An expedition of discovery into the interior of Africa; through the hitherto undescribed countries of the Great Namaquas, Boschmans, and Hill Damaras Volume 2 - Tapa blanda

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1838 edition. Excerpt: ...it from the banks of the Fish river, I was obliged to travel, first south, towards the Orange. I next went up it, and then by Griquatown, I reached the Bechuanas. In going east from this, after the mountains are passed, nothing but sand and bushes are seen; water, as 1 said before, there is none. One can get some distance to the south-east from this (though not as far as Latakoo), and find food and water. I went thus to the Nosop river (or river of the Bechuanas), a short time ago, twenty days south east of this, to shoot elephants, and I got thirty 160 TUSKLESS ELEPHANTS. pair of tusks. I passed the Kusip and the Kubakop rivers on my way to the Nosop." "What sort of a river is the Nosop?" "It is a river with plenty of bushes and a stony bed. In this the elephants had made holes with their tusks, and into these they had inserted their trunks to drink. There are plenty of elephants about the Nosop, and it took two or three men to lift some of the tusks." Many of my readers are aware that in Ceylon, where there is plenty of water and grass, most of the elephants are tuskless; whereas in South Africa, where many of the rivers are periodical, and water and grass are often scarce, almost all the elephants are provided with tusks for defence against the rhinoceros, to obtain water in the manner just described by Aramap, and to dig up the mimosas, to eat the sweet and nutricious roots. Travelling to the north-east from Niais, the first day's journey brings one to the source of the Kusip river, and the second to Awaz, or the Bean Mountain, near which is the source of the Kuisip (from which river Niais is only one day's HOT AND COLD SPRINGS. 161 journey distant), and at Awaz is one of the sources of the Swakop. The Nosop also...