lent poifons, that a£l on the animal fyftem, whether taken into
it by the ftomach or the blood. The farmers pull up the root
and leaves wherever they find them growing. It was faid that
the juice o f this bulb, mixed up with the mangled body of a
certain fpecies o f fpider, furniihes the Bosjefmans with poifon
for their arrows, more deadly than any other they are acquainted
with. This fpider ihould feem to be peculiar to the weftern
coaft of the country, at leaft I never met with, nor heard o f it,
on the other fide. Its body, with the legs, which are ihort, is
three inches in diameter, the former black and hairy, the latter
faintly fpotted; the beak red. It lives under ground, con-
ftruCting over its hole a cover compofed o f the filaments fpun
from its entrails, and earth or dung. This cover is made to turn
on a joint. When the animal is watching for its prey, it fits
yvith the lid half open, ready to fally out upon fuch infedts as
ferve it for food. On the approach of danger it clofes the
cover, and in a Ihort time cautioufly opens it again to fee i f the
enemy has retreated.
The Namaaqua Hottentots feem well acquainted with
poifonous fubftances, though they now make ufe of none.
The bow and arrow, their ancient weapons, are become ufelefs.
The country they now inhabit is almoft entirely deferted by
all kinds of beafts that live in a ftate o f nature, and the dread
o f Bosjefmans prevents them from ranging far over the country
in queft o f game. Formerly, however, the kloofs o f the
Khamies berg abounded with elands and hartebeefts, gemsboks,
quaphas, and zebras, and were not a little formidable on account
o f the number of beafts o f prey that reforted thither. A few
days
days: before our arrival at the foot o f the mountain, a lion had
occafioned fome little ftir : in the country, which had not yet
entirely fubfided. A Hottentot belonging to one of the farmers
had endeavoured for fome time, in vain, to drive his mailer's
cattle into a pool o f water enclofed between two ridges of rock,
when at length he efpied a huge lion couching in the midft of the
pool ; terrified at the unexpected fight of fuch a beaft, that
feemed to have its eyes fixed upon him, he inftantly took to his
heels, leaving the cattle to fhift for themfelves. In doing this he
had prefence o f mind enough to run through the herd, concluding
that if the lion ihould purfue, he might take up with
the firft beaft that prefented itfelf. In this, however, he was
miftaken. The lion broke through the herd, making direCtly
after the Hottentot, who, on turning round, and perceiving
that the monfter had fingled him out for a meal, breathlefs and
half dead with terror, fcrambled up one of the tree Aloes, in the
trunk of which had luckily been cut out a few fteps, the more
readily to come at fome birds’ nefts that the branches contained.
At the fame moment the lion made a fpring at him, but, miffing
his aim, fell upon the ground. In furly filence he walked round
the tree, calling every now and then a dreadful look towards the
poor Hottentot, who had crept behind fome finches’ nefts that
happened to have been built in the tree.
There is in this part o f Africa a finali bird of the Loxia
genus, that lives in a ftate of fociety with the reft o f its fpecies,
in the fame manner as the locuft-eating thruih mentioned in the
account of a former journey. Like this bird too, they conftruil
a whole republic of nefts in one clump and under one cover.
3 E , Each