The latter, who have felzed upon the choiceft part o f their
country, allow them to ere a their huts in the neighbourhood of
their farms, on condition of their furniihing a certain number
o f people to protea their cattle againft the attacks of Bosjefmans,
or wild beafts o f prey. A dozen years, more, and probably a
ihorter period, will lee the remains of the Namaaqua nation in
a ftate o f entire fervitude. Such are the effeas of an encroaching
peafantry, fandiioned by the low policy of a government that
could defcend to employ agents to effea the purchafe of whole
herds of cattle for a calk of brandy. To this government, was
fo little a concern o f fuch great magnitude, that it authorized
thofe agents, for the greater convenience of tranfporting their
brandy, to make an expenfive road acrofs a point of the
Khamies berg, which ftill bears the honorable name o f the
Company's road. The government having fixed no limits to
their colony, nor their fubjefts to their avarice, the latter found
it ftill more convenient to fettle themfelves in the midft o f the
harmlefs Namaaquas, who confidered them as the moft acceptable
neighbours in the world. For a bottle of brandy, which
coft fixpence, they willingly exchanged an o x ; and fuch is ftill
the infatuation of this people for the noxious liquor, that they
will even now exchange a Iheep for the fame quantity of it.
How great foever may have been the avaricious defigns o f
the firft fettlers of the Khamies berg, and the degree o f blame
imputable both to them and the government, it is but juftice
to remark, that the prefent inhabitants have much the appearance
of being a harmlefs and honeft fet o f people. Thofe heroes
in infamy, whofe charadters, as drawn in the page of the French
traveller
traveller before alluded to, feem not to be in the finalleft degree
overcharged, have moft o f them met the fate they fo well
deferved. Pinaar, and Bernfry, the Baftaards Piet and Klaas,
and many others of the fame ftamp, have murdered one
another, or have fallen by the hands of their own Hottentots.
Though the Namaaqua Hottentots vary but very little in
their perfons from the other tribes of this nation, their language
is widely different. It is obvioufly, however* of the feme
nature, and abounds with the clapping o f the tongue peculiar
to thq Hottentot. They are o f a taller ftature in general than
the eaftern tribes, and lefs robuft. Some of the women were
very elegant figures, and pollefled a confiderable ihare of
vivacity and adfivity ; and they had the fame conformation o f
certain parts of the body as the Bosjefmans women, and other
Hottentots ; in a lefs degree, however, than is ufual in the former,
and more fo than in thofe of the latter. Like the Hottentot
women of the Eaft, the moft ornamental part of their
drefs was the little fquare leather apron, to which, in addition
to the border o f fhells or beads, were appended fix or eight
chains in pairs* whofe points dragged on the ground; the
upper part of each chain was copper, the lower o f polifhed iron.
They are fupplied to them by the Damaras, a tribe of people
to the northward,, who will ihortly be noticed.
The huts o f the Namaaquas differ very materially from
thofe eredted by the Hottentots of the colony, or by the Bof-
jefmans, or by the Kaffers. They are perfe<ft hemifpheres,
covered with máttlng made of fedges; and the frame-work,
or