CHAPTER VI.

The Bechuanaland Settlement.

"THE original possessors of the soil of South Africa were not the dark-skinned people, the Bantu, whom we have been led by unhappy associations to regard as the “ natives,” but a yellow-skinned race, differing in little but their woolly hair from the Chinese and the Malays. At the time of Van Riebeck’s expedi­tion—in 1652—they had already deeply degraded in the scale of civilisation. To-day their descendants, the 50,000 or 60,000 Hottentots, Bushmen, Namaquas and Korannas, have no political or social importance.

With the dark-skinned race, the Bantu, who occupied the southern extremity of Africa contemporaneously with the Europeans, the case is very different. They out­number the Europeans in the proportion of six to one; and they have plainly signified their intention of sharing the country with them.

Hitherto we have been mainly concerned with the warlike tribes of this family, the Kafirs, the Zulus, and the Matabele Zulus; we have now to consider the re­lations of the Europeans with one of the peaceable tribes, the Bechuanas.

The distribution of the military and industrial Bantu is significant. The military Bantu are found in possession of the most fertile regions. They are found between the Drakensberg mountains and the Indian Ocean, and in the fertile districts to the north-west—the Zoutpans- berg—and to the south of the range—Kaffraria. The

99