Jock Of The Bushveld by Sir Percy Fitzpatrick (Chapter 20)( Page 3 ) Jantje

There were numbers of little squirrel-like creatures there too.  Our fellows used to call them ground-squirrels and "tree-rats"; because they live underground, yet climb trees readily in search of food; they were little fellows like meerkats, with bushy tails ringed in brown, black and white, of which the waggon-boys made decorations for their slouch hats. Jock wanted a go at them: they did not appear quite so much beneath notice as the birds. Along the water's edge one came on the lagavaans, huge repulsive water-lizards three to four feet long, like crocodiles in miniature, sunning themselves in some favourite spot in the margin of the reeds or on the edge of the bank; they give one the jumps by the suddenness of their rush through the reeds and plunge into deep water. There were otters too, big black-brown fierce fellows, to be seen swimming silently close under the banks.  I got a couple of them, but was  lways nervous of letting Jock into the water after things, as one never knew where the crocodile lurked.  He got an ugly bite from one old dog-otter which I shot in shallow water; and, mortally wounded as he was, the otter put up a rare good fight before Jock finally hauled him out. Then there were the cane-rats, considered by some most excellent and delicate of meats, as big and tender as small sucking-pigs.  The cane-rat, living and dead, I was one of the stock surprises, and the subject of jokes and tricks upon the unsuspecting: there seems to be no sort of ground for associating the extraordinary fat thing, gliding among the reeds or swimming silently under the banks, with either its live capacity of rat or its more attractive dead _role_ of roast sucking-pig. The hardened ones enjoyed setting this treat before the hungry and unsuspecting, and, after a hearty meal, announcing--"That was roast rat: good, isn't it?"  The memory of one experience gives me water in the gills now!  It was unpleasant, but not equal to the nausea and upheaval which supervened when, after a very savoury stew of delicate white meat, we were shown the fresh skin of a monkey hanging from the end of the buck-rails, with the head drooping forward, eyes closed, arms dangling lifeless, and limp open hands--a ghastly caricature of some hanged human, shrivelled and shrunk within its clothes of skin.  I felt like a cannibal. The water tortoises in the silent pools, grotesque muddy fellows, were full of interest to the quiet watcher, and better that way than as the "turtle soup" which once or twice we ventured on and tried to think was good! There were certain hours of the day when it was more pleasant and profitable to lie in the shade and rest.  It is the time of rest for the Bushveld--that spell about middle-day; and yet if one remains quiet, there is generally something to see and something worth watching.  There were the insects on the ground about one which would not otherwise be seen at all; there were caterpillars clad in spiky armour made of tiny fragments of grass--fair defence no doubt against some enemies and a most marvellous disguise; other caterpillars clad in bark, impossible to detect until they moved; there were grasshoppers like leaves, and irregularly shaped stick insects, with legs as bulky as the body, and all jointed by knots like irregular twigs--wonderful mimetic creatures. Jock often found these things for me.  Something would move and interest him; and when I saw him stand up and examine a thing at his feet, turning it over with his nose or giving it a scrape with his paw, it was usually worth joining in the inspection.  The Hottentot-gods always attracted him as they reared up and `prayed' before him; quaint things, with tiny heads and thin necks and enormous eyes, that sat up with fore legs raised to pray, as a pet dog sits up and begs.