28 THE MONKEYFOLK OF SOUTH AFRICA 



grabbed as many as I could, but try as I would I couldn't 

 pull my doubled fist out of the hole. Just then a sudden 

 shout was heard, and, glancing up, I saw two Kafirs and 

 three dogs rush from behind some boulders and make 

 for me. I tried to rush off, but that big calabash hanging 

 from my hand kept me back. The dogs were soon round 

 me, and after a struggle I was thrust inside a sack and 

 carried off. How bitterly I cursed my stupidity, for it 

 hadn't dawned on me that if I had let go my hold of those 

 mealies, I could easily have slipped my hand out of the 

 calabash. Ever so many of us have been captured by this 

 stupid trick; but our tribe are beginning to learn from 

 experience, and it's only the Back-veld, ignorant baboonfolk 

 who are now tricked in that way. 



THEY PUT ME IN A CAGE 



I was thrust into a box and carried off to Port Elizabeth, 

 in a thing you call a train. I was taken to the museum 

 and put into a nice, large, roomy cage. I soon lost all 

 nervousness and fear, for hundreds of the children of the 

 humanfolk came to see me. Their faces were so jolly, and 

 they laughed so much that I felt really and truly happy, and 

 liked them far better than the children of the baboonfolk. 

 They brought me all kinds of nice things. At first I ate 

 so much and so often that I became seriously ill. But 

 I grew wise after a while, and was more careful. I used to 

 get everything which is most dear to a baboon's heart— 

 cakes, biscuits, fruit, nuts, sweets. 



RIVALS 



One day the man at the museum put three baboon 

 children into the cage with me. I rather liked it at first, 

 because, after all, one hankers after his own kind and 



