THE BOER AS AN ATHLETE

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue 7370, 23 January 1902, Page 4

THE BOER AS AN ATHLETE

The Boer is a born a ( hlete. The pure, rarefied air of the Transvaal gives him wonderful lung pewer, to which the constant exercise he receives on his farm and on his transport trips adds strength and suppleness. One favourite amusement among them is (remarks the Sun) what is called a kopje race. A man is stationed at the top oi the hill. The competitors, who may number anything from fifteen to twenty, toe the line at a spot about half a mile from the foot of the kopje. The contest consists in circling round the man on the top of the hill, and returning to the starting point. Some of the hills scaled in this way are so steep that the average traveller would hesitate to go to the exertion of walking up them, but the Boer will go up them at a [run, springing from boulder to boulder as he goes along, and then come down at a break -neck pace.

Another favourite amusement is what . is known as the six-legged race. This ia a short race of seventy yards between a man on horseback and a man on foot. In aty other country it would be safe wagtring to bet on the man on foot, as before the horde had fairly got into his stride he would have covered most of the distance, but the Boers have their horeeg so trained that they will start away at a gallop, a feat no other horse can accomplish, and the mounted man often com 63 out ahead. It is bard to say how the Boers would ccme out in competition with Englishmen, as no time is ever kept at theae meetings, and the events are of such dissimilar character, but there is little doubt that they would hold their own in the long-distance events.

In the sprint races they would stand no show. The older men are very fond of getting up shooting contests, but the younger men are not so partial to this sport. Ihe game ail disappeared from the Transvaal some years ago, and they have not been co accustomed to theu?B of firearma as their fathers. While the old men shoot at home-made targets, the younger men get up wrestling matches amongst themselves. The Boer is a good wrestler ; he is very active, ar.d has great powers of endurance. Sometimes in one of the contests a couple of men remain locked together for an unconseiouable timp, the struggle often ending by both combatants collapsing from sheer weakness. The man who is champion wrestler of hi 3 district is a hero in the eyes of his neighbour?, and such a man can have the pick of the prettiest girls in the neighborhood for a brido — that is to say, if he is fairly well provided for, for the Boer girl has a shrewd eye on the main chance, Boxing is really a dead letter among the Boers. They know nothing of it. The Boer has a strange horror of striking anyone with his fists. If one of the " boys " displeases him, he may kick the native en the spue of the moment, or may tie him up to the waggon, and give him a couple of dozen stripes with a sjambok, but he will never hit him with his hanc?s.