1 lO 
TRAVELS IN 
In a conntry where Chr'ijl'ians only are confidered as human 
beings, and where ftrong prejudices prevail, the negro has little 
chance of obtaining juftice. It has been obferved, with too 
much truth, that if a black (hould only ftrike a white, he runs 
the chance of being tortured and torn in pieces, on prefumptive 
proof that his intention was to murder ; but if a white man 
murders a black belonging to himfelf, he puts him into the 
ground, and nothing more is faid about it ; — if he murders that 
of another, he has only to pay the owner his full value ; unlefs, 
indeed, the owner fliould be inexorable and bring the criminal 
before the Court of Juftice, a cafe which I believe has not yet 
happened. Such is the diftribution of juftice between a man 
compelled to be a Have, and one born to be free ! 
We had little doubt that the greateft number of the Hottentot 
men, who were aftembled at the bay, after receiving favour- 
able accounts from their comrades of the treatment they expe- 
rienced in the Britifli fervice, would enter as volunteers into this 
corps ; but what was to be done with the old people, the wo- 
men, and the children? Klaas Stuurman found no difficulty in 
making a provlfion for them. " Reftore," fays he, " the coun- 
" try of which our fathers have been defpoiled by the Datch, 
" and we have nothing more to afk." I endeavoured to con- 
vince him how little advantage they were likely to derive from 
the pofTeffion of a country, without any other property, or the 
means of deriving a fubfiftence from it : but he had the better 
of the argument. " We lived very contentedly," faid he, 
" before thefe Dutch plunderers molefted us ; and why fhould 
" we not do fo again, if left to ourfelves ? Has not the Groot 
*' Baas 
