to the right and left are others more or “akl”-intellect, synonymous with less dilapidated, and the east point of knavery-did nothing but beg our the town is occupied by a small custom- guns and revolvers. His son would house painfully whitewashed. The have been contented with a little wind-blackened sun-burnt huts stand cloth, powder, and a gold chronofar beyond the enceinte, and outside meter. “Yabir,” a chief so powerthis suburb, the country-it served ful, that men spoke his name in an for skirmishing - ground during the undertone, almost merited, and narwars—is a bushy plantation of coco rowly escaped, being led out of the and fruit trees. On the mainland, room by his ears. The very Hindus separated by a pure blue channel, required a lesson in civility. With verdure and orchards face the town. the Wali or Governor, Khalfan bin Mombas is, as far as Nature made Ali, an Omani Arab of noble family, her, pleasing and picturesque.

we were on the best of terus. But The climate of this islet is hotter the manifest animus of the public and healthier than Zanzibar. The made us feel light-hearted, when, our people suffer a little from the fever, inquiries concluded, we bade adieu which renders it so dangerous for us. to Mombas. The endemic complaint is an ulcer Leaving orders with Lakhmidan, upon the legs, and parts most distant the Banyan collector of customs, to from the seat of circulation. As in land and lodge our cockroach-gnawed Yemen and in the Hejaz, here the aggage, and directing Said bin Saleast scratch becomes an ugly wound. lim, supported by our two Portuguese The cause may be sought in that servants and his three slaves, to procachectic and scorbutic habit induced tect it, Captain S and I set out by the want of vegetables, and by on the morning after our arrival to brackish water. The pure element visit the Rev. Mr Rebmann of the is indeed to be found in the old Mombas mission at Kisulodiny, his wells beyond the town, and on the station. Before the sun had power mainland ; the citizens, however, to to destroy the dewy freshness of save trouble, prefer the nearer pits, dawn, we slowly punted up the riverwhere water penetrates through briny like creek bounding the islet eastcoralline.

ward, and in our heavy “dow'-here The population, including a Beloch all small craft are so called-manned garrison rated at 300 men, may by two men and a boy, we justified amount to 8000 souls; of these there stern Omar's base comparison for are 25 or 30 Indian Moslems, and those who tempt the sea, worms nearly 50 Bhattias. We found unex- floating upon a log.” Whilst roundpectedly--the Mombas mission was ing the islet, our attention well received-by no means friendly attracted by groups of marketinclinations. Small communities are people, who called to be ferried rarely remarkable for amiability or

The acknowledgment on our morality. These people are taxed by crew's part was an African modificaother Arabs with overweening pride, tion of Marlow Bridge and its infainsolence of manner, bigotry and evil- mous pie. Sundry small settlements, speaking, turbulence and treachery. bosomed in trees and bush mixed Their habits of pilfering are in- with brabs, cocos, and the W-shaped veterate ; few travellers have failed toddy, appeared upon each“ adverse to miss some valuable. All seemed strand.” After a two miles' progress, to regard us as rivals and enemies. lame as the march of African civiliThey devoted energy to the task of sation, appeared Port Tudor, a saltspoiling us, and, that failing, they water lagoon north of and behind tried insolence. I was obliged on one Mombas. Its broad surface, broken occasion to administer, sword in only by the Rock of Rats, and hedged hand, the descent down-stairs. The on both sides by the water-loving terrors of the interior and the expense mangrove, prolongs itself in two riverof travelling were studiously exag- like arms towards the interior, till gerated. Tangai the Jemadar, å stopped by high ground. Such in quaint old Mekrani, who, unable to nature is the original of the “Tuaca, read or write, was renowned for or Nash,” with which our mappers

was

enliven dull tracts of desert. Here, though unfruitful trees,” of the old like the “Great Quiloa River," á Portuguese navigator, supply the salt-water inlet, receiving in the dry well-known Zanzibar rafters. Various season a slender runnel, and during lichens, especially the orchilla, grow rain the surface-drainage of a sea

upon the fork.

Here and there ward slope, becomes a noble black towered a nodding coco, a silk-cotton streak, dispensing the blessings of tree, or the “ Phun," with noble shaft commerce and civilisation through- and' canopied head of green, glinted out three inches of white paper. through by golden beams. White

As we advanced up the “Water of and brown fish-hawks soared high in Rabai,” the sea-arus shrank and the ether ; lower down, bright fly-catchscenery brightened. A broken blue ers hunted in concert the yellow butline of well-wooded hills—the Rabai terflies rashly travelling from bank Range-formed the background. On

to bank;

doves cooed in the thicker the nearer slopes westward were the foliage ; snowy paddy-birds perched beginnings of plantations; knots of upon the topmost tree-boughs, and peasants' huts hove successively in over the shoal-water lining the sides ; sight, and pale smoke, showing that the small grey kingfisher poised himthe land is being prepared for ap- self with twinkling wings; while proaching showers, curled high from sober-coated curlews and sand-pipers field and fell. Above was the nor- took little runs, and stopped to peck mal mottled sky of the rainy zone, into the dark vegetable mud. fleecy mists, opal-tinted, floating After ten miles of alternate rowing, upon azure depths; and from the sailing, and pulling through pelting western horizon a purple nimbus rain and potent sun, we reached moved majestically against the wind. about mid-day the landing-place, a Below, the water caught various and tree projecting from the right bank varying reflections of the firmament ; over the mud graves of many defunct in places it was smooth as glass, and mangroves. Our boat, stripped of sail, sometimes dimpled by the zephyrs oars, and rudder, to secure her prethat found a way through the hill- sence next morning, was made fast gaps, and merrily danced over the to a stump, and we proceeded to glistening floor. Here little fishes, breast the hills. A footpath led us pursued by some tyrant of the waters, over rolling ground sliced by the played duck-and-drake

upon the sur- heavy rains, thickly grown with tall face; there larger kinds, skate-shaped, coarse grass, sun-scorched to a sickly sprang nineteen or twenty feet into tawny brown, and thinly sprinkled the air, glittering like plates of silver with thorny acacias. After a mile in the sun. On both sides the view was we began the ascent of the Rabai bounded by veritable forests of the Range. Rising behind the coralline sea. The white and the red man- of the coast, this ridge of yellow or rugrove on firmer ground rose unsup- fous sandstone and red ochreish clay, ported; on the water's edge they varying in height from 700 to 1200 were propped like miniature banyan- feet, fringes the line from Melinde to trees by succulent offsets of luscious the Pangany river. The hills rise abpurple and emerald green, so in- ruptly seaward, and fall inland with tricate that the eye would vainly un- somewhat gentler slope, thus ravel the web of root and trunk, of forming a mere ridge, not, as such branch and shoot. The parasitical maritime ranges usually are, the oyster clustered to the portions de- rampart of an interior plateau. This nuded by the receding tide, whilst unusual disposition may have led to the brown newt and the rainbow the opinion that inland the country crab with single claw plunged into falls to or below sea-level.* The their little hiding-holes, or ran chine is broken by deep ravines, amongst the harrow-work of roots which, after rains, pour torrents to and upshoots binding the black mass the ocean. Despite the blighting saltof ooze. These “green and superb, breeze, aricas and cocos, mangoes

a

As instruments were not used by those who formed the opinion, it is still a disputed point.

а

and custard-apples, the guava and the cool refreshing evening, which, the castor plant, the feathery cassava unlike Zanzibar, here follows and the broad-leaved papaw and shower. The servants, most grotesque plantain, flourish upon its flanks; and in garb and form, collected to stare in the patches of black forests spared at the new white men ; and those hillby the wild woodman, the copal and savages who were brave enough to the Invule, a majestic timber-tree, still enter a house — your true African linger. The ascent of the hills was has a lively horror of stone wallsshort but sharp, and the way, stalked about, and stopped occasioncheckered with boulders, wound at ally to relieve their minds by begging times under clumps of palms and snuff or cloth. Considering the ingrateful shade. On the summit ap- tense desire of civilisation to know peared the straggling, huts of the something of man in his state of savages, pent-housed sheds of dried nature, I proceed, with the aid of fronds, surrounded by sparse culti- Mr Rebmann, who during nine years vation, lean cattle, and vegetation has made a conscientious study of drooping for want of rain. Amid these races, and who imparted it cries of“ Yambo ?” especially from with the greatest courtesy, to sketch that part of the sable community the two typical tribes. termed by prescriptive right the fair, The people of Eastern Intertropical and the screams of children, we pur- Africa are divided by their occupasued our road over seaward ridge and tions into three orders. First is the dell : at the end of a five-mile walk fierce pastoral nomade, the

Galla and we entered the mission-house, intro- Masai, the Somal and the Kafir, who duced ourselves to the inmates, and lives upon the produce of his cattle, received the most hospitable welcome. the chase, and the foray. He is the

The Kisulodiny mission - house constant terror of the neighbouring struck us as a miracle of industry races. Secondly rank the semi-pasin these lands. Begun in 1850 by toral, as the Wakamba, who, though Messrs Rebmann and Erhardt, it without fixed abodes, make their was finished after about two years. women cultivate the ground. They The form is in three sides of a hol- occasionally indulge in raids and low square, completed with a railing feuds. And the last degree of civilto keep poultry from vagrancy, and isation, agriculture, is peculiar to a flat roof is ascended by an external the Wanika, the Wasumbara, and ladder : the material is sandstone the various tribes living between the plastered with clay and whitewashed; coast and the interior lakes. This mangrove rafters form the ceiling, third order is peaceful with strangers, and Invule-planks the doors and but thievish, and fond of intestiné shutters. It has its inconveniences, strife. being distant from that source of all The Wanika * or Desert race is comfort, the well, and beplagued composed of a Negritic base, now with ants. The little red wretches intimately mixed with Semitic blood. are ubiquitous by day, overrunning of old Mulattoes, the antiquity, of the clothes, nestling in the hair, and these East African families has exploring nose and ears, and, never enabled them to throw off the varesting by night, compel the inmates riety and irregularity of half-castes. to sleep with pans full of water sup- Receiving for ages distinct impresses porting the bed-legs. We enjoyed of physical agents, they have settled

* There is no reason to seek this name in the “ Toniki Emporion" of the Periplus : here every wilderness is called “Nika." The principiative or prefix M denotes in this group of dialects the individual; its plural Wa, the population; U or N, the country; and Ki the language or other accident. Thus Nika is the wild-land, Mpika the wild-lander, Wanika the wild-land folk, and Kinika the wild-land tongue. To this general rule there are many exceptions. Some races, like the Rabai and Toruma, do not prefix Wa to the name. The people of Chhaga, as I have mentioned, term themselves Wakirima. On the other hand, the Masai collectively should be called Wamasai. In these pages the popular Moslem corruption has been preserved.

VOL. LXXXIIL-NO, DVIII.

down into several and uniform na- dence the savage. Nothing is more tional types. Many considerations remarkable in the women than the argue them rather a degeneracy from contrast between face and form. civilised man, than a people advanc- Upon the lower limbs, especially the ing towards improveinent; and lin- haunches, of the Medícian Venus, a guistic reasons induce belief in the hideous wrinkled face meets the disconsanguinity of all the African races appointed eye. south of the equator, and an ancient The Wanika are a curious study of subjection to the great Ethiopian or rudimental mind. In some points a Kushite empire. The historian of nation of semi-naturals, all with them these lands, however, has to grope is confusion. To the incapacity of through the shades of the past, guided childhood they unite the hard-headedonly by the power to avail himself of ness of age. With the germs of the the dimmest present lights.

ideas that belong to a Bacon or a Physiologically, the Wanika are Shakespeare, they combine incapabinot an inferior African race. The lity of developing them. Their relifeatures are Negritic only from the gion is that of gentily worshipping eyes downwards. Like the Galla and nothing,” yet feeling instinctively the Somal, the skull is pyramido something above them--a Fetiss-sysoval, flattened at the moral region of tem of demonolatry, and the ghostthe phrenologist, and compressed at faith common to Africans ; in fact, the sides. The face is somewhat the vain terrors of our childhood broad and plane, with highly-devel- rudely systematised. Thus they have oped zygomata ; the brow is moder- neither god nor devil, nor heaven ately conical, high and broad ; the nor hell, nor soul nor idol. orbits wide and distant; the nose lungu,” the word applied, like the depressed with patulated nostrils; Kafir Uhlunga, to the Supreme, also the lips bordés, fleshy and swelling i denotes any good or evil revenant. the jaw prognathous, and the beard They offer sheep, goats, poultry, and scant. The Mnika's hair, which palm-wine upon the tombs of their grows long and wiry, is shaved off ancestors,* but they cannot comprethe forehead from ear to ear, and hend a futurity. They fear the hangs down in the thinnest of cork- Koma or Evestrum : etymologically screws, stiffened with fat. His com- it means one departed;"— but they plexion is chocolate - brown, seldom say of the dead, Yuzi sira—“he is black, unless the mother be a slave finished.” Thus believing. with our from the south. The skin is soft, but philosophers, the Koma to be a subthe effluvium truly African. His jective, not an objective existence, figure is, like his features, Semitic ghost craft is still the only article of above and Negritic below. The head their idiotic creed. All their diseases is well seated upon broad shoulders ; arise from possession. They have evil the chest is ample; the stomach, ex- ghosts, and haunters of both faiths cept in early boyhood or age, does —the Mulungu is the Pagan's, the not protrude, and there is little stea- Phaypo is the Moslem's departed spitopyga. But the lean calf is placed rit. Their rites are intended either high, the shank bows forward, and to avert evils from themselves, or to the foot is large, flat, and “lark- cast them upon others, and the priheeled.” The gait-no two natives mal cause of their sacrifices is the walk exactly alike-is half-stride, Mganga or medicine-man's self-intehalf-lounge ; and the favourite stand- rest. When the critical moment has ing position is crow - legged. Eyes arrived, the ghost is adjured to come wild and staring, abrupt gestures, forth from the possessed ; and he harsh, loud, and barking voices, evi- names some article in which, if worn

a

round the neck or limbs, he will re- For a whole week the relations of the side without annoyance to the wearer. deceased must abstain from business, This idea lies at the bottom of many however urgent, and, under pain of practices. It is the object of the insult and a heavy fine, ruin themleopard's claw, the strings of white, selves by killing cattle and broaching black, and blue beads worn over the palm-wine for the community. At shoulder, and called Mudugu ga mu- these times also there is a laxity of lungu, (ghost-beads), and the rags manners which recalls to mind the taken from the sick man's body, and abominations of the classical Adonia. nailed to what Europeans call the The characteristic of their customs “Devil's tree"-termed technically a is the division of both sexes, with kehi, or chair. This article is pre- initiatory rites resembling masonic ferred by the ghost or demon to the degrees. The orders are three in patient, and thus, by mutual agree number*—Nyere, the young; Khamment, both are happy. Some people, bi, the middle-aged; and Alfaya, the especially women, are haunted by a old. Each has its different initiadozen revenants, each of which has tion and ceremonies, the principal of his peculiar charm and name. One which is, that the junior must purof them is ridiculously enough called chase promotion from the senior orBarakat-in Arabic, a blessing: der. Once about every twenty years

It has not suited the Moslem's pur- happens the great festival Unyaro, at pose to proselytise the Wanika, who which the middle-aged degree is condoubtless would have adopted the ferred upon men from thirty down saving faith like their brethren the to years of childhood. The candiSomal. As it is, the Toruma clan has dates retire to the woods for a fortbeen partly converted, and many of night, during the first half claying the heathen fast like Mohammedans, themselves with white, during the feeling themselves raised in the scale second with red earth. On this ocof creation by doing something. Their casion a slave is sacrificed, and the ceremonies are the simple contri- ceremony is performed with a numvances of savage priestcraft. Births ber of mysterious rites concerning are not celebrated, and the new-born which I could learn nothing. This infant is strangled if weakly or de- year the Unyaro was to occur; the formed. Children become the mo- arrival of the Masai prevented the ther's, or rather her brother's por- rite. When all the Khambi have perty, to be disposed of as he pleases. been raised to the highest order, Circumcision, partially practised by Mfaya, these, formerly the elders, the gentile throughout East Africa return literally to a second childhood. from Egypt to the Cape, is a semi- They are once more Nyere (old boys), religious act, performed once every and there is no future promotion for five or six years upon the youths en them. After the bloody sacrifice and masse, and accompanied by the usual the coatings of clay, these orders eating and drinking, drumming and are mainly distinguished by their dancing. A man may marry any religious utensils : for instance, the number of wives; the genial rite-no Miansa, or huge drum, a goat-skin tie, however, to these fickle souls—is stretched upon a hollowed tree-trunk, celebrated by jollifications, and broken six feet long, whose hollow prolonged at leisure. The principal festivities, sounds, heard at night from the depths if they can be so called, are at fune- of distant hills, resemble a melancholy rals. The object is, as the people say, moan, is peculiar to the third degree, Ussa kiwewe, to “ break the fear” of or elders. It is brought during dark death-an event which, savage-like, to the Kaya, that the junior orders they regard with inexpressible horror. may not look upon it. Similarly,

a

* Traces of this threefold organisation, founded as it is upon nature's laws, may be found in many communities of the negro and negroid race. The Kru republic, for instance, which flourishes in pure democracy close to the Ashanti and Dahomey despotisms, divides its members into three classes, the Kedibo, or juveniles; the Sedibo, or soldiers (adults); and the Guekbade, elders and censors. A fee is also paid for entering the different orders.