22 LIFE OF DA V1D LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



over the Witsemberg and "Winterhoek mountains, once the strongholds of his 

 clan. As the Dutch settlers increased, and found it necessary to make room 

 for themselves, by adopting as their own the lands which lay beyond them, 

 the Hottentots, the aborigines, perfectly incapable of maintaining their ground 

 against these foreign intruders, were compelled to give place by removing to 

 a distance, or yielding themselves in passive obedience to the farmers. From 

 time to time he found himself and his people becoming more remote from, the 

 land of their forefathers, till he became united and subject to a farmer named 



P . Here he and his diminished clan lived for a number of years. In 



Africaner P — ■ — found a faithful and an intrepid shepherd ; while his valour 

 in defending and increasing the herds and flocks of his master enhanced his 

 value, at the same time it rapidly matured the latent principle which after- 

 wards recoiled on that devoted family, and carried devastation to whatever 



quarter he directed his steps. Had P treated his subjects with common 



humanity, not to say with gratitude, he might have died honourably, and 

 prevented the catastrophe which befell the family, and the train of robbery, 

 crime, and bloodshed which quickly followed that melancholy event. 



It can serve no good purpose here to detail the many provocations and 

 oppressions which at length roused the apparently dormant energies of the often 

 dejected chieftain, who saw his people dwindling to a mere handful ; their wives 

 and daughters abused, their infants murdered, while he himself had to subsist on 

 a coarse and scanty pittance, which, in the days of his independency, he would 

 have considered as the crumbs of a table fit only for the poorest of the poor. 

 Demonstrations too tangible to admit of a doubt, convinced him and his 

 people, that in addition to having their tenderest feelings trodden under foot, 

 evil was intended against the whole party. • They had been trained to 

 the use of fire-arms ; to act not only on the defensive, but offensive 

 also ; and Africaner, who had been signally expert in re-capturing stolen 

 cattle from the Bushmen pirates, now refused to comply with the com- 

 mand of the master, who was a kind of justice of peace. Order after order 

 was sent down to the huts of Africaner and his people. They positively 

 refused. They had on the previous night received authentic information that 

 it was a deepdaid scheme to get them to. go to another farm, where some of 

 the party were to be seized. Fired with indignation at the accumulated woes 

 through which they had passed, a tempest was brooding in their bosoms. 

 They had before signified their wish, with the farmer's permission, to have 

 some reward for their often galling servitude, and to be allowed peaceably to 

 remove to some of the sequestered districts beyond, where they might live in 

 peace. This desire had been sternly refused, and followed by severity still 

 more grievous. It was even-tide, and the farmer, exasperated to find his 

 commands disregarded, ordered them to appear at the door of his house. 

 This was to them an awful moment; and though accustomed to scenes of 



