The water-skin I had made was not of much use, as the day was comparatively cool. Being fresh from the animal, it had to be used with the hair inside. It held the water very well, but gave a “doggy” taste to it. Swartboy and Cornelius were waiting for me; the latter was anything but a chief, either in manner or appearance. Nothing had been heard from Amiral; it was barely possible that any answer should have been received, owing to the distance. Besides the three chiefs present, there were a great number of the influential men. I used as interpreters, Phlebus, my new waggon-driver, a missionary schoolmaster, and a Griqua: these all spoke Hottentot and Dutch perfectly, and the last two a little English also. I knew enough Dutch myself to be able to check any gross mistake in the rendering from English to that language, and the three interpreters were checks upon one another in the rest. The schoolmaster spoke; the others interrupted if he was not accurate. We met together more than once. The meetings were long and very orderly, many people speaking, and all to the point. These men evidently felt they had gone much too far, and openly acknowledged that the system of robbing had done much mischief to themselves. No planting or sowing was going on; the Hottentots were idle and restless; there was no law in the country; and the Damaras harassed them with frequent retaliation. They begged me to suggest some system on which they could proceed; and also to draw up some laws which would at least meet the common cases of cattle robbing and murder. I was rather diffident of success; but in these wild parts a trained legislator is hardly to be expected to travel, and the best must be made of what materials are at hand; so being convinced that I had already gained a favourable footing amongst them, and that what I said would be attended to, I thought the matter well over, and made my _début_ as a lawgiver. As every one of my new friends were robbers by profession it would never do to make much ado about theft, for if I did nobody would enforce the law. I therefore simply made theft finable at double the number of oxen stolen, together with a mulct upon the people of the werft to which the criminal belonged, if, as was usually the case, they concealed him. The spoor is so certain and honest a witness, and facts become so notorious, that there is little difficulty about questions of evidence. In this spirit I drew up a few laws which Cornelius and Jonker discussed, and to which they fully assented. I also endeavoured to restrain the jealousies and quarrels between the Oerlams and Hottentots by inducing Cornelius and Jonker to make a mutual agreement that criminals should be punished by the captain of the country where the crime was committed, and not, as heretofore, by his own captains.