SECOND EXPEDITION 10 SOUTH AFRICA 97 
the opposite bank of a small stream, which here ran into the 
__ Limpopo, I saw two waggons unmistakably Dutchmen’s. I was 
_ disgusted enough that anyone should dare to come poaching 
_ on ourmanor. But what was to be done? They were many, 
__ nine or ten, and we were but two. After breakfast one of my 
_ Hottentots, who had been herding the oxen in the direction of 
_ the Boers’ waggons, brought a message, or rather an order, 
_ that I was to go over to them. I returned for answer that if 
_ they wanted anything they could come to us. They took it 
f quite in good part, and about ten o'clock, after ascertaining 
from my boys of what our party consisted, seven or eight of them 
_ crossed the stream and made their way up to our camp, having 
4 the good taste to leave all their roérs behind. We had a 
i & sccaty chat, coffee and tobacco playing a considerable part 
init, and filling up the gaps in my rather incomplete Dutch. 
_ Dear old Frank could never be induced to believe that Dutch 
; ‘was anything but bad English, and would occasionally put ina 
_ word or two of this latter in the worst grammar and pronuncia- 
| tion he could improvise. We smoked and we drank coffee, and 
‘we were amicable exceedingly, when one of my guests chanced to 
_ see the ivory under the waggon. They all got up to look at 
_ it—where did it come from ?— who shot it? I said I had, and 
_ during the last few days. Alone? Yes, alone. ‘That must be a 
_ lie. A poor lean fellow like you could never have shot such a 
_ splendid lot of tusks.’ They appealed to my drivers for the truth, 
and when we returned to our coffee-pot, made an astonishingly 
liberal proposal that I should join and shoot with them, and 
take half the ivory killed by the whole party. They were in 
earnest, and I had the greatest difficulty in getting off ; but I 
have reason to believe it was through the account of these 
Boers, and of another party I met at Livingstone’s station at 
“Mabotsé, that I received the most courtéous message from 
Preetorius, who was then their chief, that he hoped I would 
sit Mahalisberg, and that I should find a hearty welcome 
‘throughout Boerland. They had a wholesome dread of traders, 
ho for ivory might supply the natives with muskets and am- 
