My friend Penny le Roux IBCLC has just shared with me an excerpt from a book
she is reading called "Down Memory Lane with some early Rhodesian women" by
Madeline Heald. The excerpt describes the experiences of a white settler
family travelling to Rhodesia by train in 1905.  I'm sure you will be as
fascinated as I was.  Here it is, with apologies for the length of the
preamble, which I've included to give a sense of the hardship of those old
pioneer days:

"The train carrying us from Johannesburg's Park Station puffed its way
laboriously over the rough track through the Kalahari Desert.  The heat was
intense and the coaches were covered inside and outside with fine Klahari
dust ... Our throats were parched, as there was no water in the compartments
and no dining-saloon on the train.

"Most of the passengers carried a basket of cold foods, tea leaves, sugar
and other necessities for the long journey to Rhodesia.  The only means of
obtaining hot water to brew the tea, was when the train stopped at wayside
halts.  Passengers would get out and walk up to the engine where the
engineman would supply water from the boiler.

"The nights spent on the train were an absolute night-mare, especially for
those like my mother, who had a small baby and a toddler of three.... The
passengers, as we have seen, lacked many amenities and especially fresh
milk.  On this occasion our train stopped at a wayside station to take on
water for the engine... there were a number of African women offering
whisky-bottles filled with fresh milk for sale.  The passengers, many of
whom had small children, and thinking that this was indeed a blessing,
clambered to get hold of the milk and were stretching out of the windows
eagerly offering cash to the vendors and grabbing bottles of milk offered.
Eventually all the bottles were sold and one woman passenger who had failed
to obtain a bottle appealed to the vendors.

"A kindly old soul among the crowd came forward and assured the lady that
all was not lost.  She, herself, would go and procure another bottle.
Having given this assurance, she departed and disappeared to the rear of the
station building.  My younger sister, Johanna, and I, both being curious,
followed to see where the cow was to be milked, but there was no sign of a
cow.  The vendor, with the help of a small black girl, was hurrying through
the performance of milking her own brasts into a dirty old tin, the contents
of which were later poured into a bottle.  This was subsequently sold to the
customer."

Pamela Morrison IBCLC, Zimbabwe (wondering if this sets some kind of
precedent for milk banking ..)
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