42 EXPEDITION INTO [Chap. VI. 



mulatto Hottentots, we met their Chief, Captain 

 Dowd, whose mouth watered at the appearance of 

 our waggons, and who requested particularly that 

 we would not transact any business with his people 

 until the morrow. This man is remarkable as being 

 one of the only two Griquas who escaped the general 

 massacre of their army by Moselekatse's warriors 

 in 1831, the particulars of which we obtained from 

 himself. From him also we received five fresh oxen, 

 in lieu of our six lame ones and a cast-ofF surtout 

 coat of Richardson's, which he immediately donned 

 with great exvdtation. 



At Kramers-fontein next day, a horrible spec- 

 tacle presented itself to us in the form of an 

 emaciated old Bushwoman, who had come down 

 from her kraal, five miles distant, to fill two ostrich 

 egg-shells with water, " Grim misery had worn 

 her to the bones," and it is no exaggeration to say 

 that her attenuated form appeared a skeleton covered 

 with a wet cloth. Those rounded proportions which 

 are given to the human form divine, had no ex- 

 istence in her. Her skin resembled wrinkled leather, 

 and I can compare her legs and arms to nothing 

 but straightened sticks, knobbed at the joints. Her 

 body was actually crawling with vermin, with which 

 she was constantly feeding a little half-inanimate 

 miniature of herself in arms. 



Withered and wild in her attire. 



She looked not like a habitant of earth. 

 And yet was on it." 



We were glad to bribe her to depart by a present 



