1775. tunate beggars, they are likewife exceedingly unreafonable tbeir dealings, as when they make their payments, they are very apt to aik for a handfome prefent into the bargain. Both the Gonaquas and CafFres differ from other Hottentots in this .particular, that they make ufe of circum- cifion. This operation is performed on youths of different ages, as they are accuftomed to wait till they can perform it on feveral at a time. The Gonaquas women make ufe of almoft the fame kind o f apron or veil as the Hottentot females do. The men are much more naked and lefs covered about this part than the males among the Hottentots, inaimuch as they cover with a little cap, or cafe, made of the ikin o f an animal, the extremities only o f what modefty ihould teach them to conceal entirely. This, flasket, refem'bling the extremity o f the thumb of a glove, is fometimes faftened with.a fmall thong, or the finew o f an animal, to fome firings o f beads or leathern belts, which they wear for ornament’s fake round their waifts. Some individuals are feen with lions or buffaloes tails hanging on thefe fame belts, as trophies o f their courage in having killed thefe beafts. By reafon of the nakednefs of thefe people, o f which I have juft been giving a defcription, .it may be thought that they have as little modefty as covering : but the fail is, that very 'few of them could be induced, even by preients, to take off their little cafes, in confequence of my wiih to be perfe<ftly convinced that they were circuracifed. Indeed, I have been told by a farmer, that in Cafferland one does not unfrequently fee even, grown :up gMs without any covering vering whatfoever; and that in certain dances, it confti- De'c^ er. tutes part o f the folemnity for the youths of both fexes to make fuch oblations to love in the prefence o f every one, as by the laws o f decency and of civilized nations, are con- lidered as facred to the married ftate alone. The Caffres feemed to me to referable very much in appearance the Mofambique flaves, whom I had feen at the Cape; and, perhaps, thefe nations border upon eachothei; the former being probably defcended from the latter, or the latter from the former. The Gonaquas Hottentots, who at this time .paid their refpedls to me, came chiefly with an intent to beg tobacco. They were all of them armed with one or more o f the javelins, which they call hajjagais, (vide Plate II. Vol. I. Fig. i , a.) as well as with ihort flicks, to which they gave the name o f kiffis. With one of thefe I faw a lad very nearly hit a fparrow-hawk in its flight. But they took fo bad an aim, when they threw their javelins, that, though they tried very often, they could not hit a handkerchief which I had fet up between two flicks, at the diftance of twenty paces, by way o f mark for them, and at the fame time as a prize for him that ihould hit it. This want o f dexterity, certainly proceeded from their having negledted to praftife, as they lived too far from the Boihies-men Hottentots, and Caffres, and too near to the Chriftians, to be able to ex- ercife any hoftilities againft the former, or to dare to do it 'againft the latter. In the mean time they were very bufy in examining narrowly each others'javelins, and in feeling for their proper balance. They threw them, however, with a great deal of force; and, as I have been told by feveral V o l . II. C • people,
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