NATIVE GAME. 139 



Should any lords of the creation be about, 

 they are almost certain to be doing nothing ; 

 but that they do so well aud thoroughly that 

 one must not blame them. Occasionally two or 

 three will rouse themselves sufficiently to take 

 part in a game played with some large acacia 

 seeds in holes scooped in the sand, the seeds 

 being passed rapidly from one hole to another ; 

 but I have never been able to discover the 

 rules of the game. Sometimes quite a large 

 party will assemble before a canteen to play 

 this game, making a proportionate number of 

 holes in the sand, and many are the squabbles 

 that arise during its progress. 



Lean dogs, cats, pigs, fowls, children (not 

 leau), and sometimes goats, wander and play 

 about the kraals, giving plenty of movement ; 

 and for scent ! the odour of a long-worn, never- 

 washed Kafir blanket, which is indescribably 

 faint and nasty, and is often painfully apparent 

 long before a kraal is entered. For sound there 

 is the continual chattering or singing of the 

 women, varied by a screaming child or the 



