THE DORP AND THE VELD:

First Edition: vii, (i errata), 264 pages, original red pebble-grained cloth, decorated in blind on both covers and title gilt on the upper cover (Six Months in Natal) and decorated and titled on the spine (The Dorp and the Veld – Barter), original endpapers with the ticket of Sharland Bookseller, High Street, Southampton on the front free endpaper, signature of a previous owner on the free endpaper, contemporary pencil notes on the rear free endpaper, some light foxing on the first few pages, overall a very good copy in the original bright red cloth.

Mendelssohn (Sydney) South African Bibliography, volume I, page 92, ‘The writer does not speak too highly of South Africa, remarking, “My only wish is to convey a correct impression of a land to which so many of our poor countrymen are looking with anxious, and too often delusive hopes, and to prevent as far as I can the bitter disappointment, not to say despair, consequent on the failure of so important a step as that of emigration.” This work affords a graphic picture of the state of affairs in Natal and the Orange River Sovereignty in the middle of the nineteenth century, at a time when the former country was feeling the effects of the collapse of Mr. Byrne's ambitious emigration scheme. Mr. Barter visited the Orange River Sovereignty with some experienced friends, with a view of purchasing land, but saw nothing suitable for his purpose. He seems to have got on fairly well with the Boers, of whom he remarks “there are no men more honest,” and he asserts, “we have yet to learn some useful lessons on the management of native affairs from them.” He admits, however, that “the task of conciliating a Dutchman is generally attended with so much difficulty that even the kindest and best Englishmen have abandoned it in despair.” The author was certainly not enthusiastic with regard to the prospects of farmers in South Africa, although good land could be bought in Natal at two shillings an acre, and he suggested that some compulsion should be applied to the natives in order to get them to work. Mr. Charles Barter died in Natal on June 7, 1904, aged eighty-five.’