Chap. III. 
CAPTURE OF A BUSHWOMAN. 
61 
returned with the joyful tidings of “ metse,'' water, exliibiting the 
mud on their knees in confirmation of the news being true. It 
does one’s heart good to see the thhsty oxen rush into a pool of 
delicious rain-water, as tliis was. In they dash until the water is 
deep enough to be nearly level with their throat, and then they 
stand drawing slowly in the long refreslnng moutlifuls, until their 
formerly collapsed sides distend as if they would burst. So much 
do they imbibe, that a sudden jerk, when they come out on the 
bank, makes some of the water run out again from their mouths ; 
but as they have been days without food too, they very soon 
commence to graze, and of gTass there is always abundance every¬ 
where. This pool was called Mathuluani; and thankful we were 
to have obtained so welcome a supply of water. , 
After giving the cattle a rest at this spot, we proceeded down 
the drv bed of the river Mokoko. The name refers to the water- 
bearing stratum before alluded to; and in this ancient bed it bears 
enough of water to admit of permanent wells in several parts of it. 
We had now the assurance from Eamotobi that we should suffer 
no more from thirst. Twice we found rain-water in the Mokoko 
before we reached Mokokonyani, where the water, generally below 
ground elsewhere, comes to the surface in a bed of tufa. The 
adjacent country is all covered with low thorny scrub, with grass, 
and here and there clumps of the “ wait-a-bit thorn,” or Acacia 
detinens. At Lotlakani (a little reed), another spring three miles 
further down, we met with the first Palmyra trees wliich we had 
seen in South Africa; they were twenty-six in number. 
The ancient Mokoko must have been joined by other rivers 
below this, for it becomes very broad, and spreads out iato a large 
lake, of which the lake we were now in search of formed but a 
very small part. We observed that, wherever an ant-eater had 
made his hole, shells were tlxrown out with the earth, identical 
with those now alive in the lake. 
When we left the Mokoko, Eamotobi seemed, for the first time, 
to be at a loss as to which dhrection to take. He had passed only 
once away to the west of the Mokoko, the scenes of his boyhood. 
Mr. Oswell, while riding in front of the waggons, happened to spy 
a Bushwoman running away in a bent position, in order to escape 
observation. Thinking it to be a lion, he galloped up to her. 
She thought herself captured, and began to dehver up her poor 
