had become a farce, but the secretary of state professed to have obtained sufficient information from it to guide him in framing an act to enable the colonies and states to enter into confederation.
Some events of minor importance that occurred during the period embraced in this chapter may here be recorded.
On the 29th of May 1874 her Majesty the queen was pleased to grant to the Cape Colony the coat of arms now in use. It was designed by Mr. Charles Aitken Fairbridge, of Capetown, and is emblematic of the Dutch, French, and British elements in the population, while the supporters are characteristically South African animals, the gnu and the gemsbok.
On the 14th of January 1875 a disastrous fire broke out in the town of Stellenbosch, and could not be extinguished until engines and three hundred men of the 86th regiment arrived from Capetown. Some fifty houses were burned before the flames were subdued.
During the night of the 1st of October of the same year an almost equally destructive fire took place in the village of Wellington, when some forty houses with their contents were burned.
