34 TRAVELS IN 
The firft a£fc of their patriotic fpirit was an attempt to take 
by violence, out of the hands of juftice, a criminal whom the 
Landroft, or chief magiftrate of the diftrid, had forwarded, 
under the efcort of a dragoon, towards the Cape. His crime, 
which was an a£t of forgery on orphan property, committed to 
the care of a conflituted board in the Gape called the Weejkammer^ 
or chamber for managing the effeds of minors and orphans, 
had been fully proved againft him before the provincial 
court of judicature; but being one of the patriotic party, 
and a very diftinguiflied character in all the difturbances that 
had taken place in this diftridt, he was confidered as too valuable 
a fubjed to be taken off by a regular courfe of juftice. Ac- 
cordingly, about fourteen boors, each armed with an enormous 
mufquet ufed for killing elephants and other wild beafts, were 
difpatched upon the Karroo, or great defert, on the meritorious 
enterprize of reftoring the culprit to the fociety of which he 
was a member. The dragoon, however, into whofe cuftody he 
had been committed, thought proper to demur, and at length 
told them, in a very refolute and fpirited manner, that fooner 
than furrender him into their hands, or fuffer him to be taken 
out of his, he fhould certainly blow out his brains. But the 
Landroft's fecretary, who had alfo been fent in joint charge of 
the prifoner, no lefs frightened than the boors were at the de- 
termined manner of the dragoon, prevailed upon the latter, if 
not to relinquifli the criminal, at leaft to convey him back to 
the drofdy, and deliver him up to the Landroft ; to this he re- 
ludantly aflented ; the courageous boors keeping at a proper 
diftance from the waggon. 
Having, 
