The Ridge of White Waters

Extract

One who is outside the danger-zone, as we are in South Africa, must feel bound to apologise for asking those whose thoughts are preoccupied with the war to consider other things. When men are fighting for survival it hardly seems the time to speak of the uncertain future and lands as far away as dreams. So it is with diffidence that I write this. But I write for three reasons. First : the work of God must go on as ever among those who have no fault or part in the great quarrel, and it may be a consolation to those in the war to know that it is going on. Secondly it should introduce to their thoughts of post-war reconstruction a land that seems to be destined for construcion at a pace similar to that of the growth of the United States in the last century. Thirdly I believe that the place I am to speak of, the Gold Reef of South Africa, is a focal point in the war. When the German armies began the attack on France, the bells were rung (the German people were told) for the beginning of a battle that was to carve out for them a great empire. Empire where? Surely in Africa, where the German Empire had been. And which is the most minerally wealthy, and the most temperate part of Africa, that which the thorough German mind sees to be most capable of rapid development? Without a doubt it is South Africa. (The last German Emperor said he would never permit Britain to hold it). And the present centre of this desirable land and of its industrial possibilities is in the hills surrounding Johannesburg, called the Wit watersrand, or Ridge of White Waters.