of October the peach-blossom had altogether disappeared
and was succeeded by the prodigious bloom of roses,
which often constitute whole hedges to fields and gardens.
There are a few white blooms, but the majority
are of a pale pink colour, mostly single, some semidouble,
and there are also small double button-hole
blooms which grow in clusters; these roses flower continuously
during the whole Transvaalian summer. An
occasional passion-flower (Passiflora) is also found with
the roses and blooms during the same time. Oleanders
(Nerium oleander) thrive remarkably well in Pretoria.
In one private garden are two specimens, each some
fifteen to twenty feet high and of the circumference of
a large fruit-tree ; these at the early part of October
became a mass of red bloom and were a glorious contrast
to the puny examples we grow in our greenhouses
in England. The oleander—cut and trimmed—forms a
considerable portion of the hedge which encloses the
cemetery. I did not meet with our old friend the
Oleander Hawk-Moth (Chcerocampa nerii), though its
non-appearance in my path was probably purely accidental,
for I found , two other hawk-moths common to
our English fauna, which in Pretoria were not scarce
and quite unmodified from their usual form: I allude to
Acherontia atropos and Protoparce convolvuli. In gardens
the Hibiscus is hardy and blooms freely, but is not
so much cultivated as such a handsome plant deserves,
whilst the useful and robust “ Indian shot-plant "(Canna
indica) everywhere abounds with its striking foliage and
its deep red bloom. Flower-gardens, however, exhibit
most of the features of those at home—the geranium,
verbena, marigold, stock, dahlia, sunflower, phlox drum-
mondi, and mignonette being very common. Zinnias
here attain to particular excellence and growth, and the
scattered seed has produced a small wild or degraded
form which is found on the hard veld. It will thus be
seen that the greater part of the plants and flowers of
Pretoria are, like its inhabitants, migrants and colonists.
The winter season, during which I arrived with its evergreen
and deciduous trees, its orange-trees bearing ripe
fruit, and its leafless willows, the August noon and the
March sunrise and sunset, is incongruous in the extreme,
and is better described as the cool dry season. Towards
the end of August gardening operations commence, for
the rains are soon expected, and I received a Spring
Catalogue of Plants and Seeds from a firm m Port
Elizabeth that reminded one of the Carter and Sutton
publications at home. |
The streets of Pretoria are wide and well designed.
Their width, however, had a lowly origin, for they were
thus devised and constructed for the convenience of ox-
wagons, which could not turn round in narrow roadways.
Years hence, when the rail shall have entirely or almost
completely replaced the old Boer wagon, this requirement
will be forgotten, and those who originally laid out
the town will probably be credited with more artistic
and less utilitarian tastes. All the Transvaal towns are
designed on one scale: given two parallel squares a
church square and market square—connect and approach
same with a straight road, and let shorter trans-
-verse roads branch off on each side. Pretoria was thus
laid out as Pietersburg is to-day, and the grass-grown
paths and squares of the last are only like what the
first was a few years since. Pretoria is now going
through a building phase ; its giant government buildings
are equal to accommodate the official servants of a
State twice the size of the Transvaal; its mercantile
buildings are sufficient for twice its present trade, so
that business profits have already approached the competitive
attenuation. A large market building is being
reared upon the market square; the town will shortly
be lighted by electricity ; churches and chapels abound,
and a Church of England Cathedral—small, of course^
A water company now supplies pure water—though at
a present prohibitive tariff—to supplant the former
typhoid beverage of the sluits; there is a permanent
race-course, and a prosperous and gigantic distillery
sheds a lurid light on three struggling breweries; there
are judges, a national flag, and a national anthem—but
are these really Boer institutions % and what part have
the true Boers taken in producing such results I
c 2