MY AFRICAN HOME

Or Bush Life in Natal when a young Colony (1852-7).

First edition: frontispiece, 364 pages + 32 pages publisher’s catalogue, 6 black and white plates, black and white illustrations in the text, patterned end papers, book plate and booksellers ticket on the front paste down end paper, embossed ownership mark on the front free end paper, original green cloth boards titled gilt on the upper cover and spine, uncut fore edge and bottom edge, a good copy.

Mendelssohn (Sidney) South African Bibliography volume 1 page 540 : Mrs. Feilden and her husband went to South Africa in a sailing ship, and soon after their arrival at Port Natal they established themselves at their farm, " Feniscowles," near Durban, where all the hardships and troubles of pioneer life seem to have befallen them. The farmers and settlers of Natal appear to have had a very rough time of it at this period, and numbers of them left the Colony to go to Australia, where gold had been discovered. The Feildens appear to have kept an open house, and the writer comments on the free and easy manner of their self-invited guests, a few of whom undoubtedly made matters awkward for their hosts ; of these it is remarked that some men " throw off every sign of courteous manner in the bush." There were, however, plenty of guests of a very different stamp, among the names mentioned being many of the old pioneers of Natal — Bishop Colenso, the Fynns, William Baldwin, the celebrated hunter and author, and many others, who enjoyed the rough and ready hospitality of Feniscowles. Of Bishop Colenso the author observes that she considered him " an earnest good man," but " despotic "reference is made to the Bishop's labours among the Kaffirs, and it is stated that Mr. Fynn, the old pioneer, asserted that the missionaries never got a real convert from the Zulus.