The Protector, Mr. Moorhouse, and me again had a long and lively conversation today about the claims of the natives and the hopes that could be said in relation to them, especially the old ones among them. The fact that he doesn't see or doesn't want to see the just claims of the natives is an old thing to me, but he had never expressed his desperation for their formation into useful people so clearly as he did today, when he said that if he were now asked whether one could hope that the old native inhabitants could become useful (available), he would definitely say no. I replied, whether that was seriously his belief? and when he repeated it, I asked him the question: "Why would one need a protector and what use could one have?" He meant: "to protect them from insults." I replied that the police could do that just as well. "But this," he said, "was hostile to the natives." Me: "With this view, his police would just be a protective police force."
In the course of the conversation we agreed that I would attempt to teach the native children on condition that they were given something to eat.
December 17th, 1839.
Today I visited my dear Bertha again and not only enjoyed a wonderful evening with her, but also had the pleasantly surprising experience that she laid a good foundation in the grammar of the German language when [she] was in Köpenick
December 18th, 1839.
This evening the natives had wanted to fight each other again by our people visiting the Eastern men in their camp, but the latter had held the offended and angry men among them so that it didn't come to that. In the evening with Julius Drescher.
[An intricate cross, in the shape of a paw cross, is included here, presumably as a sign of a day to "mark red on the calendar" as the first payment of a £100 bill of exchange had arrived today (December 19th).]
(Abb. 02)