rs. Honey they relish, and for
vegetables devour bulbs and roots. Like the Hottentot, the Bushman is a
great smoker.

The disposition of the Bushman has been much maligned; the cruelty which
has been attributed to him is the natural result of equal brutalities
practiced upon him by the other natives and the early European settlers. He
is a passionate lover of freedom, and, like many other primitive people,
lives only for the moment. Unlike the Hottentot he has never willingly
become a slave, and will fight to the last for his personal liberty. He has
been described as the "anarchist of South Africa." Still, when he becomes a
servant, he is usually trustworthy. His courage is remarkable, and Fritsch
was told by residents who were well qualified to speak that supported by a
dozen Bushmen they would not be afraid of a hundred Kaffirs. The terror
inspired by the Bushmen has indeed had an effect in the deforestation of
parts of Cape Colony, for the colonists, to guard against stealthy attacks,
cut down all the bush far round their holdings. Mission-work among the
Bushmen has been singularly unsuccessful. But in spite of his savage
nature, the Bushman is intelligent. He is quick-witted, and has the gift of
imitating extraordinarily well the cries of bird and beast. He is musical,
too, and makes a rough instrument out of a gourd and one or more strings.
He is fond of dancing; besides the ordinary dances are the special dances
at certain stages of the moon, &c. One of the most interesting facts about
the Bushman is his possession of a remarkable delight in graphic
illustration; the rocks of the mountains of Cape Colony and of the
Drakensberg and the walls of caves anciently inhabited by them have many
examples of Bushman drawings of men, women, children and animals
characteristically sketched. Their designs are partly painted on rock, with
four colours, white, black, red and yellow ochre, partly engraved in soft
sandstone, partly chiselled in hard stone. Rings, crosses and other signs
drawn in blue pigment on some of the rocks, and believed to be one or two
centuries old, have given rise to the erroneous speculation that these may
be remains of a hieroglyphic writing. A discovery of drawings of men and
women with antelope heads was made in the recesses of the Drakensberg in
1873 (J.M. Orpen in _Cape Monthly Magazine_, July 1874). A few years later
Selous discovered similar rock-paintings in Mashonaland and Manicaland.

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