Page 15 - ATA

A15
LOCAL Tuesday 16 July 2019

All for the red Aruban gold Episode XXVI

Continued from Page 14 Quant’s house was razed to the kwihi-tree- it has survived till the donkey, comes to pay his respects
ground by the English. In fact, un- present day- was already stand- to the commander and his family.
When Commanders’ Bay was de- til the coming of Boye in 1816, our ing there at that time. People now
serted and the people settled on information about the command- belonging to the oldest generation We have anticipated events here
the Ponton hill, the administrations ers is very confusing indeed. It relate that they heard that under in order to be able to give a con-
also moved there. Now that it had does not seem to be known where this kwihi-tree Van der Biest used tinuous survey of the removals of
become safer to live on the bay Boye lived, but about Jan van der to play his violin in the evening, the commander’s residence. To-
and a new dwelling-Centre was Biest III, who superseded him, in seated before his country-house. gether with this functionary an in-
arising around it and the com- the capacity of vice-commander A delightful scene from Aruba’s creasing number of persons settled
mander established his headquar- in 1819, tradition reports that he age of repose: The commander “on the Bay”, as it was then com-
ters there too. used to live at a place where now in his garden, playing his violin to monly called. The construction of
Windstraat runs. In Van der Biest’s his family, in the background some the Fort had made life reasonably
Oral tradition says that Command- time there still was “mondi” (An slaves serving (uncooled) refresh- safe there, though his safety will
er Bruin Govertsz Quant (1805-6) Aruban word denoting barren soil ments. A peacefulness only slightly prove anything but absolute in the
still resided at Ponton. A removal over-grown with weeds and cac- disturbed by an occasional visitor period to be discussed in the next
after Quant would be plausible. tuses). The story tells us that the old who, on horseback, or straddling a episode.q

4. Naval canons used at Fotr Zoutman. Pic. 5. Sailing to the Bay of Horses.