1812. 
THE PIICHO OR ASSEMBLY. — SPIES. 
409 
chief himself must at all times have been the real president, though 
I am not able to state the rules by which the members of the piicho, 
and the officiating president, are guided in giving their opinions and 
in managing the business of the meeting. 
Besides a nightly watch of six or seven Bachapins stationed 
round the outside of Mattivi's cattle-enclosure, four of his servants 
came every night to sleep in the Hottentots' hut ; so that these 
poor fellows were as much tormented by company, as their master. 
No sooner had they filled a pipe and put it to their mouth, than one 
or other of the natives cried out, Lee ki rdki ! * (Give me smoke !) 
to which I advised them to answer, Bd-pelu (Wait a little); an 
expression, of which I was myself obliged to make frequent use. 
But they found it impossible, by any artifice, to save their tobacco ; 
and at last, to conceal it, they resolved to leave off all smoking in 
their presence. This they mentioned to me as a most distressing 
grievance ; and though I could not sympathize in these feelings, I 
pitied them for their sufferings under this privation, which, to a 
Hottentot, I knew could not be a trifling restraint. 
In addition to this, I saw the necessity of imposing on them 
another restriction, by desiring them to be circumspect in what they 
said to each other ; as it appeared to me that the four men, who slept 
in their hut, were placed there as spies upon us. One of them, 
named Champdni, had paid frequent visits to Klaarwater, and had 
lived among those Hottentots till he had acquired a knowledge of 
Dutch, sufficient to enable him to understand the general tenor of 
our conversation, and to express himself intelligibly. 
But this restraint on their smoking was not their greatest incon- 
venience : their fear had been so strongly excited by the violent 
debates respecting the gun, that they all confessed themselves to feel 
very uneasy at this place and ardently to desire to return home. 
Some even ventured to hint, in an indirect manner, that they did not 
intend to go farther northwards. This confession, or the last part of 
* The word 7-oki is probably a corruption of the Dutch word fooken, ' to smoke,' 
which they may have learnt from the Hottentots. 
VOL. IL 3 G 
