and he told them to lie down, and he struck them with his stick, and as he struck each the body of a person came out, and the skin of a snake was left on the ground, and he sprinkled the skins with canna, and the snakes turned from being snakes, and they became his people.
The big people you have seen painted with deformities are the Qobe—they carried battle-axes, and are so drawn, they were cannibals, they cut people’s heads off, they killed women and drew the blood out of their noses. Cagn sent Cogaz to their residence to deliver a woman from them, and he lent him his tooth. His toothache had told him to send Cogaz. Cogaz went, and when he was coming back Cagn saw the dust, and sent the little bird that flies up and says tee-tee, called moti in Sesuto, and qouka in Bushman language, but it told nothing; then he sent another bird, the tinktinki, or tintinyane,—qinqininyq in Bushman,—and it brought no news. Then he sent a third, the qeiv, a black and white bird that sings in the early morning, called tsqanafike in Sesuto; and he rubbed canna on its beak, and it flew to the dust and brought back word that the giants were coming. The giants attacked Cogaz several times but he used to get upon the tooth of Cagn and it grew up to a great height, and they could not reach him. He used to cook his food up there, and then he used to play on his reed flute, and this put them to sleep; and he would go on, and they would wake up, follow him, and he would get up on the tooth again. At last, when they continued attacking him, he killed some of them with poisoned arrows, and Cagn said he would not have these people, but drive them far off and kill them as they were cannibals, and he cut up his kaross and sandals and turned them into dogs and wild dogs and set them at the Qobe giants and destroyed them.
Qwanciqutshaa, the chief, used to live alone. He had no wife, for the women would not have him. A man sent a number of little boys to get sticks for the women to dig ants’ eggs. One of the women grumbled, saying the stick she received was crooked and those of the others were straight. That night she dreamed that a baboon came to take for his wife a young girl who had refused Qwanciqutshaa. Next day, as she was digging
