29 Degrees,
To Lake Ngami In The North, And From About 24 Degrees East Long.
To Near The West Coast,
Has been called a desert simply because
it contains no running water, and very little water in wells.
It is
By no means destitute of vegetation and inhabitants,
for it is covered with grass and a great variety of creeping plants;
besides which there are large patches of bushes, and even trees.
It is remarkably flat, but interesected in different parts
by the beds of ancient rivers; and prodigious herds of certain antelopes,
which require little or no water, roam over the trackless plains.
The inhabitants, Bushmen and Bakalahari, prey on the game
and on the countless rodentia and small species of the feline race
which subsist on these. In general, the soil is light-colored soft sand,
nearly pure silica. The beds of the ancient rivers contain
much alluvial soil; and as that is baked hard by the burning sun,
rain-water stands in pools in some of them for several months in the year.
The quantity of grass which grows on this remarkable region is astonishing,
even to those who are familiar with India. It usually rises in tufts
with bare spaces between, or the intervals are occupied by creeping plants,
which, having their roots buried far beneath the soil,
feel little the effects of the scorching sun. The number of these
which have tuberous roots is very great; and their structure is intended
to supply nutriment and moisture, when, during the long droughts,
they can be obtained nowhere else. Here we have an example of a plant,
not generally tuber-bearing, becoming so under circumstances where
that appendage is necessary to act as a reservoir for preserving its life;
and the same thing occurs in Angola to a species of grape-bearing vine,
which is so furnished for the same purpose. The plant to which
I at present refer is one of the cucurbitaceae, which bears a small,
scarlet-colored, eatable cucumber. Another plant, named Leroshua,
is a blessing to the inhabitants of the Desert. We see a small plant
with linear leaves, and a stalk not thicker than a crow's quill;
on digging down a foot or eighteen inches beneath, we come to a tuber,
often as large as the head of a young child; when the rind is removed,
we find it to be a mass of cellular tissue, filled with fluid
much like that in a young turnip. Owing to the depth beneath the soil
at which it is found, it is generally deliciously cool and refreshing.
Another kind, named Mokuri, is seen in other parts of the country,
where long-continued heat parches the soil. This plant
is an herbaceous creeper, and deposits under ground a number of tubers,
some as large as a man's head, at spots in a circle a yard or more,
horizontally, from the stem. The natives strike the ground
on the circumference of the circle with stones, till, by hearing
a difference of sound, they know the water-bearing tuber to be beneath.
They then dig down a foot or so, and find it.
But the most surprising plant of the Desert is the "Kengwe or Keme"
(`Cucumis caffer'), the watermelon. In years when more than the usual
quantity of rain falls, vast tracts of the country are literally covered
with these melons; this was the case annually when the fall of rain
was greater than it is now, and the Bakwains sent trading parties every year
to the lake. It happens commonly once every ten or eleven years,
and for the last three times its occurrence has coincided with
an extraordinarily wet season. Then animals of every sort and name,
including man, rejoice in the rich supply. The elephant,
true lord of the forest, revels in this fruit, and so do
the different species of rhinoceros, although naturally so diverse
in their choice of pasture. The various kinds of antelopes feed on them
with equal avidity, and lions, hyaenas, jackals, and mice,
all seem to know and appreciate the common blessing. These melons are not,
however, all of them eatable; some are sweet, and others so bitter
that the whole are named by the Boers the "bitter watermelon".
The natives select them by striking one melon after another with a hatchet,
and applying the tongue to the gashes. They thus readily distinguish
between the bitter and sweet. The bitter are deleterious,
but the sweet are quite wholesome. This peculiarity of one species of plant
bearing both sweet and bitter fruits occurs also in a red, eatable cucumber,
often met with in the country. It is about four inches long,
and about an inch and a half in diameter. It is of a bright scarlet color
when ripe. Many are bitter, others quite sweet. Even melons in a garden
may be made bitter by a few bitter kengwe in the vicinity.
The bees convey the pollen from one to the other.
The human inhabitants of this tract of country consist of
Bushmen and Bakalahari. The former are probably the aborigines
of the southern portion of the continent, the latter the remnants of
the first emigration of Bechuanas. The Bushmen live in the Desert
from choice, the Bakalahari from compulsion, and both possess
an intense love of liberty. The Bushmen are exceptions in language, race,
habits, and appearance. They are the only real nomads in the country;
they never cultivate the soil, nor rear any domestic animal
save wretched dogs. They are so intimately acquainted
with the habits of the game that they follow them in their migrations,
and prey upon them from place to place, and thus prove
as complete a check upon their inordinate increase as the other carnivora.
The chief subsistence of the Bushmen is the flesh of game,
but that is eked out by what the women collect of roots and beans,
and fruits of the Desert. Those who inhabit the hot sandy
plains of the Desert possess generally thin, wiry forms,
capable of great exertion and of severe privations.
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