414 A FALSE ALARM SENSUALITY AND CUNNING. 



By a liberal supply of tobacco and flesh, we soon became 

 excellent friends ; but all my endeavors to elicit information 

 about the country were fruitless. They merely shrugged 

 iheir shoulders, urging as an excuse their ignorance of such 

 matters; they said, however, that their chief would, no 

 doubt, satisfy my curiosity on these points. 



We bivouacked at the vley, where a great number of 

 Bushmen — friends and relatives of those at Kobis — also hap- 

 pened to be encamped. Just as I had retired to rest, and 

 while watching with interest the animated features and ges- 

 tures of our new friends, the Bechuanas, who, by a glorious 

 lire, were regaling themselves with the pipe and the " flesh- 

 })ots," Bonfield came running up to me in great haste, say- 

 ing, "Please, sir, the Bushmen tell us that Sebetoane, 

 having heard of our coming, had sent a message to Lecho- 

 ietebe with orders to dispatch people to waylay and kill us, 

 and that these were the very individuals to whom the task 

 was intrusted !" 



Being myself by this time pretty well used to similarly 

 absurd and unfounded stories, and knowing that I had noth- 

 ing to fear, I took no notice of the communication, but again 

 retired with as much unconcern as if I had been in a civil- 

 ized country. This, however, was far from the case with my 

 men, for the following morning I learned that their anxiet}' 

 had kept them awake during the greater part of the night, 

 and that some had actually packed up theu' things, intend- 

 ing to steal away secretly. 



The next morning proved the groundlessness of the report. 

 The Bushmen, we found, had fabricated the story as a means 

 of prolonging my stay among them, in the anticipation of 

 obtaining an occasional gorge from the spoils of the chase. 

 The low cunning of this people is only equaled by their cre- 

 dulity. To them, no tales can be too ridiculous and absurd 

 for belief. For instance, my Bushmen guides amused me by 

 relating one evening that a tribe of black people had just 



