152 
HOTTENTOTS DURING INTOXICATION. 14—18 April, 
the justice to declare, that, when in a state of intoxication, at which 
times there would be no restraint upon vicious inclinations, they 
generally exhibited a goodness of disposition which, I shall always 
thhik, belongs naturally to the Hottentot character. 
One day, when they were in this state. Old Hans and Speelman 
came together into my room, with hearts overflowing with zeal for 
my service and the most respectful regard for my person. The 
object of their communication was some information respecting a 
Hottentot whom they expected to persuade to join our party. Their 
solicitude for the interest of my journey, and their repeated declar- 
ation that they were ready to do any thing to serve me, left nothing 
further for me to wish, but that they were sober. 
Old Cobus had saved his wages till within a day or two of our 
departure, and had nearly established himself in my good opinion, as 
a Hottentot who was careful of his property ; but, unable to resist 
temptation and bad example, he faltered at last ; and I found him 
one day lying in the tent, after a fit of intoxication, bewailing the loss 
of all his money. This misfortune brought him sufficiently to his 
senses., to confess that he had spent a great part of it at the pagter's ; 
but that the rest, being usually kept in his hat, had been stolen away, 
while he lay in a state of insensibihty, or, as he more delicately called 
it, sleep. The thief was never discovered, nor even suspected. 
One of my men appeared in his manners very different from the 
rest ; he was always silent and sullen ; seldom quitted the tent ; and 
whenever any strangers from the village came there, as they frequently 
did for the purpose of learning some particulars of our journey, he 
used to cover himself up in his kaross and lie down in one corner as 
if asleep. On one occasion, when I ordered him to fetch some sheep 
which I had purchased at a neighbouring farm, he evinced the greatest 
reluctance to go, and, pretending that he was unacquainted with the 
road, begged that I would send another instead of him. This 
diabolical wretch had sufficient cause for desiring thus to hide him- 
self from observation ; yet, although the rest of my people sometimes 
remarked that his behaviour was strange and unaccountable, no one 
had any suspicions of his being the man whom he was afterwards 
