All up the border, which, as I have before written, is the 20th degree of east longitude, there stretches a narrow fringe of desert “farms,” many of them huge blocks of 20,000 morgen (roughly 40,000 acres) each, mostly, too, of barren, sandy, waterless land, “farms” indeed only in name. Some of them have one or two water-holes, some have none whatever. A few have so-called “homesteads” on them, generally a forlorn dwelling little better than a hovel, though there are one or two exceptions of a better type. But wild and desolate as are these stretches of land, many of them are capable of sustaining large flocks of sheep, goats, and cattle; indeed, the number of fat beasts running on certain of these inhospitable-looking wastes is surprising. And the “poverty” of the scattered inhabitants is not nearly as bad as it appears, their wretched homes and the squalor of their surroundings being almost as inexcusable as their appalling filth. This latter was the more noticeable at some of the farms along the Molopo, the dry bed of which eventually forms the route north, where water can always be found on boring. Often there is an aeromotor and a well-built stone dam full of water, stagnant and filthy and full of animalcules for the want of cleaning out; and from this filthy pestiferous brew the owners would dip the drinking-water for their needs, rather than take the two minutes’ trouble of unhitching the motor and getting a splendid stream of crystal water, flowing pure and fresh from the abundant supply below. Of course there were exceptions, but the bulk of these degenerate people apparently never dreamed of washing themselves, except when they made their periodical visit to _nachtmaal_ at far-distant Upington. The vicinity of one of these “farms” was usually heralded by an appalling smell, for generally in the near vicinity were to be seen several swollen, rotten carcasses of goats, cattle, sheep, or horses, dead of _lungziekte_ or _nieuwziekte_ or _paardeziekte_, or one of the many diseases that had recently devastated the animals in these parts. No matter how near they might have died to house or water, no attempt appeared ever to have been made to drag the putrid carcass away or bury it, and the offal of slain animals usually strewed the vicinity of the house to the very doorstep. Quite recently an epidemic of typhoid had devastated the whole of this border region, and I believe many learned treatises were written as to what peculiar form of fever it may have been and how it originated--but surely the cause was not far to seek!