4. The Rivers
One of our chief reasons for coming to Alale was the fine lagoons in the river beds. Like all other rivers in South Africa, the Ban and Neyr rivers contain no constantly running water. But there are numerous ** holes of water," or lagoons, which are divided from each other by "drifts," that is by roads or tracks, or they are separated by hard bed-rock or heaps of loose and rounded stones. The banks are lined almost always with a hedge of willows and other trees, and edged with rushes, reeds, and cyperus, a rush with a green star-shaped top and flower.
The lagoon on which we depend for water is some five feet deep, and extends for nearly a mile up the Ban river. It also continues some half mile along the Neyr river, which is a tributary of the Ban river. The bottom is muddy clay.
One great disadvantage to neariy all Cape Colony rivers is that the water is not clear, being strongly coloured with fine red Karroo soil, which never seems to settle.
For some years we have suffered from severe droughts, and once or twice the water has been almost completely dried up. When the lagoon is low like this, the natives go a-fishing. Forming themselves into line across some slightly deeper part of the river-bed, and arming themselves with long and slender willow boughs, they walk towards the shallower water, driving the fish before them with their sticks. When the fish are driven into the shallows, thousands of them jump out of the water, numbers being killed or stunned by the beaters' sticks. Small native boys pounce upon these fish and throw them upon the bank, where they are picked up and packed into sacks and baskets. The whole makes a very lively scene, with the shouting natives, splashing water, and shining fish being thrown to the packers on the banks.
The long droughts are usually followed by very heavy rains, which soon turn the stagnant pools and dry river-bed into a roaring torrent, carrying large tree-trunks and the accumulated refuse of months before it.
The Ban river does not rise as fast as some others in the Colony, having a smaller area of drainage. But I have seen it rise about two feet in an hour, after only two hours' heavy rain.
The floods always bring down large quantities of soil from the higher country, where devastation is seen in the ruined acres of land which have been swept by the heavy rains. This mud is deposited in the valleys in thick layers, and forms rich gaxden soil. After a flood, the vegetation along the riverside remains encrusted with red mud for some time, giving everything below the high-water mark a very kharki-like appearance.
Once, when the river "came down," the water was so thickly impregnated with mud, that thousands of fish lined the banks, gasping for air. They were so close together that with a garden rake and pitchfork we were able to get a bucketful of very fine fish in a short time.
The Ban river is more accessible to the township than the Neyr river, and natives are constantly to be seen coming down the banks with tins to draw water, or fishers sitting patiently with line in hand, waiting for the fish which seldom seem to come to them, though they catch numbers of fat and slimy river frogs.
The Ban river is wider and more open than the Neyr river. Man has been at work on its banks, and, as usual, has not improved on Nature. One bank is already almost denuded of trees, and those left have been cut to pieces for firewood and hut-building. But the opposite bank is comparatively untouched, and the whole is still very pretty. Many trees on its banks are weighed down with masses of creepers, chiefly the passion flower, whose golden-yellow fruits are much sought after by the youth of Alale.
The Ban river is fairly wide up to its jimction with the Neyr river, where it forms a triangular piece of water. From this point it narrows, but for nearly a mile is quite wide enough for boating.
With such a lagoon it was not long before we bought a boat to put upon it. This has been a constant pleasure to us. The village children, too, are never tired of rowing up the river in it. Sometimes it will be a string of little girls, each with a pet monkey in her arms, tied with a piece of cord round the waist for safety, the other end of it being secured round the *' mother's " waist. The airs these monkeys put on, and the distress they cause their " mothers " by their antics, is comical in the extreme. These monkeys are a small grey variety, with bare faces and large eyes ; the hair stands round the face like a frill. It is wonderful what they can be taught to do, but they can never be really trusted.
All boys like boating, and these Colonial laddies are no exception ; they are peculiarly sharp in detecting life, whether fish, birds, or nests, which makes a row with them very interesting.
Sometimes the children will sing as we row along, when the natives come down the river bank to see what is going on, and cattle and ostriches peer at us cautiously from behind the bushes.
The rivers are beautiful at all hours, either by day or night, and the boat is in constant requisition, either in the fresh sunny mornings, when everything seems to begin the day with new hopes, or in the panting heat of mid-day, when even the birds are silent and seek the deepest shade to protect them from the fierceness of the sun.
Once or twice at night we have strung Chinese lanterns from one end of the boat to the other, and decorated the garden and trees in the same way, and then rowed up the river to the sound of song and laughter, with the coloured lights dancing in our wake ; again, at other times, with the full moon as our only lamp, and no other sound than the dipping oars, or the hoo-hoo-ing of the owls, accompanied by the rustle of the night wind among the trees.
The Neyr river is our favourite river, being shaded with full-grown trees, and too far away from the village to be spoilt by its inhabitants.
After a hard morning's work, with hot winds and a broiling sun, it is delightful to get into our boat and row up the stream, where the trees meet overhead and give refreshing shadeThe greenery and still water is a rest to mind and body. At such times it is a pleasure, after a few strong strokes, to ship our oars and glide under the leafy archway, with the willow branches brushing the boat as it passes through some narrower part. Thus quietly gliding along, we can observe the birds and other creatures in these seldom disturbed parts : king-fishers with red crests and bright plumage flit from bough to bough as the boat advances, while the legavons, (The Nile Monitor) too lazy to rise, lie prone on the mud banks, where they have been basking in a stray patch of sunlight. Strings of bubbles rise to the surface of the water and float before the gentle breeze, marking the lurking-place of a frog, eel, or crab ; or a fish will rise for some dainty morsel and fall with a splash into the water again, leaving a circle of rings to spread in everwidening ripples. Sometimes a crane will suddenly rise from a near tree and fly ahead some hundred yards, to settle and then rise again as the boat approaches.
In one part of this river the finks have built. From each pendant willow branch hangs a fink's nest, woven from long grasses into the shape of a snail's shell, the fink entering from below and laying its eggs in the rounded hollow which in the snail-shell holds the body of the snail. By this means the eggs are kept safe from snakes and wet. When the wind blows, and the nest swings at the end of the slender branch, the eggs are safe and cannot be thrown out. There are few prettier sights than some hundreds of these nests together, swaying gently in the light breeze, especially in the late nesting season, when some birds are still building, and others have finished, the finks flitting here and there with grass and food.
In some parts the river widens into still pools, in others it narrows until the trees meet across the water, or prostrate trunks almost block it altogether.
After a row of about half a mile the boat's progress is stayed by a barrier of loose stones and bed-rock, overgrown with a thick mat of rushes. Leaving the boat, we may push on through mimosa bushes, rushes, and mud, the latter bearing the tracks of baboons and bok, which have been to the river to drink. There is quite a high bank of hard sandy soil and stones on one side, which has been carved out by the river and washed by the rains into sharp ridges, and what look like miniature castles and bridges.
Water-turtles do not often visit our part of the river, but I have seen a pair disporting themselves just opposite our garden. The back of one would rise slowly above the water, then suddenly sink with a swirl, when its companion would rise and go through the same process. The legavon, which is amphibious, deserves special notice, for it is the most distinctively African animal that we have. In shape it very much resembles a lizard, and often reaches seven feet and more in length. Its tongue is forked, and the small scales which cover the entire body are dusky grey and yellow. Legavons are great enemies to our fowls, carrying off young chickens and eggs. We have skins of two specimens which were caught inside our fowl-pens, they not being able to find the way out again. When attacked by dogs, they use their tails in fighting ; their teeth are not strong enough to do any serious damage to the tough skin of the dog.
In the Neyx river the scene is always changing and shifting; colour, light, and shade, never seem the same twice over. There is life always and everywhere, and yet with it a strange peacefolness ; birds flying and singing amongst the trees, innumerable insects, gliding snakes, and legavons.