THE BUSHMEN.


[Illustration: Letter T.]

The Bosjesmans, or Bushmen, appear to be the remains of Hottentot
hordes, who have been driven, by the gradual encroachments of the
European colonists, to seek for refuge among the inaccessible rocks and
sterile desert of the interior of Africa. Most of the hordes known in
the colony by the name of Bushmen are now entirely destitute of flocks
or herds, and subsist partly by the chase, partly on the wild roots of
the wilderness, and in times of scarcity on reptiles, grasshoppers, and
the larvae of ants, or by plundering their hereditary foes and
oppressors, the frontier Boers. In seasons when every green herb is
devoured by swarms of locusts, and when the wild game in consequence
desert the pastures of the wilderness, the Bushman finds a resource in
the very calamity which would overwhelm an agricultural or civilized
community. He lives by devouring the devourers; he subsists for weeks
and months on locusts alone, and also preserves a stock of this food
dried, as we do herrings or pilchards, for future consumption.

The Bushman retains the ancient arms of the Hottentot race, namely, a
javelin or assagai, similar to that of the Caffres, and a bow and
arrows. The latter, which are his principal weapons both for war and the
chase, are small in size and formed of slight materials; but, owing to
the deadly poison with which the arrows are imbued, and the dexterity
with which they are launched, they are missiles truly formidable. One of
these arrows, formed merely of a piece of slender reed tipped with bone
or iron, is sufficient to destroy the most powerful animal. But,