28 
AN ADMIRER OF AMERICANS. 
confiding smile of the utmost complacency, under cover 
of wliich he 'put at least half of my supply into his capa- 
cious mouth, and was at once seized with a severe fit of 
coughing, the result of his being unacquainted with the 
particular knack of using that valuable hut likely-to- 
choke-you luxury. Then, after recovering himself in a 
measure, and with a face that would doubtless have been 
red had it not been almost black naturally, he com- 
menced to tell us that “ between the spot on which we 
stood and the house of Mr. John Koutze, the pilot, there 
was no lack of game, but that a great difficulty some- 
times existed in finding it; that he felt confident, how- 
ever, that, in spite of this difficulty, we could, by continu- 
ing our walk a mile or two farther, start up several 
spring-boke and any number of quail: he himself had 
just passed over the ground and seen several.” He 
ended by telling us most emphatically, and with an air 
of great apparent candour, that “he liked Americans,” 
and that we might thank our nationality for the informa- 
tion just received. Englishmen, he said, were “ no good,” 
but Americans — ah ! — he sighed a deep sigh, which, com- 
bined with a look, — such a look ! — was doubtless intended 
to produce another chew; but the purser and myself had 
both been around Cape Horn already, and were now' 
rounding that of Good Hope ; so the box remained un- 
opened. 
At first we thought that by “ spring-boke” he must 
mean the ordinary African hare ; but, upon our intimating 
as much, he hooted at the idea, assuring us that “he no 
speky lie,” and that they stood as high as the knee, and 
had horns. At this w'e concluded they must be antelope ; 
