THE HOTTENTOT ROBBER-AFRICANER. 21 



frequently displays those vagaries in colour which delight the eye of the 

 savage all over the world. 



As the Hottentot tribes who live beyond the colonial frontier differ in 

 no very marked manner in their mode of life from the Bechuanas, of whom 

 we shall treat further on, we need not dwell upon their habits while living 

 in a natural state here. 



Numbers of Hottentots, who were smarting under injuries, received at 

 the hands of the whites formed themselves into bands, and for many years 

 carried murder and pillage among the settlers. The most noted freebooting 

 Hottentot, of whom we have any record, was Africaner. One of our earliest 

 recollections is the receiving at a Sunday school a copy of a tract, with 

 the picture of a black man on the first page of it, which gave an account 

 of this dreaded chief, and his wonderful conversion to Christianity. We 

 are indebted to Dr. Moffat for the following account of Africaner. Dr. 

 Moffat knew him intimately as we shall see, but his conversion was due 

 to the brothers Albrechts, who were sent out to Africa by the London 

 Missionary Society, the same society that sent out Drs. Moffat and 

 Livingstone : — 



"This notable robber added not a little to their anxieties. Appearing 

 before them on one occasion, he said, ' As you are sent by the English, I 

 welcome you to the country ; for though I hate the Dutch, my former 

 oppressors, I love the English ; for I have always heard that they are the 

 friends of the poor black man.' So early and so fully was this man, the 

 terror of the country, impressed with the purity and sincerity of the mis- 

 sionary character, that, hearing it was the intention of the Albrechts to remove 

 to a more eligible situation, he came to the missionaries (after having sent 

 repeated messages), entreating them not to leave that part of the country, 

 and testifying the pleasure he felt at seeing the progress his children had 

 made under their instruction, promising to send the rest, which he did eventu- 

 ally, taking up his abode with them, and causing his people to do the same. 



" Before proceeding with the painful record of events which followed in 

 rapid succession, it may be proper here to glance briefly at Africaner's history 

 and character. In doing this, it will be well to fix the attention on Jager, the 

 eldest son of the old man, who, from his shrewdness and prowess, obtained the 

 reins of the government of his tribe at an early age.* He and his father once 

 roamed on their native hills and dales, within 100 miles of Cape Town; pas- 

 tured their own flocks, killed their own game, drank of their own streams, 

 and mingled the music of their heathen songs with the winds which burst 



* The father of the large family of Africaners or Jagers, had resigned the hereditary right of 

 chieftainship to his eldest son Jager, afterwards Christian Africaner ; the old man, who lived to a 

 great age, being superannuated. 



