All these bits of information were derived from very many sources; some I received from persons in Damara-land, some from Ghou Damup among the Namaquas, and the rest from Bushmen who lived far to the east of them. The Ghou Damup are abused and tyrannised over by everybody, but servitude has become their nature, and the very name of Ghou which they themselves adopt and use is far from complimentary. Like many other Hottentot names it is not translatable to ears polite. The missionaries for delicacy’s sake call them “Hill” Damaras, because they live on the hills. A standing joke against the Ghou Damup is, that they trace their descent from the monkey tribe. An old man amongst them gave me the following history of his family; he worded it very neatly:—“My great uncle was a baboon, and lived on excellent terms with the rest of the family, but the following occurrence caused his separation from it. My grandfather had been gambling, and lost all the ornaments, &c., that he had on his person, but wishing to continue the game, requested his brother the baboon to go to my great grandfather, the famous Hadji-Aybib, and beg enough beads from him to form another stake. My great uncle the baboon went, but passing a Hottentot werft by the way, in which were many fierce dogs, before unknown in the country, he became so alarmed at their barking and snapping at him that he ran to the hills, and never dared face man again. Why should not we and the baboons be brothers?” said the old gentleman. “Everybody persecutes us alike. We both live on the hills, eat the same roots, and ‘crow’ for them with our hands in the same manner!” Hadji-Aybib, my friend’s great grandfather, married a Bushwoman for his second wife, who annoyed her step sons by her hauteur, and twitted them on account of their vulgar habits and low connections. Influenced by her, Hadji-Aybib cruelly treated his Damup progeny, and they on their part earnestly longed for his death. One day he was missing, rumour gave out that he was killed, and the sons gave way to the greatest paroxysms of merriment, during which they behaved in such an unseemly manner before the eyes of their fine lady Hottentot connections that on Hadji-Aybib’s return,—for he was not killed after all,—they were obliged, from absolute shame, to hide themselves away from his presence, and fled to the hills, bearing with them the reproachful name of Ghou Damup. _August 13th._—Our party separated, one detachment _en route_ to the bay, and Andersson, Timboo, John Morta, Phlebus, and myself, travelling towards Lake ’Ngami. I took only five or six of the most active Damaras with me, and appointed the neighbourhood of Jonker’s werft as a place of rendezvous for both parties at the beginning of November.