The usual plan that is adopted is, to eat at once the best parts of an animal, and to cure the rest by drying it in the sun. This process is a very simple one. The meat is cut into thin, long strips, and hung on branches in the open air. The burning sunbeams soon have their effect, and convert the scarlet strips of raw meat into a substance that looks like old shoe-leather, and is nearly as tough. The mode of dressing it is, to put it under the ashes of the fire, next to pound it between two stones, and then to stew it slowly in a pot, just as is done with fresh beef. Of course, this mode of cooking meat is only employed on the march, when the soldiers are unable to take with them the cooking-pots of domestic life.
Sometimes, especially when returning from an unsuccessful war, the Kaffirs are put to great straits for want of food, and have recourse to the strangest expedients for allaying hunger. They begin by wearing a “hunger-belt,” i. e. a belt passed several times round the body, and arranged so as to press upon the stomach, and take off for a time the feeling of faint sickness that accompanies hunger before it develops into starvation. As the hours pass on, and the faintness again appears, the hunger-belt is drawn tighter and tighter. This curious remedy for hunger is to be found in many parts of the world, and has long been practised by the native tribes of North America.
The hungry soldiers, when reduced to the last straits, have been known to eat their hide-shields, and, when these were finished, to consume even the thongs which bind the head of the assagai to the shaft. The same process of cooking is employed in making the tough skin eatable; namely, partial broiling under ashes, then pounding between stones, and then stewing, or boiling, if any substitute for a cooking-pot can be found. One of the missionaries relates, in a manner that shows the elastic spirit which animated him, how he and his companions were once driven to eat a box which he had made of rhinoceros hide, and seems rather to regret the loss of so excellent a box than to demand any sympathy for the hardships which he had sustained.
We now come to the question of the liquids which a Kaffir generally consumes. Ordinary men are forced to content themselves with water, and there are occasions when they would only be too glad to obtain even water. Certain ceremonies demand that the warriors shall be fed plenteously with beef during the night, but that they shall not be allowed to drink until the dawn of the following day. At the beginning of the feast they are merry enough; for beef is always welcome to a Kaffir, and to be allowed to eat as much as he can possibly manage to accommodate is a luxury which but seldom occurs.
However, the time comes, even to a hungry Kaffir, when he cannot possibly eat any more, and he craves for something to drink. This relief is strictly prohibited, no one being allowed to leave the circle in which they are sitting. It generally happens that some of the younger “boys,” who have been but recently admitted into the company of soldiers, find themselves unable to endure such a privation, and endeavor to slip away unobserved. But a number of old and tried warriors, who have inured themselves to thirst as well as hunger, and who look with contempt on all who are less hardy than themselves, are stationed at every point of exit, and, as soon as they see the dusky form of a deserter approach the spot which they are guarding, they unceremoniously attack him with their sticks, and beat him back to his place in the circle.
On the march, if a Kaffir is hurried, and comes to a spot where there is water, he stoops down, and with his curved hand flings the water into his mouth with movements almost as rapid as those of a cat’s tongue when she laps milk. Sometimes, if he comes to a river, which he has to ford, he will contrive to slake his thirst as he proceeds, without once checking his speed. This precaution is necessary if he should be pursued, or if the river should happen to be partially infested with crocodiles and other dangerous reptiles. (See engraving [No. 2] on p. 145.)
Kaffirs are also very fond of a kind of whey, which is poured off from the milk when it is converted into “amasi,” and which is something like our buttermilk to the taste. Still, although the Kaffirs can put up with water, and like their buttermilk, they have a craving for some fermented liquor. Water and buttermilk are very well in their way; but they only serve for quenching thirst, and have nothing sociable about them. Now the Kaffir is essentially a sociable being, as has already been mentioned, and he likes nothing better than sitting in a circle of friends, talking, grinding snuff or taking it, smoking, and drinking. And, when he joins in such indulgences, he prefers that his drink should be of an intoxicating nature, therein following the usual instincts of mankind all over the world.
There are few nations who do not know how to make intoxicating drinks, and the Kaffir is not likely to be much behindhand in this respect. The only fermented drink which the genuine Kaffirs use is a kind of beer, called in the native tongue “outchualla.” Like all other savages, the Kaffirs very much prefer the stronger potations that are made by Europeans; and their love for whisky, rum, and brandy has been the means of ruining, and almost extinguishing, many a tribe—just as has been the case in Northern America. The quantity of spirituous liquid that a Kaffir can drink is really astonishing; and the strangest thing is, that he will consume nearly a bottle of the commonest and coarsest spirit, and rise at daybreak on the next morning without even a headache.
The beer which the Kaffirs make is by no means a heady liquid, and seems to have rather a fattening than an intoxicating quality. All men of note drink large quantities of beer, and the chief of a tribe rarely stirs without having a great vessel of beer at hand, together with his gourd cup and ladle. The operations of brewing are conducted entirely by the women, and are tolerably simple, much resembling the plan which is used in England. Barley is not employed for this purpose, the grain of maize or millet being substituted for it.
The grain is first encouraged to a partial sprouting by being wrapped in wet mats, and is then killed by heat, so as to make it into malt, resembling that which is used in our own country. The next process is to put it into a vessel, and let it boil for some time, and afterward to set it aside for fermentation. The Kaffir has no yeast, but employs a rather curious substitute for it, being the stem of a species of ice-plant, dried and kept ready for use. As the liquid ferments, a scum arises to the top, which is carefully removed by means of an ingenious skimmer, shown at [figs. 3 and 4], on page 155. This skimmer is very much like those wire implements used by our cooks for taking vegetables out of hot water, and is made of grass stems very neatly woven together; a number of them forming the handle, and others spreading out like the bowl of a spoon. The bowls of these skimmers are set at different angles, so as to suit the vessel in which fermentation is carried on.