23 



face ; these were easily caught by hand. One such instance 

 occurred in the river (Nahoon), when a Kafir boy simply took 

 the fish out of the river from off the bank. Upon cleaning 

 it the intestines were found quite empty. It was, however, 

 cooked and eaten by a family near by. Unfortunately, I have 

 not any reliable information as to the species of fish seen on 

 the beach, mostly to the westward of Cove Rock, simply a 

 general statement saying ' all sorts of fish.' On one or two 

 occasions during the past 25 years quantities of fish have 

 been seen on the beach as on the present occasion, and local 

 fishermen are of the opinion that they have perished from 

 want of food and abnormally low temperature of water. Such 

 fish when examined have been invariably found to have empty 

 stomachs. I do not think that the fish thrown away by the 

 trawlers, as some allege, would account for such large quan- 

 tities as those on the beach, and when similar occurrences 

 took place earlier in the 25 years period there were no trawlers." 



Mr. Wood, of East London, took some pains to ascertain 

 the facts of the case. He writes : " I have met a Keiskama 

 North resident, who saw the fish on the beach — those which 

 were those probably alluded to in the newspaper paragraph you 

 quote. As well as I can gather, the report first appeared in 

 the Daily Despatch here, and came from a correspondent out 

 Keiskama way. I am told it did not state fish had been cast 

 up on the East London beach, and as far as I have learned 

 nothing of the kind was noticed here. According to my 

 Keiskama informant, sometime about the middle of September, 

 hearing from a Kafir that there was a lot of fish lying about the 

 beach, he took a few sacks and set out to collect the gifts the 

 gods had sent. He found them by the score, a few hundreds 

 altogether upon the mile or so of beach and, with the exception 

 of a few here and there, they were more or less alive. Upon 

 the sand washed by the surf they were lying about in a limp 

 exhausted sort of condition, whilst in the rock pools they 

 moved about as if dazed. There had been a heavy swell on 

 for some days, but the water was warm. His young brother, 

 who did the wading, said that it was quite nice and warm. 

 This condition would correspond with what is stated in en- 

 closed letter from one of the skippers of our local trawlers. 

 The fish were chiefly Romans, Eels, Cape Salmon, Kabeljaauw, 

 Dogfish, Ostracion, Blasops and a compressed fish of chaetodon 

 outHne, the latter being most numerous. He went back to 

 get his sacks refilled, but the tide had come up in the interval 

 and they were never seen again. Soles were not observed." 



The enclosed letter referred to is as follows : " On September 

 8th, 9th, loth and nth, when trawling 18 miles east of East 



[C.P. 6-'i4.] 



