Of these two men, who had evidently been brought into this part of
South Africa by the chances of an exploration, one lent only a vague
attention to the beauties of nature that were opened to his view. This
indifferent traveller was a hunting bushman, a fine type of that brave,
bright-eyed, rapidly-gesticulating race of men, who lead a wandering
life in the woods. Bushman, a word derived from the Dutch "Bochjesman,"
is literally "a man of the bushes," and is applied to the wandering
tribes that scour the country in the N.W. of Cape Colony. Not a
family of these bushmen is sedentary; they pass their lives in roaming
over the region lying between the Orange River and the mountains of
the East, in pillaging farms, and in destroying the crops of the
overbearing colonists, by whom they have been driven back towards the
interior of the country, where more rocks than plants abound.
This bushman, a man of about forty years of age, was very tall, and
evidently possessed great muscular strength, for even when at rest
his body presented the attitude of action. The clearness, ease, and
freedom of his movements stamped him as an energetic character, a man
cast in the same mould as the celebrated "Leather-stocking," the hero
of the Canadian prairies, though perhaps possessing less calmness than
Cooper's favourite hunter, as could be seen by the transient deepening
of colour in his face, whenever he was animated by any unusual emotion.
The bushman was no longer a savage like the rest of his race, the
ancient Laquas; for, born of an English father and a Hottentot mother,
the half-breed, through his association with strangers, had gained more
than he had lost, and spoke the paternal tongue fluently. His costume,
half-Hottentot, half-European, consisted of a red flannel shirt, a
loose coat and breeches of antelope hide, and leggings made of the skin
of a wild cat; from his neck hung a little bag containing a knife, a
pipe, and some tobacco; he wore on his head a kind of skull-cap of
sheep-skin; a belt, made from the thick thong of some wild animal,
encircled his waist; and on his naked wrists were rings of ivory,
wrought with remarkable skill. From his shoulders flowed a "kross,"
a kind of hanging mantle, cut out of a tiger's skin, and falling as
low as the knees. A dog of native breed was sleeping near him, while
he himself was smoking a bone pipe in quick puffs, giving unequivocal
signs of impatience.
"Come, let's be calm, Mokoum," said his interlocutor. "You are truly
the most impatient of mortals whenever you are not hunting; but do
understand, my worthy companion, that we can't change what is. Those
whom we are expecting will come sooner or later--to-morrow, if not
to-day."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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