1811. 
BOOKOO VINEGAR. 
479 
Dam, to whom Gert was, as I now found, in some degree 
related, very humanely offered to take the poor fellow into his hut, 
where his wife could nurse him. This was immediately done ; and 
I agreed to make them a compensation for their trouble. Twenty 
drops of laudanum were given him in the course of the evening ; by 
the assistance of which he enjoyed his usual sleep. But with me it 
was far otherwise : I passed a night of distressing wakefulness, dread- 
ing that in the morning I should be told of some fatal symptoms 
having shown themselves, or of a lock-jaw having supervened. But, 
thanks to the little sensibility of his nerves, nothing untoward of this 
kind, nor any inflammatory appearance, occurred to check my hopes 
that all would go on properly. 
22nd. As the bursting of a gun is an accident too likely to 
happen, future travellers in these warm regions, who may unhappily 
be placed in such a situation will not think the details here given 
of the management by which the cure was effected, a useless part of 
my narrative, although others may find it uninteresting. 
The Hottentots expressed so much faith in the powers of 
Boekoe-azyn (Bookoo vinegar) as a wash to cleanse and heal the 
wound, that I allowed it to be used, as I knew of nothing in the 
nature of it which could be hurtful ; but, on the contrary, had long- 
believed the leaves of the Diosmas to contain virtues which would at 
some future period obtain for them a place in the materia medica of 
Europe, as they have long done in that of the Hottentots and Boors. 
This Boekoe (or Buku) azyn is made by simply putting the leaves of 
some kind of diosma * into a bottle of cold vinegar, in which they 
are left to steep. The longer they have been infused, the more 
efficacious the vinegar is esteemed ; becoming at length almost a 
mucilage. 
When the small stock which could be procured of old Bukus 
vinegar was consumed, a succedaneum was made by a similar infusion 
* In the present instance, those ot" Diosma serratifolia ; of which the Jigure of a 
sprig in seed of its natural size, is given at page 476. 
