HOW WE FARED. 231 



pity that the Natal preserve.:?, plentiful as are both 

 fruit and sugar in that most fertile of lands, are hardly- 

 less extravagant in price. But very good home-made 

 jams can be obtained from the Cape gooseberry — a kind 

 of small tomato, enclosed in a loose, cracklinor ba^- much 

 too large for it ; also from priemhesjes (pronounced 

 "primbessies"), a delicious wild fruit which grows on 

 small trees along the lower slopes of the mountains. 

 These trees only bear biennially ; and, as if exhausted 

 by the lavish profusion of fruit jdelded each alternate 

 season, produce nothing in the intermediate year. The 

 pretty fruit,resembling a small, semi-transparent cherry, 

 is at first completely enclosed in such a tight-fitting case 

 that it looks like a soft, velvety green ball. As the fruit 

 ripens this green covering divides in half, and gradually 

 opens wider and wider, disclosing the vivid scarlet 

 within. Amid the prevailing stiffness and sombreness of 

 Karroo vegetation the pretty, rounded outline of these 

 trees, and their bright, glossy, dark foliage — forming 

 an effective background for the jewel-like fruit as it 

 peeps from the delicate pale-green cases in all different 

 stages of expansion — afford a pleasing contrast. 



In search of priemhesjes we made many delightful 

 expeditions on horseback to the foot of the mountains ; 

 sitting in our saddles close to the trees and picking 



from our animals' backs, T occasionally standing 



up like a circus-rider to reach the higher boughs. Our 

 horses became quite accustomed to the work, and, 

 moving into the exact spot desired, would stand motion- 

 less as long as we chose while we filled our baskets. 



