The "boys" I found to be, not boys in years, but the unmarried men of the tribe, who had separate huts to themselves. Conducted by my guards into one of these, I was instantly surrounded by the "boys" who never seemed as if they could look at me enough. The inspection was anything but pleasant; and seeing that the interpreter had accompanied us, I ventured to say I was suffering both from hunger and thirst, whereupon I had handed me some sour clotted milk, termed amasi, some maize, and a liquid which passes there for beer. Eagerly I drank the latter, then having eaten the rest, hunger alone making it palatable, I took possession of the mat allotted me, and feeling from the chief's words, and curiosity to know more about me, that I should at any rate be safe till the morning, soon fell into a sound sleep--as sound rather as the pest of Kaffirland, the fleas which swarm there, would permit--in which the staring "boys" about me, and my strange and perilous position were forgotten in dreams of my pleasant Cornish home among the rocks, and of Katie and my children. CHAPTER SEVEN. AN INTERVIEW WITH THE CHIEF--THINGS LOOK BRIGHTER. I awoke early next morning, earlier even than my companions, who laid slumbering on their mats, or beds made of stems of grass lashed together. So having nothing better to do, I began to inspect them as they had inspected me, and could not help again admiring the perfect symmetry of their dark forms, accompanied by the easy grace attendant upon every movement of limbs which had never been confined or crippled by clothing. I have called them, and till that moment believed them to be of negro blackness, but I now discovered my error--dark almost to black they were, but through the skin showed the red blood, giving a peculiar tint, and anything but an unpleasing appearance; it was, however, rather spoilt in my opinion by the excessive quantity of grease it is the custom in Caffraria to rub into the skin, till they shine like a gentleman's patent leather boot. But on this point, as on many others, Europeans and Kaffirs differ, for the latter, either male or female, regard full dress to be the having the body resplendent with grease, which mode of "dressing" produces, as may be imagined, an exceedingly disagreeable odour in the close confined spaces of the huts, the only opening being the low entrance; though in this, as in everything else, there are few things but have their use--for the oiling the bodies is absolutely compulsory to prevent the skin cracking under the rays of the scorching sun.