APR. 1771 HOTTENTOTS 439 



which they meet with upon the road. Great as these 

 conveniences are, the people who come from afar must do 

 little more than live, as there is no trade here, but in a few 

 articles of provisions, which are sent to the East Indies, and 

 curiosities. They can bring nothing to market but a little 

 butter, such skins of wild beasts as they have been able to 

 procure, and perhaps a few kinds of drugs. 



There remains nothing but to say a word or two con- 

 cerning the Hottentots, so frequently spoken of by travellers, 

 by whom they are generally represented as the outcast of 

 the human species, a race whose intellectual faculties are so 

 little superior to those of beasts, that some have been 

 inclined to suppose them more nearly related to baboons 

 than to men. 



Although I very much desired it, I was unable to see 

 any of their habitations, there being none, as I was 

 universally informed, within less than four days' journey 

 from the Cape, in which they retained their original customs. 

 Those who come to the Cape, who are in number not a few, 

 are all servants of the Dutch farmers, whose cattle they 

 take care of, and generally run before their waggons : these 

 no doubt are the lowest and meanest of them, and these 

 alone I can describe. 



They were in general slim in make, and rather lean 

 than at all plump or fat : in size equal to Europeans, 

 some six feet and more ; their eyes not expressive of any 

 liveliness, but rather dull and unmeaning; the colour of 

 their skins nearest to that of soot, owing in great measure to 

 the dirt, which, by long use, was ingrained into it, for I 

 believe that they never wash themselves. Their hair curled 

 in very fine rings like that of negroes, or a Persian lamb's 

 skin, but hung in falling ringlets seven or eight inches 

 long. Their clothes consisted of a skin, generally of a sheep, 

 and round their waists a belt, which in both sexes was 

 richly ornamented with beads and small pieces of copper. 

 Both sexes wore necklaces, and sometimes bracelets, likewise 

 of beads, and the women had round their legs certain rings 

 made of very hard leather, which they said served to defend 



