Old Mr Von Schlicht of Klipfontein--who had spent most of his life in Namaqualand, had recently been endeavouring to recall for me details of the desert journeys of Ecklon and Drege, who did so much for South African botany. I ascertained that Ecklon visited Kamiebies. How his heart must have leaped when his eyes first gathered in the winter glory of those mountains. When he afterwards stood, begging his bread at the corner of the Heerengracht, Cape Town,--did he ever recall that scene? Strange world of men that so often lets its noblest, after lives of heroic toil for the highest and most unselfish ends, die in the gutter-- if it does not more mercifully slay them--and pays tribute of corn, wine and oil, of jewels and fine raiment, to the company-monger or other chartered robber adroit enough to squeeze through the meshes of the law. We inspanned at sunset, and plunged straight into the desert, travelling slightly to the south of east. Our objective was lower Pof Adder--which must not be confounded with the northern Pof Adder beyond Namies. We were out of the region of "toa"; the plain was covered with small shrub,--half of which were soft and succulent and the others hard and thorny. There were no intermediate kinds; the desert is a region of extremes. In spite of the jolting I managed to get a few hours' sleep. We outspanned for an hour at midnight and made coffee. Now we had some heavy sand-tracts to cross,--with jolty stretches lying between them. But we reached the camp of the half-breeds just at dawn, as had been intended. They were caught--if not exactly red-handed, yet with ample proof of their guilt. In the mat-houses of the suspected men we found boxes and bags packed full of feathers. These were of all kinds--from the long white plumes and the short blacks of the male bird, to the browns of the hens and chicks. The culprits pleaded guilty; retributive justice was forthwith satisfied at the wagon-wheel. The camp was quite a large one; I should say it contained over sixty souls, men, women and children included. These people were all of the same colour, light-yellow; they even seemed to shew signs of type-inception. Lean, sinewy and tough, they were not beautiful either in form or feature. In neither sex did the sallow skin give any hint of blood beneath. However, anaemic as they were, whatever fluid circulated in their arteries must have been of good quality, for their capacity for physical endurance was considerable. It was the eyes of those half-breeds that were most distinctive. These were dusky and deep, with an expression--not exactly furtive; rather expressive of haunting apprehension. This was hardly to be wondered at, for they had ceaselessly to watch for every change in the desert's pitiless visage--to note each alteration in the moods of earth and sky. Their lives were spent in answering a succession of riddles propounded by the terrible sphinx between whose taloned paws they existed as playthings.