domestic happiness and luxury. ”

“ To what place of refuge could they be moved that night? The visitor looked imploringly at Mrs. van Warmelo as if he expected her to offer Harmony, but she, mindful of Mr. Botha's warning, did nothing of the kind.
"Death is staring them in the face," the visitor continued. "I don't know what to do!"
Hansie, who knew the visitor well and trusted him implicitly, then pleaded with her mother—to no avail, Mrs. van Warmelo remaining firmly obdurate, and saying distinctly, for the edification of her visitor, "I have never harboured a spy, and I hope I never shall." ”

“ Life at Pretoria was at this time far from pleasant for the Boers who remained loyal to their cause.
Most people who had the means, or were not bound to the country by the closest ties, let their houses and went to Europe until the war was over. Many of those who did not leave of their own free will were sent away to the coast, where they were considered safe from plotting against the British, and the few remaining Boer families were apparently on their best behaviour, above all dreading the fate of their fellow-countrymen. ”

“ But the resistless hand of Fate was drawing her into the sphere of work for which she longed most ardently—woman's work, at home, abroad—and the glamour of Johannesburg stole over her in time.
The terms of peace have been fulfilled, responsible government for the Transvaal and Free State, and [376] Hansie thinks with an intolerable pain of that day at Teneriffe. Had she but known—had she but known—but the cables (she had called them "lying cables" then, and she was not far wrong) had spoken only of a glorious victory for the English and unconditional surrender on the part of the Boers. ”

“ Each man, beside the horse he rode, was leading a spare beast.
[85] Carlo wagged his tail sympathetically.
Overhead the sky was of the deepest, richest sapphire blue, paling away to the horizon to the most delicate tints, against which the distant hills showed up in bold relief.
"Gentleman Jim," one of the native servants, was evidently enjoying his Sunday too, for he loitered in the garden, plucking up a weed here and there and watching the bees at work, the busy bees who know of no day of rest.
"Bring me some grapes, please, Jim," Hansie called out to him. ”

“ Willem Botha warned his friends at Harmony against having a single incriminating document in the house.
"Detection means death for all concerned," he said one day, "but without written evidence the worst the enemy can do is to send you out of the country or to a Concentration Camp. Destroy every paper of a dangerous nature you may have, as I have done, and then you need never feel anxious."
This wise counsel was all very well, but Hansie had a mania for "collecting," and she could not make up her mind to destroy what might become a valuable relic of the war. ”

“ Hansie sat silent for a long time, turning these things over in her mind.
"But what is all this accursed war about, miss? We soldiers know nothing except that we have to fight when we are ordered to do so."
"Of course you know nothing. An English soldier is nothing but a fighting machine, not allowed to think or act for himself. Discipline is a grand thing, but Heaven protect a man from the discipline of the British army. ”

“ Even with these precautions Mrs. van Warmelo seemed to feel very uneasy, and Hansie coming into the kitchen unexpectedly one afternoon, found the Captain standing beside the stove and blowing vigorous puffs of smoke up the chimney!
Volcanoes and earthquakes would have been a welcome change to every one after those never-to-be-forgotten days of strain and tension; and much as Hansie had longed to see some one from commando again, her longing to see these men depart became a hundred times more intense. ”

“ Under its influence a nation may become, in times of war, dishonourable and treacherous, may be dragged from one abyss of degradation to another, deeper than the last, until all self-respect is gone and the voice of conscience is silenced for ever.
Well may we guard against this growing evil in South Africa! Well may we keep our national mottoes pure!
[147] I do believe that the Dutch South African saying, "Geduld en moed, alles sal reg kom" ("Patience and courage, everything will right itself") , is responsible to a great extent for the South African indifference to duty. ”

“ Her mother was delighted with the thought, and at 4 o'clock that afternoon they took a cab to Braamfontein Station.
The train had been delayed, and would be in at 6 instead of 5 o'clock, so they were told, but, for fear of having been misinformed, they decided to wait at the station.
Cold, dusty, pitiless, the keen wind blew on that unfriendly platform. There was no ladies' waiting room—in fact, it seemed as if the rooms had all been utilised for other, perhaps military, purposes.
It is incredible the amount of suffering that can be crowded into one hour of waiting! ”

“ These men had been concealed by other friends, and when the scare was over they escaped from Pretoria to the commandos. They had nearly been forgotten when news reached the capital of their capture by the enemy, five of them in all, and of their imprisonment in jail.
While their life hung in the balance a time of nervous dread, not to be forgotten, was passed through, for they would either be shot as spies or they could save themselves by betraying their friends. ”