THE OKAVANGO RIVER 39 



land that was now getting more open, with patches 

 of big open plain. In spite of being sandy, it 

 carried a big crop of grass with plenty of water, 

 obtainable even in the dry season by digging in 

 the vleys. 



One morning, whilst looking for a blind ox that 

 had strayed away at night, we made the acquaint- 

 ance of a little party of four unusual-looking 

 bushmen — tall and dark, quite different from the 

 little red or copper-coloured men in German 

 South- West, or the bushmen whom I met and 

 hunted with later on. Whether it happened that 

 these four merely had a negro cross in them, or 

 whether there is a different race or tribe of bush- 

 men in this district, I do not know. These bush- 

 men, who carried bows and arrows and spoke 

 apparently the usual bushman's clicking tongue, 

 were a little shy at first, but I soon made friends 

 with them, g'ving one of them my Mannlicher to 

 examine and taking his bow and arrows and 

 pretending to suggest an exchange. They ran up 

 the tracks of the lost ox very quickly and helped 

 to recover the beast. 



We went out hunting together the same after- 

 noon, and I was well pleased that I had decided to 

 ride my mule when I saw the way they stalked 

 along. Although we were unlucky and struck 

 no game, it was a delight to watch the savages. 

 The bushman who took the lead, a young fellow 

 of perhaps twenty-oneyears, over six feet in height 

 and quite dark in colour, with a wonderfully 



