132 
CHILD MEDICINE. 
Chap. VI. 
A woman came a distance of one hundred miles for relief in 
a complaint wliicti seemed to have baffled the native doctors; 
a complete cure was the result. Some twelve months after 
she returned to her husband, she bore a son. Her husband 
having previously reproached her for being barren, she sent me a 
handsome present, and proclaimed all over the country that I 
possessed a medicine for the cure of sterility. The consequence 
was, that I was teased with apphcations from husbands and 
wives from all parts of the country. Some came upwards of two 
hundred miles to purchase the great boon, and it was in vain for 
me to explain that I had only cured the disease of the other 
case. The more I denied, the higher their offers rose; they 
would give any money for the ‘‘ child medicineand it was 
reaUy heart-rending to hear the earnest entreaty, and see the 
tearful eye, which spoke the intense desire for offspring: “ I am 
gettmg old, you see grey hairs here and there on my head, and 
I have no child; you know how Bechuana husbands cast their 
old wives away; what can I do ? I have no cliild to bring water 
to me when I am sick,” &c. 
The whole of the country adjacent to the Desert, from Kuru- 
man to Kolobeng, or Litubaruba, and beyond up to the latitude 
of Lake Ngami, is remarkable for its great salubrity of climate. 
Not only the natives, but Europeans whose constitutions have 
been impahed by an Indian chmate, find the tract of country 
indicated both healthy and restorative. The health and longevity 
of the missionaries have always been fair, though mission-work 
is not very conducive to either elsewhere. Cases have been 
known in wliicli patients have come from the coast with com¬ 
plaints closely resembhng, if they were not actually, those of con¬ 
sumption; and they have recovered by the infiuence of the 
climate alone. It must always be borne in mind that the climate 
near the coast, from which we received such very favourable 
reports of the health of the British troops, is actually inferior for 
persons suffering from pulmonary complaints to that of any part 
not subjected to the influence of sea-air. I have never seen the 
beneficial effects of the inland climate on persons of shattered 
constitutions, nor heard their high praises of the benefit they have 
derived from traveUing, without wishing that its bracing effects 
should become more extensively known in England. No one 
