SOUTHERN AFRICA. 117 
as the Bosjcsmans beyond the Sneuvvberg, in expeditions 
against whom they had been accustomed to join ; but that on 
the contrary, as far as the best accounts could be depended 
on, they were a mild, rational, and in some degree a civil- 
ized people, who had on all occasions afforded protection to 
such colonists travelling in their country as had made proper 
applications to their sovereign tor it. The story of some 
Dutch farmer having been murdered in Kaffer-land, where he 
had gone for the sake of exchanging trinkets for cattle, had 
got hold of their minds, and it was no easy matter to make 
them conceive the difference between our going officially, in 
the service of government, to the Kaffer king, and the case 
of a man clandestinely entering the country with a view of 
carrying on an illicit traffic with its subjects. From the mo- 
ment these men were informed of our intentions they had 
daily teazed the landrost with their proposal of twenty men^ 
till at length it was found necessary to silence their applica- 
tion by saying, that if they had any apprehensions as to their 
personal safety they were at full liberty to retura to Graaff 
Reynet. Though nothing more was said on the subject, there 
was reason to suppose that the farmers had been assembled 
by the Hemraaden for the purpose of accompanying us. To 
a Dutch peasant a jaunt from home, on a hunting excursion, 
or to explore new regions, is supreme felicity : but any safe 
opportunity of getting into the Kaffer countr}^ so abundant 
in cattle, was not to be resisted. Some of the farmers it was 
absolutely necessary to take along with us, as none of our 
own party were acquainted with a single step of the country. 
Those that seemed to be the most proper for this purpose were, 
an old man from Upper Zuure Veldt, and Rensburg, one of the 
