Native Life in South Africa [61]
injunction. The grandmother of the child was composed. "When the Lord's will is to be done," she said, "no mortal can stay it," but his aunts were restless. "Go, call the doctor at once," they demanded. He came, gave a solemn look and stood silent. After feeling the pulse he said: "The child has collapsed. I have done all I could and can do no more." Next came the anxious looks of the other attendants, the footfalls of inquiring neighbours, messages to nearer and further relatives about the pronounced "collapse".
This was at noon, and each one expected that he could hold out for two hours at the most; but he breathed throughout the afternoon with a gallantry that was wonderful in its way. His large round eyes turned upward as though they had become blind to their immediate surroundings. It seemed that those eyes could no longer see the objects in the room and its anxious inmates; truly they could no longer see the sun or the moon and stars that night. Kimberley was no longer a home to the little chap whose short lease of life was clearly drawing to an end. A new outlook seemed to have dawned over his now brightening face. His eyes were riveted on the New Jerusalem, the City of God, and he seemed to be in full communion with the dear little cousins who preceded him thither during the previous month. Evidently they were beckoning him to leave this wicked South Africa and everything in it, and come to eternal glory. In this condition we left him early in the afternoon to answer the call of our daily and nightly drudgery -- it would be gross extravagance to call it "duty" -- an occupation which has no reverence for mournful occasions. At 9.15 p.m., just about the time of his birth sixteen months before, the little soul was relieved of its earthly bonds.
There he lay robed in a simple white gown, his motionless form being an eloquent testimony of the indelible gap left in our domestic circle as a visitation of 1913. But the celestial expression of his face, his deep-brown colour, and his closed eyelids, seemed to say to us: "Be at ease, I have conquered."
Still, it must be confessed that to us this wrench was a most painful experience, and that the doctrine of "Thy will be done" was found to be a great deal more than a mere profession of faith. The sympathies of relatives, friends, and other mourners, their deeds and words of condolence, followed by a solemn religious service, took the sting out of the affliction, although it must again be confessed that so deep was our sorrow for the dead child's mother that for some time we could not bear to look her in the face.
Painful and unusual solemnities and formulae were gone through during the next day, and these again were lightened by the kind and sympathetic assistance of genuine friends, like Messrs. Joseph Twayi, H. S. Poho, and others, some of them delegates to a Temperance Conference then sitting in Kimberley.
In the absence of the pastors of St. Paul's Mission, who were both attending the annual synod at Pniel, two Wesleyan ministers -- Rev. Jonathan Motshumi of Kimberley, and Rev. Shadrach Ramailane of Fauresmith -- took charge of the funeral service, and a row of carriages followed the hearse to the West End Cemetery.
As the procession turned round Cooper's corner into Green Street, Kimberley, something caused us to look out of the carriage window; we then caught sight of one of the carriages that formed the procession in which some little girl friends and relatives of the deceased were driving, their plain white dresses relieved only by a scrap of black ribbon here and there. Their silent sympathy, expressed with girlish shyness, was evident, though their snow-white dresses were in striking contrast to the colour of their carriage and of the horses, and the sombre black of the rest of the funeral party. As we saw the solemn procession and heard the clank of the horses' hoofs, we were suddenly reminded of that journey in July, 1913, when we met that poor wandering young family of fugitives from the Natives' Land Act. A sharp pang went through
This was at noon, and each one expected that he could hold out for two hours at the most; but he breathed throughout the afternoon with a gallantry that was wonderful in its way. His large round eyes turned upward as though they had become blind to their immediate surroundings. It seemed that those eyes could no longer see the objects in the room and its anxious inmates; truly they could no longer see the sun or the moon and stars that night. Kimberley was no longer a home to the little chap whose short lease of life was clearly drawing to an end. A new outlook seemed to have dawned over his now brightening face. His eyes were riveted on the New Jerusalem, the City of God, and he seemed to be in full communion with the dear little cousins who preceded him thither during the previous month. Evidently they were beckoning him to leave this wicked South Africa and everything in it, and come to eternal glory. In this condition we left him early in the afternoon to answer the call of our daily and nightly drudgery -- it would be gross extravagance to call it "duty" -- an occupation which has no reverence for mournful occasions. At 9.15 p.m., just about the time of his birth sixteen months before, the little soul was relieved of its earthly bonds.
There he lay robed in a simple white gown, his motionless form being an eloquent testimony of the indelible gap left in our domestic circle as a visitation of 1913. But the celestial expression of his face, his deep-brown colour, and his closed eyelids, seemed to say to us: "Be at ease, I have conquered."
Still, it must be confessed that to us this wrench was a most painful experience, and that the doctrine of "Thy will be done" was found to be a great deal more than a mere profession of faith. The sympathies of relatives, friends, and other mourners, their deeds and words of condolence, followed by a solemn religious service, took the sting out of the affliction, although it must again be confessed that so deep was our sorrow for the dead child's mother that for some time we could not bear to look her in the face.
Painful and unusual solemnities and formulae were gone through during the next day, and these again were lightened by the kind and sympathetic assistance of genuine friends, like Messrs. Joseph Twayi, H. S. Poho, and others, some of them delegates to a Temperance Conference then sitting in Kimberley.
In the absence of the pastors of St. Paul's Mission, who were both attending the annual synod at Pniel, two Wesleyan ministers -- Rev. Jonathan Motshumi of Kimberley, and Rev. Shadrach Ramailane of Fauresmith -- took charge of the funeral service, and a row of carriages followed the hearse to the West End Cemetery.
As the procession turned round Cooper's corner into Green Street, Kimberley, something caused us to look out of the carriage window; we then caught sight of one of the carriages that formed the procession in which some little girl friends and relatives of the deceased were driving, their plain white dresses relieved only by a scrap of black ribbon here and there. Their silent sympathy, expressed with girlish shyness, was evident, though their snow-white dresses were in striking contrast to the colour of their carriage and of the horses, and the sombre black of the rest of the funeral party. As we saw the solemn procession and heard the clank of the horses' hoofs, we were suddenly reminded of that journey in July, 1913, when we met that poor wandering young family of fugitives from the Natives' Land Act. A sharp pang went through