SOUTHERN AFRICA. ^ 389 
passing througli open fields that for a very considerable ex- 
tent were under a rude sort of cultivation, they entered a 
large town composed of cottages or huts, not laid out in 
streets, but placed in an irregular manner, and each hut 
enclosed within a sort of palisade. The sight of so great an 
assemblage of human habitations, after so long and dreary a 
journey, was equally as unexpected as it was agreeable. In 
a country so desolate as Southern Africa, where so few human 
beings are met with, and these few in the last stage of misery, 
the pleasure must be doubly felt of encountering a large 
society of mankind whose condition has the appearance of 
something like comfort. Riding at a quick pace among the 
houses, preceded by the interpreter and those which had 
been sent to invite them, the commissioners soon came to the 
spot where the Chief had assembled the elders of the people 
to receive them. This venerable man, whose name is Moo- 
liahaban, was sitting in the midst of his council in a circular 
space, surrounded with wooden paling. He received the 
commissioners without the least embarrassment, and in the 
most friendly manner ; accepted their present, which excited 
the curiosity of the elders, and of the crowd that by this time 
had assembled in vast numbers round the enclosure. They 
examined every article with minute attention, and were de- 
sirous of being made acquainted with then' respective uses. 
In return they presented the commissioners with thick 
curdled milk. The ceremony of introduction being ended, 
the Chief invited the commissioners to his own house, where 
he presented them to his two wives and twelve children. 
Great crowds of people pressed after them, but the women. 
