source, their allowance of tobacco and brandy, before it became due to them.

The marriages of the daughters of the Nimiquas are not distinguished by dowrys from their parents, as among the Europeans: on the contrary, if a young man fancies a female, he must purchase her of her parents, and in this case a wife is not uncommonly procured at the cost of a cow; and the act of living together constitutes the character of man and wife.

Among the curious insects in this quarter, the buprestis, and a remarkable kind of beetle, require particular notice. As for the report that the former has a human face, either dead or alive, it is totally unfounded.

The buprestis here is of a most beautiful green; but the beetle I have been speaking of, seems to possess so uncommon a degree of venom that it will dart a quantity of fluid into the face of any person who may come too near; and if entering the eyes, cause insufferable pain; while in the other part of the skin it acts in every respect as a burn, and will also change the colour where it falls.

The degree of surprize which the African savage shews on his first sight of a gun discharged, is much like those of Botany Bay.

One of the former seeing a white man fire at a bird and kill it, ran to the kraal, to relate the double prodigy he had witnessed. The report had been heard there; but when it was known, that it was the white man who had

4

pro

duced the thunder, and killed a bird at the same time, almost all the horde ran to the spot where the supposed miracle was performed.

The next day, when these savages came to visit the camp, I was employed, says the relator, in taking an observation of the sun's altitude. Those who the day before had seen me take aim at the bird before it fell, and now saw me direct my quadrant, which they took for another fusee, pointed in the same manner at the sun, fixed their looks attentively, now at the instrument, then at the luminary, and waiting for the report with impatience, they were much disconcerted when they found my operation terminate without any explosion.

To produce further amusement with their simplicity, says the same author, I caused my perspective glass to be brought, which to them was a third fusee, placed it on the stand which served as a support for my great carbine, and, directing it towards the kraal, desired the person whom I thought the boldest among the Nimiquas to look through it. Here the aftonishment of the poor savage was so great, that he trembled with joy, and all his muscles were contracted at once. Without moving his eye from the glass, he stretched his hand towards the end of the tube, as if to touch what he saw. Failing in this attempt, he quitted the instrument, and was equally surprized not to see them where he supposed them to be. He then asked his companions whether they were

returned to their former place. In vain did they answer, that they had seen nothing of them: he would not believe them; he pointed with his finger to the place where he had supposed the objects to be situated : "There,

there they were," said he. The more they persisted in endeavouring to convince him of his mistake, the more he was offended at them, and the scene had nearly terminated in a quarrel.

Of the Ghonaquas, a middle cast between the Nimiquas and the other Hottentots, I have already spoken. The Koranas, and the Houzouanas, form classes still inore distinct; but as the country they inhabit, and the manners of these savages, have nothing strikingly dif ferent from the rest of that continent, I shall proceed to a description of the Caffres, as the most interesting and entertaining.

CHAP. XVI.

Description of the Caffres, and their country near the Great Fish River-Their boundaries-Weapons of war and hunting-The superior figure and qualifications of Gaika, the Caffre king-Convention between the Caffres and the British-Contrast between their conduct and the Dutch, towards vessels wrecked upon the coast-Method of training cattleA peculiar breed-Employment of the Caffre women-Custom of purchasing wives-Dress and ingenuity-Curious substitute for thread -Manner of hunting-Sagacity of the seacow-Traffick-Probability of their descent from the Arabs-Of their practise of circumcision-Of their opinion of mechanics—Ideas of music, &c.-Practice of tattooing the skin.

THE

HE place near which the Great Fish River is crossed on the way from the settlement of GraafReynet to the Caffre-land is known by the proximity of a stream, called Kowsha. It is a part so little inhabited, that sometimes the country may be traversed a day or two together, without meeting a living soul. About a day's journey on the other side, there is a river of

considerable magnitude, distinguished by the name of the Keiskamma. But all the travellers that have been among these people, agree, that taken collectively, a finer race of men than the Caffres are not to be found, being tall, stout, muscular, and well made. But as the English reader has no doubt heard of the Grosvenor, and other East Indiamen, which have been shipwrecked upon the Caffre coast, it may be proper to understand that the country inhabited by these people is bounded on the south by the sea-coast; on the east, by a tribe of the same kind of people, who call themselves Tambookies ; on the north, by the savage Bosjesmans; and on the west, by the colony of the Cape. With the Tambookies they live on friendly terms; but, like the Dutch peasantry, they are never at peace with the Bosjesmans. But from the nature of their weapons, these savages care as little for a hassagai as they dread a musquet. The hassagai, the principal weapon used by the Caffres, is an iron spear from nine inches to a foot in length, fixed at the end of a tapering shaft about four feet long. At the distance of fifty or sixty paces, they can throw this weapon at a mark with a tolerable degree of exactness; but beyond that distance they have no kind of certainty. In battle, the enemy will receive the point of the hassagai upon an oval shield about four feet in depth, made from the hide of a bullock. They have another weapon

called the keerie,

which is still less formidable

than the hassagai: this is a stick about two feet