110 CIIIKORONGO-ONKOMPE. [CIHAP, Vt.
rain-makers were in great request in Ovampoland, and that a tribe of them lived by the great river that bounded it to the north, and that Nangoro sent a woman with several presents to these people. If rain was scarce in any year they killed and eat the woman, and had a fresh one sent to them. He also said that the Bushmen on our road to Nangoro's were very ferocious, and that he and his companions Lad been fighting with them as they came by, and that now they were more exasperated than ever. These were the only two lies that I have ever heard from an Ovampo. The second was natural enough; as to the first I cannot yet understand why he took such pains to invent and tell it.
Chikorongo-onkompf, or " Chik," as I will for brevity's sake call him, spoke Damara language perfectly, but with an accent, and so did Katondoka and Netjo, the next in command, but the others could barely make themselves intelligible. Their own language is most musical and liquid, and they speak it in a slow singing manner. It seems nothing but L's, which is curious, as the Damaras do not possess that letter and cannot pronounce it. It is odd enough that Damara children, who say L as all other children do when they try to pronounce R, should as they grow older reverse matters, and forgetting how to pronounce the L, always say R instead of it; thus Mr. Kolbe's name was changed to Korube; my man, whom we nicknamed Bill, was called by the Damaras " Biro." They took infinite pains to master my name, which after various transformations settled into Bortonio-the "io" being an affectionately diminutive affix. Andersson's name was too full of consonants for them; they gave it up in despair, and called him Kabandera (the bird-killer). Many of the Ovampo and Damara words are much alike; thus if you say "bring fire" it is "et omuriro" in Damara, "ella omuliloo" in Ovampo.
The Ovampo way of encamping is very characteristic, for they do not sleep by the side of a large burning log of wood, but instead of that go to great pains in collecting stones about the size of bricks, and make two or three rows of small fires, perhaps five in each row, placing the stones round each of them in a rude circle of two feet diameter; so as to confine the ashes and keep the brands from falling about; then they lie down and go to sleep between the fire-places. They arrange these encampments with great regularity, and the plan of them is certainly a good one in countries where there may be a sufficiency of dry sticks and brush, but no large firewood ; for by keeping up the fires
