THE MONKEYFOLK OF SOUTH AFRICA 103 



with stones. Just think what we have to put up with. 

 We baboonfolk know that a great many of you are kind- 

 hearted and gentle, but we also are aware that a great 

 number of you are also wilfully cruel. You allow your 

 children to offer us every kind of indignity, and positively 

 torture us. Yet you wonder why we grow surly and bad- 

 tempered. You cannot have much brain in your cranium 

 or you wouldn't need to wonder. 



A FAVOURITE FOOD 



One of our favourite foods when we are wild and free 

 is a plant you call a Babiana. You gave it that name because 

 you first saw us digging it up and eating it. The Babiana 

 is the little blue plant you call a " crocus," which smells 

 so sweetly, and which you gather in baskets and place out 

 in dishes of water. This little plant is very hardy. It will 

 manage to exist when nearly all other vegetation dies. 

 When the rains come, it throws up little lily-shaped leaves, 

 and a short stem, on which grows a beautiful sweet-smelling 

 blue flower. This flower soon dies, but another quickly 

 takes its place, until several blooms have appeared. The 

 flowers themselves are delicious to eat. When we are not 

 very hungry we content ourselves with picking and eating 

 the flowers only, but when we need substantial food we dig 

 up the bulb of the crocus, which is underground. If we 

 are extra hungry we don't bother about peeling it, but just 

 eat it, skin and all. At other times we neatly peel off the 

 skin, and eat the delicate onion. This Babiana or crocus, 

 which, by the way, is not a crocus at all, scientifically speak- 

 ing, lies dormant the greater portion of the year, because 

 there is no rain and the ground is parched and dry. At 

 these times the leaves wither away and no trace can be seen 

 of the plant. That doesn't trouble us in the least, because 

 we can find it just as easy by our sense of smell as we can 



