178 LODGES IN THE WILDERNESS 



ment, the charred fibres of the woven grass- 

 blades on which the clay design had been 

 formed, could be clearly seen. In the low, 

 stone ledges surrounding the vley were to be 

 seen grooves evidently caused by the sharpen- 

 ing of weapons. Some of these grooves were 

 very deep, and as the Bushmen's arrow-heads 

 were made of bone, the scores must have been 

 the result of sharpening by many generations. 

 A few of them looked as fresh as if they had 

 been used the previous day. 



A careful search discovered stone imple- 

 ments of various types, — palaeolithic as well as 

 neolithic. These suggested a receding suc- 

 cession of prehistoric peoples to days unthink- 

 ably remote. Some of the weapons were very 

 peculiar, — they were either spear-heads or 

 arrow-heads. But they seemed too small for 

 the former and too large for the latter. If they 

 were spear-heads they must have been used by 

 pygmies ; if arrow-heads by giants. 



As there were apparently no springbucks 

 worth the hunting on that side of the desert, 

 we decided to return home at once. We thus 

 had no opportunity of testing the qualities 

 of the fearsome hunting-chariot-contraption 

 constructed by Andries. I was not altogether 

 sorry; my bones ached in anticipation of our 



