"The messenger sent in haste is always forced
to spend the night on the way by the abundance of food you place before him."
The Bayeiye live much on fish, which is quite an abomination
to the Bechuanas of the south; and they catch them in large numbers
by means of nets made of the fine, strong fibres of the hibiscus,
which grows abundantly in all moist places. Their float-ropes
are made of the ife, or, as it is now called, the `Sanseviere Angolensis',
a flag-looking plant, having a very strong fibre, that abounds
from Kolobeng to Angola; and the floats themselves are pieces of a water-plant
containing valves at each joint, which retain the air in cells
about an inch long. The mode of knotting the nets is identical with our own.
They also spear the fish with javelins having a light handle,
which readily floats on the surface. They show great dexterity
in harpooning the hippopotamus; and, the barbed blade of the spear
being attached to a rope made of the young leaves of the palmyra,
the animal can not rid himself of the canoe, attached to him in whale fashion,
except by smashing it, which he not unfrequently does
by his teeth or by a stroke of his hind foot.
On returning to the Bakurutse, we found that their canoes for fishing
were simply large bundles of reeds tied together.
