THE BULL-FROG. 175 



and spend the evening with its inmates. The whole 

 family united in expressing their dread of the 

 violent storms with which they are visited during 

 the summer months, and which are frequently at- 

 tended with the most fatal effects. The farmer's 

 wife told me with great emotion, that one of her 

 sons had been killed by the lightning, while 

 securing a flock of sheep, thirty of which were struck 

 dead by the same flash. She further assured me 

 that during these tempests she sat in constant 

 terror, and could never retire to rest until they had 

 subsided. 



On the following morning we proceeded through 

 an extensive valley, in which the smaller description 

 of game was very abundant, not being much disturbed, 

 as the farmers in the neighbourhood considered it a 

 waste of powder and shot to fire at birds. Crossing 

 the Brakke River late in the afternoon, we uit- 

 spanned at the place of Piet Olivier, where we were 

 detained several days by successive tempests. One 

 morning, whilst occupied near my waggon, I was 

 attracted by the vociferations of a party of Hottentots 

 and Bushmen, who were engaged in throwing stones 

 at some object in a marshy plot of ground : on 

 reaching the spot where they were thus engaged, 

 I was surprised to hear a noise like the bellowing of 

 an ox, which I found to proceed from an immense 

 frog, commonly called the bull-frog. There was a 

 whole family of this species, and on observing my 



