294 KNOWLEDGE OF SIMPLES. [1698. 



wlio are not allowed to purchase any Cattel of the Hottentots 

 in any manner whatsoever, under the penalty of 50 Sous^ for 

 the first Offence, 200 for the Second, and being whipp'd and 

 banish'd for the third. '-^ The Gonrpany sells every Ox again 

 for 25 Florins, and every Sheep for seven, in a manner that 

 without much burdening the Buyer, or running any Kisque, 

 they make great Profit. 



However ignorant, or rather how bestial soever the 

 Hottentots are, they know something of Simjdcs, and make 

 use of them with Success. Let one be bit with any 

 venomous Creature, be one Wounded or Ulcerated, or let 

 there be any Swelling of Intlammationj they know how to go 

 exactly to the Plant that will cure them, and admiuister the 

 Eemedy with greater Success than we oftentimes do ours. 

 The Sick that have been brought a-shoar at the Gape have 

 often experienced this, and those Wounds that very skilful 

 Surgeons have given over, have in a short time been cur'd by 

 these People. The most ordinary way is to pound the 

 Herbs, and apply them to the Wound, but the Patient 

 swallows likewise divers Juices press'd out of the same 

 Herbs. 



Neither this Nation, nor any of the others of the Southern 

 Point of Africa, are absolutely without Government. They 

 have even hereditary Chiefs, who may reasonably be call'd 

 Kings, because they wear a sort of Crowns as I have been 

 often inform'd by a curious Traveller,^ who penetrated two 

 hundred Leagues up into the Country. But altho' these 

 Chiefs may have a general Eight to inspect the conduct of 

 the People, they seldom make use of it but in time of War, 



' In orie;. : " ecus," i.e., crowns or rix dollars. (Vide sup?-a, p. 154.) 



2 Ever since 1658 trade between the burghers and the Hottentots was 

 strictly forbidden, and on the 19th October 1697, four months before 

 Legnat's visit, Governor Van der Stel had issued a severe pkicant on the 

 subject. (Cf. Theal, I. c, p. 20.) 



3 Possibly Captain Wiilem Padt, who had been employed in reducing 

 to order the Chainourpia and Hessequa tribes. ( ]'ide Theal, /. c, p. 4.) 



