Then, having cleaned myself and lit a pipe, I walked across
the road to see Mr Wardlaw.

I found the schoolmaster sitting under his own fig-tree
reading one of his Kaffir primers. Having come direct by rail
from Cape Town, he had been a week in the place, and ranked
as the second oldest white resident.

'Yon's a bonny chief you've got, Davie,' were his first words.
'For three days he's been as fou as the Baltic.'

I cannot pretend that the misdeeds of Mr Japp greatly
annoyed me. I had the reversion of his job, and if he chose to
play the fool it was all in my interest. But the schoolmaster
was depressed at the prospect of such company. 'Besides you
and me, he's the only white man in the place. It's a poor look-
out on the social side.'

The school, it appeared, was the merest farce. There were
only five white children, belonging to Dutch farmers in the
mountains. The native side was more flourishing, but the
mission schools at the locations got most of the native children
in the neighbourhood. Mr Wardlaw's educational zeal ran
high. He talked of establishing a workshop and teaching
carpentry and blacksmith's work, of which he knew nothing.
He rhapsodized over the intelligence of his pupils and
bemoaned his inadequate gift of tongues. 'You and I, Davie,'
he said, 'must sit down and grind at the business. It is to the
interest of both of us. The Dutch is easy enough. It's a sort of
kitchen dialect you can learn in a fortnight. But these native