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An Englishman named Cecil Rhodes went out to South Africa for his health. He happened to be there when diamonds were discovered and fortunes were being made, and he found his health and found wealth too. A part of South Africa was named after him: Rhodesia. When Rhodes died he left a great deal of money, part of which was to be used to send some of the best young men chosen from our country and other countries to the great university of Oxford in England. These boys are called Rhodes Scholars.
Cecil Rhodes wanted to build a railroad from the top of Africa to the bottom of Africa, from Cairo in Egypt to Cape Town at the southern point. Most of the railroad has been built since he died. It is called the “Cape to Cairo” Railroad, but more is still to be built. Rhodes was one of the few Englishmen who didn’t ask to be sent home when he died. He chose a place in Africa on the top of a mountain to be buried. It was such a high point he called it “The World View.”
The capital of South Africa, Pretoria, is like an English city. The chief city is Cape Town, and it too is just like an English city. Only about a hundred years ago these cities were jungle in which only savage blackmen lived.
If you collect stamps you may have heard of a famous stamp called “A Mauritius” that a collector paid $20,000 for, enough money to buy a good house and lot, yet the only thing he can do with it is put it in a stampalbum. Why should he pay so much money for it? Just to show others something he has that no one else has. Mauritius is a little island off the east coast of Africa. There are other islands near Africa. Madagascar is the biggest. Mauritius is one of the smaller ones. Zanzibar is another small one. Pictures of their stamps you will have in your album, if not the stamps themselves. From Zanzibar come the cloves your mother uses to spice baked apples, pickles, and hams. Cloves look like little burnt match heads, and I don’t believe you would ever guess what they really are. They are tiny flower blossoms that grow on the clove-tree!
