chap. viii. SETTLEMENT OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANS. 
203 
Next morning, while sitting at our breakfast, of which 
excellent fruit formed a considerable part, I looked out and 
saw within a circular fence, at a short distance from the house, 
eight or ten horses driven round upon a quantity of straw 
spread over a smooth hard clay floor. This I was informed 
was their threshing floor, and thus the corn was trodden out, 
— a process which I afterwards witnessed in many other parts 
of the colony. During the day we accompanied the missionary 
and a number of the people to their grazing ground, com 
lands, gardens, fountains, and different habitations. At the 
latter we found the goodwife had usually a cup of coffee and 
cakes, or a dish of grapes or some other refreshment, waiting 
our arrival. The cottages, though designated by their owners 
as only temporary dwellings, were many of them neat and 
comfortable. All contained a separate and partitioned bed¬ 
room ; and I was sometimes amused at the accumulation of 
treasures which the outer room exhibited. Each had a table 
and chairs, or some ruder kind of seat, frequently the driving 
box of a waggon. In one cottage, where we took some re¬ 
freshment, the end of the room was occupied by two large 
bins about four feet deep, built up in brick-work from the 
floor, and filled with excellent wheat, in quantity, I was told, 
about forty bushels. At one corner of the same room hung 
the fowling-piece of the master, with powder-horns, and 
shooting apparatus; at another corner the adze, the axe, the 
cross-cut saw; and in a third the spade and the hoe; while 
chisels, augers, and small tools were stuck into different parts 
of the thatch; and on a pole above hung long strips of the 
dried flesh of the antelope, and other beasts. The shelves, in 
different parts, were occupied with articles of crockery-ware, 
besides a coffee-pot, and a brass or tin tea-kettle. Beyond 
these, the skins of kids, or other small animals converted 
into bags, with the hair inside, but the legs projecting,—some 
apparently filled with nails or other valuables, — hung from 
