The whites of the party were much interested in observing the habits and customs of the simple people among whom they had strayed. None of the Bechuanas appeared to have the slightest wish to go away from the place they had chosen for a permanent home. To them it afforded tranquillity, and that was all that could be said of it, for it afforded little besides. That was all they required. Not one of them seemed afflicted with ordinary human desires. They had no ambition, no curiosity, no love of wealth,—none of those wants that render wretched the lives of civilised people.
A place less suited for the abode of men could scarce have been found, or even imagined. The soil was sterile, unproductive, and rarely visited by game worthy of being hunted. The few roots and other articles of food they were enabled to raise, furnished but a precarious subsistence.
So limited was their supply of ordinary utensils, that even the most trifling article was in their eyes valuable, and anything given them by their guests was received with a gratitude scarce conceivable. They had discovered the art of living in peace and happiness, and were making the most of the discovery.
From what they were told by the villagers, our travellers could not expect to get out of the karroo in less than two days, and no water could be obtained along the route. But, as their cattle were now well rested, they were not so apprehensive, and after a friendly leave-taking with the Bechuanas, they once more continued their journey.
The trouble they had given to their simple hosts was remunerated without much cost. A glass bottle that had once contained “Cape Smoke,” was thought by the latter to be of greater value than a gun; and, taking their circumstances into account, they were perhaps not far astray in their estimate.
Chapter Forty Nine.
Scenes seldom visited.
Knowing that the longer they should be in reaching the next watering-place the weaker their cattle would become, our travellers strove to perform more than half the distance in less than half the time. On their first day’s journey after leaving the kraal, they went about twenty-five miles; but on starting the next day they saw that not more than half that distance was likely to be accomplished, and that their principal work would consist in plying the jamboks.