SOUTHERN AFRICA. 235 
men, and thefe were furnifhed by government' with powder 
and ball. It was a fervice at all times taken with reludance, 
efpecially by fuch as were leaft expofed to the attacks of the 
favages ; and, during the late difturbances of Graaff Re}'nei% 
thefe expeditions met with confiderable interruptions. The 
people of Bruyntjes Hoogte were the firft who failed in raifing 
their proportion of men. Zuure Veldt was deferted, and Gam- 
deboo and Zwart Ruggens became negligent and remifs. The 
people of Sneuwberg, lying nearelt to the common enemy, were 
left to fuftain the whole brunt of the bufmefs; and had they 
not conducted themfeives with great fortitude, perfeverance, 
and addrefs, that valuable part of the colony, the nurfery of 
cattle, had now been abandoned. A whole divifion called the 
Tarka^ and a great part of another, the Sea-Cow river and 
Rhinofceros-berg, had been deferted, as well as a fmall part of 
Sneuwberg. There is, however, another caufe which, more 
than the interruption to the expeditions, has tended to increafe 
the ilrength and the boldnefs of thefe favages, and which, unlefs 
removed, will in the end effeft the utter ruin of this diftant 
part of the colony. The cafe is this : The government of the A 
Cape, which feemed to have been as little acquainted with the 
temper and difpofition of its diftant fubjedls as with the geo- 
graphy of the country, formed all its refolutions, refpeding the 
Bosjefmans, on reprefentations made to it by the perfons imme- 
diately concerned. In confequence of thefe reprefentations, it 
decreed that fuch of the Bosjefmans as fliould be taken alive in 
the expeditions made againft them, were to be diftributed by 
!ot among the commandant and his party, with whom they 
H H 2 were 
