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The Reawakening : Scientific Exploration   237


latter could have been killed. We_ got tired of shooting and after bagging thirty rhinoceroses in a week, left them alone. The Bushmen were in ecstasies, they dried every bit of the meat and wasted none. There were herds of elephants there but what could be done ! The country was perfectly open and without horses it would have been madness to have gone after them. They look immense beasts in the night time. We sat up in the night in little places built round with loose stones. The walls about 3 feet high, and a circle of some six feet across, close by the water and there waited for the rhinoceroses. Many were shot 8 paces off most about twelve. They very seldom drop on the spot, but as soon as wounded run about most viciously-one found out Andersson and knocked down his screen however he jumped out on the other side. They are extremely quick beasts-the largest shot was 16 feet long and about 6 feet high. I forget his girth, but it was enormous. I put a bullet clean through one, in at one side, and out at the other. It is very seldom that this happens, as the hide is so thick. Well at this place we came on the tracks of people who had reached the Lake on ride oxen, and great scoundrels they were too. The story is a long one, it is this. The year after Mr Oswell discovered the Lake, some Griquas explored a direct road to it, from the Southward and just after they had gone a party of the Kubabees (also from the South but more to the West than the Griquas) also went up the country on a plundering excursion. They reached 'Tounobis the place where we shot the rhinoceroses, and there hearing of the Griquas, they got Bushmen guides and reached their waggon tracks in four days, three days more brought them in sight of the Lake, and to the borders of a river that runs out of it to the eastward ; there they attacked a small village. The Natives (the Mationa) all had their throats cut and the cattle were driven off. Another very large village was near, so the Kubabees dared not fire, for fear of being heard, so they only cut the throats of the people in the small village, and then went quickly back. They got, I hear, some very pretty carosses and all the Bushmen assure me that the unicorn is found here. I really begin to believe in the existence of the beast, as reports of the animal have been received in many parts of Africa, frequently in the North. Anyhow the skins which were stolen were quite new to all those who saw them. The guide of the Kubabees was one of my many informants. Last rainy season another party of 4 waggons and plenty of horses went to the Lake to shoot elephant. I do not know whether they have been murdered there, or returned some other way but nothing more has been heard of them. I could not find out, whether they were Griquas or Europeans-one of the Bushmen had got one of their iron cooking pots, a broken one.-I would have pushed on with my 4 remaining Oxen that were in travelling condition, but the next stage which intervened, between where I was, and the Mationa, was said to be a still longer one than that which I had just come. It was risking too much. My time was very limited, and as it is, after my return to my waggons, I have come down at such a pace that my remaining oxen are quite unfit for the shortest journey (I was so afraid of missing the ship that I expected). The rainy season will now soon come on and in April there will be water everywhere. My remaining things I have divided in two parts, with one I have paid £100 of wages &c. to Hans (my head man) who wants to stay in the country, the other half I have given to Andersson, who has entered into partnership with Hans, to trade in cattle and ivory. Andersson has been a right good fellow and has gone through very hard work. I have


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