Seven years afterward Colonel Gordon, while travelling in Caffraria, was informed by a native that there was a white woman among his countrymen, with a child whom she frequently embraced, and over whom she wept bitterly. Bad health compelled the Colonel to return home, but he sent her a letter in French, Dutch, and English, begging that some sign, such as a burned stick, or other token, might be returned in answer to it, when every exertion should be made for her recovery; but nothing more was ever heard of her. Nevertheless, for years there was a general belief at the Cape that some of the unfortunate ladies still survived, who had it in their power to return, but that having been compelled to marry Caffre chieftains, and "apprehending that their place in society was lost, and that they should be degraded in the eyes of their equals," they resolved to abide where they were.
[Illustration: THE DOLLS' RECEPTION AT REPUBLICAN HALL, THIRTY-THIRD STREET, NEW YORK.--DRAWN BY MRS. JESSIE SHEPHERD.]
This beautiful engraving will give our little readers an idea of an entertainment which is now being held in Republican Hall, Thirty-third Street, New York city, where, instead of grown people or children being the important personages, three hundred dollies are dressed up in magnificent toilets, waiting to receive the visits and admiration of their friends.
The dollies do not talk, with the exception of a few who say "Papa" and "Mamma"; but they are all arranged in groups representing beautiful pictures. Some of these have backgrounds of painted scenery, and all have appropriate surroundings to perfect the tableaux.
There are a "model school," with dormitory, school-room, and play-ground; a christening, with the minister and baby and a party of friends; a kitchen, with a whole family of darkies; a dozen children "coasting"; a real log-cabin, to be used as a baby-house; and last, and prettiest of all, the heroes and heroines of every nursery: Mother Goose and her children, dressed in costumes which the modern picture-books have made popular; Red Riding-hood, Polly Flinders, Bobby Shaftoe and the little lady he left behind him, Little Bopeep, Mistress Mary, Tom Tucker, Willy Boz, Tom, Tom, the Piper's son, and his audience, and a great many others.