there
was probably the offer of a freshly killed antelope or sheep ; but the
farmer's family was often content with "biltong," the dried meat that
hung in strips or was piled in stacks under his curing shed.
Near
every house was the accompanying kraal or open-walled circle for the
confinement of the flocks at night, built of stones, and usually so
bedded and filthy with fresh dung that a heavy percentage of the
farmers' sheep died yearly from foot-rot or scab.1 Close to
the kraal was the water reservoir for the flocks and the household use,
unless the farm lay on the bank of an unfailing stream. These
collections of water were commonly hill drainage, stored in long,
narrow ponds by rough dams across ravines, or the drainage and rainfall
filling shallow natural basins which the Boers call "pans." In the
early morning the birds flew from all quarters to these ponds. Wild
ducks, geese, plover, sandgrouse, and flocks of pigeons and doves
hovered over the pools and splashed and dabbled in the water, while the
blue-gray Kafir cranes stalked warily along the brink.
These
basins are quite numerous in the country lying between the Orange and
the Vaal, as well as throughout the Transvaal. The light earth washed
down the hill slopes was largely calcareous, and incrusted the grasses
and roots of the basin in a calc-tufa which is almost impervious to
water. So the pans became excellent natural reservoirs, though there
was, of course, a heavy loss from evaporation. No calamity is so
dreaded by the graziers as the failure of their water-supply, for it
has often caused the loss of a flock and the ruin of the poor owner.
Therefore the pans are highly valued and strictly reserved, and the
dams are daily inspected lest a burrowing land crab should open the way
for a rush of water that would empty the reservoir.2 When a
settler was fortunate in getting a tract of land with a pan or a
water-spring, he almost invariably gave the name to his farm, as
Dutoitspan, Dorstfontein, Jagersfontein,
1 " On Veld and Farm," Frances MacNab, London, 1897. "South Africa Diamond Fields," Morton, New York, 1877.
2 " Among the Diamonds," 1870-1871.
