Page:George McCall Theal, History of South Africa from 1873 to 1884, Volume 1 (1919).djvu/74

54 History of the Cape Colony. [1877 made welcome. Usually too there is a combat between young men desirous of displaying their prowess before the company, and hard blows from keries are given and taken without loss of temper. A 3'oung man covered with welts would be disgraced by complaining, instead of doing so he puts on a smiling face and says he never had such fun in his life before. But it was very different at this marriage feast in Fingoland in August 1877. Late in the evening, when all were excited by dancing and beer drinking, a quarrel arose, no one was afterwards able to tell exactly how or why, and even the evidence as to what followed is most conflicting. At any rate the Galekas were ranged on one side and the Fingos, who greatly outnumbered them, on the other, and they used their keries so freely that one Galeka was killed and the two chiefs were badly bruised. The visitors were then driven over the border to their own kraals. Three days later four large parties of Mapasa's Galekas, who had in the meantime mustered with the intention of avenging the insult offered to their friends, crossed the little stream that formed the boundary of Fingoland, and swept off the stock belonging to several kraals along the line, consisting of one hundred and forty head of horned cattle and six hundred sheep and goats. Colonel Eustace was absent at the time, but his clerk, Mr. West Fynn, on hearing what had occurred, proceeded immediately to the border, which was only about eight miles or thirteen kilometres from the residency, and pointed out to the Galekas that they were doing wrong. Mapasa, whose retainers the raiders were, admitted that they were in fault, and promised that the captured cattle should be restored, which, however, was only partly carried into effect. As always happens in such cases, some of the animals that were seized had been slaughtered at once and eaten, others had strayed away and could not be found, and no one was willing to