Explorations in Southwest Africa Author:Thomas Baines Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CIIAFTEE III. A HOTTENTOT CHIEF—DRESS OF THE DAMARAS HAUITS OF THE HOTTENTOTS GREAT BARMEN HOT S1MUNGS JUNCTION OF THE BARUEN RIVEll WITH THE SWAKOI' TH... more »E AWASSBERG— TRADING AMONG THE HOTTENTOTS APICA's KRAAL UN- TllAINED OXEN—THE VALLEY OF THE WINDHOCK. On the 22nd of June, Mr. Hoachanas arrived with Mr. Euncie's wagon from the Bay, and persuaded me to go out to Euncie's place at Anna Wood, about twenty-five miles to the north-west, where we arrived about eleven; the same night crossing the Swa-Kop six or eight times, and halting before the house under the most magnificent anna-trees (a kind of thorn) I had seen in the country. The river, all the way from Otjimbingue, presented a broad, level, sandy bed, with banks from three to five or six feet high on each side, and hills more or less distant. There were only two or three feet water, so that boats of light draught would meet no obstruction for many miles. It is as well, perhaps, that the sudden flushes, raised at long intervals by thunder showers, do not run off, but are absorbed and protected from evaporation by the sandy bed. At Anna Wood 1 am told the water is always at the 18G1.] A HOTTENTOT CHIEF. 43 surface, and certainly the gigantic thorns must require a watered locality in which to flourish. Being obliged to return to Otjimbingue on the 24th, I spent the morning of Sunday in sketching Mr. Runcie's house and the noble trees that overshadowed it. Some of them were, I suppose, 90 feet high, and 6 ft. or 7 ft. in diameter at the base. They seemed to be a kind of acacia, the leaves being similar, and the flowers hanging in catkins rather than golden balls like the mimosa. The wood is light, easily worked even while wet, and very flexible until dried. It is said that there are no worms in the living...« less