afety and subsistence--in short, a Hill Hottentot: impelled by hunger
and by injuries, he has committed depredations upon the property of
others until he has had a mark set upon him; his hand has been against
every man, and he has been hunted like a wild beast, and compelled to
hide himself in the caves of almost inaccessible rocks and hills.

"Thus, generation after generation, he has suffered privation and
hunger, till the race has dwindled down to the small size which it is at
present. Unable to contend against force, his only weapons have been his
cunning and his poisoned arrows, and with them he has obtained his
livelihood--or rather, it may be said, has contrived to support life,
and no more. There are, however, many races mixed up with the Bushmen;
for runaway slaves, brought from Madagascar, Malays, and even those of
the mixed white breed, when they have committed murder or other penal
crimes, have added to the race and incorporated themselves with them;
they are called the Children of the Desert, and they are literally
such."

"Have you seen much of them?"

"Yes, when I was in the Namaqua-land and in the Bechuana territory I saw
a great deal of them. I do not think that they are insensible to
kindness, and moreover, I believe that they may often be trusted; but
you run a great risk."

"Have they ever shown any gratitude?"

"Yes; when I have killed game for them, they have followed me on
purpose to show me the pools of waters without which we should have
suffered severely, if we had not perished. We were talking about lions;
it is an old-received opinion, that the jackal is the lion's provider;
it would be a more correct one to say that the lion is the Bushman's
provider."

"Indeed!"

"I once asked a Bushman, 'How do you live?' His reply was, 'I live by the
lions.' I asked him to explain to me. He said, 'I will show what I do: I
let the lions follow the game and kill it and eat till they have their
bellies full, then I go up to where the lion is sitting down by the
carcass, and I go pretty near to him; I cry out, What have you got
there, can not you spare me some of it? Go away and let me have some
meat, or I'll do you some harm. Then I dance and jump about and shake my
skin-dress, and the lion looks at me, and he turns round and walks away;
he growls very much, but he don't stay, and then I eat the rest.'"

"And is that true?"

"Yes, I believe it, as I have had it confessed by many others. The fact