in the final charge, Boezac and his men laid
low many of the bravest chiefs and warriors. This gave the Kafirs a
decided check. The troops cheered and fired with redoubled speed and
energy. Lieutenant Aitcheson of the Artillery plied the foe with a
withering fire of grapeshot. Boezac and his hunters, turning their
flank, pressed them hotly in rear, and the Hottentot cavalry charged.
The Kafirs recoiled, though some of the boldest, scorning to give in,
rushed madly among the soldiers, and perished fighting. Then a wild
panic and a total rout ensued, and the great host was scattered like
chaff, and driven into the ravines.
Brief though this fight had been, the carnage among the Kafirs was
terrible. One who was an eye-witness of the fight tells us that the
bodies of about 2000 Kafir warriors strewed the field of battle, and
that many others perished of their wounds in the rivulet leading down to
the Cape Corps' barracks. Nuka, the faithless interpreter, was shot,
but Makana escaped.
A few months afterwards, however, he delivered himself up, and the other
chiefs sued for peace. With Makana's surrender the war of 1819 ended.
The Lynx himself was sent prisoner to Robben Island. After nearly two
years' confinement he attempted to escape in a boat with some other
prisoners, but the boat was upset in the surf on Blueberg beach, and
Makana was drowned, while his companions escaped.
As Grahamstown grew in years and size, she bore her part well, both in
the suffering and the action which the colony has been called on to
endure and undertake, during all the vicissitudes of its career--in
peace and in war. What that part has been would take a volume to tell.
She is now a large and beautiful town--the capital of the Eastern
Province--situated on the slopes of the Zuurberg range, near the head
waters of the Kowie River, 1760 feet above the sea, and thirty-six miles
distant therefrom. She is also the focus where all the roads from the
interior converge to enter the only available gap through the
mountains--Howison's Poort.
Very pleasant to dwell in is this "City of the Settlers"--_alias_ the
"city of gardens," with its agreeable society, fresh breezes, and
charming situation; its "twenty miles" of well-gravelled and tree-lined
streets; its handsome shops and stores, its fine public buildings--
notably the Cathedral, and the Albany Hall--its three great reservoirs,
with their "twenty-four million gallons" of water,
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