of inhabited places and is shunned as poisonous. Still more dreaded on
account of their sting are the various species of _Buthus_, or scorpion,
which likewise exhibit a special preference for human habitations. The
big black scorpion, however, as long as a man’s hand, which is found on
the coast, does not seem to appear in Bornu. Many varieties of the
spider proper are forthcoming and are distinguished by their remarkable
form and often also by their gorgeous colouring. One species with
bluish-grey and golden-yellow markings and as large as a fingerbowl
builds huge webs with strong yellow threads amongst the undergrowth.
Amongst the mites, there is a tick, _Ixodes_, which makes itself very
noticeable as a most troublesome form of vermin; they swarm in
innumerable quantities on the grass of the roads and ‘bush’ paths and
appear even to outlast the burning of the grass in the dry weather by
slipping into cracks in the soil. Cattle and sheep are often thickly
covered with them and on this account are apt to waste away from the
loss of blood caused by them. Apparently the vermin mentioned by Barth
under the name of ‘Kari’ is something similar to such a tick.[340]
The little that is known or published about the ‘Crustaceae’ of Bornu
leaves us in ignorance of some pretty considerable species;[341] still
the Chad and its affluents have certainly a great abundance of
interesting varieties to show.
The few varieties of molluscs[342] which are known in Bornu furnish a
surprising amount of information. While among the land-snails the
handsome _Achatinae_, which are found everywhere in tropical Africa,
predominate both in number and size, there are varieties of molluscs in
Chad and its affluents which more than any other creatures confirm the
theory set forth by Professor Dr. O. Boettger, in _Nachbl. der deutsch.
Mal.-Ges._, 1905, p. 25,[343] ‘that in very early geological times the
Chad district, which has now no effluent, was in connexion with the Nile
water-system’. There are a large number of mussels also, whose shells
cover certain spots on the banks of Chad with a stratum of the same
kind; these spots were formerly under the water of the lake and appear
likewise to confirm Boettger’s assertions.[344]
Among the worms the big earth-worms of Southern Bornu, which are also
found in Adamawa, deserve mention; their excrement forms little piles of
considerable size which are a characteristic phenomenon of the ‘bush’
there.[345] Of parasitic worms there is the well-named Guinea-worm,
_Filaria medinensis_, by far the best known and apparently the commonest
variety.[346]
Information as to the water animalculae of Bornu is practically non-
existent, although this would perhaps be a point of cardinal importance
for the geologist. There still remains a wide and fruitful field of
inquiry for the scientist on this whole subject, as far as Bornu is
concerned.
The principal domestic animals bred in Bornu can be enumerated in a few
words. What Nachtigal said on this subject forty years ago, holds good
even to-day.[347] The most important of the animals bred there is the
ox. In Bornu their use is not confined to furnishing butcher’s meat and
the production of milk, but they are also constantly employed in some
parts as riding and pack-animals. There are various breeds of oxen in
Bornu, but they all show traces of intermixture. The most widely
distributed species is the humped ox, similar to the ‘zebu’ of India,
which is bred all over the Sudan, but which is much larger than the
latter and far more varied in colour. Certain animals of this breed have
the very remarkable peculiarity that their horns grow at a
disproportionate rate.[348] In the neighbourhood of Lake Chad one often
sees ‘Kuri’ oxen with the hump scarcely formed or not at all, yet
adorned with extraordinarily long and strong horns, which gives them a
somewhat strange appearance.[349] Sheep and goats cannot compete in
point of numbers with the cattle. The former are of extraordinary
size,[350] while the latter, as throughout the Sudan, have very thin
bodies, short legs, with short and generally brown hair.
According to Nachtigal’s statement the horse bred in Bornu found its way
there across the Sudan 800 years ago.[351] It has acclimatized itself
excellently, and in the course of years has adapted itself very well to
the conditions of soil of the swampy low-lying plains, which are not
exactly suited to a horse’s anatomy. Donkeys are largely bred, but
chiefly in the south-westerly districts, near the Hausa States, where
they take the place of oxen as pack-animals. They are all of a very
light grey colour with sharply defined zigzag stripes on the back and a
single similar stripe of the same colour across the withers. Mules are
not bred in Bornu.
Of the camels employed in Bornu only the kind that are bred in Kanem can
remain there for long, and even they only thrive where they can find on
the dunes plants to graze on such as the ‘retam’, which are indigenous
to the Sahara.
Dogs are not often met with;[352] they are small, mean-looking, and
certainly have few of the good qualities of the European animal, and
there are few varieties of breed; in Zinder they appear to live in a
semi-wild state and to have undertaken there, like the vultures, the
duty of scavengers.[353] Birds are confined to cocks and hens, and here
and there also pigeons and Muscovy ducks. Finally, of the wild creatures
of Bornu which are occasionally in some places tamed and made useful,
the most important are the civet-cat, the guinea-fowl, and the ostrich.
[Footnote 221: Nachtigal, ii. 368.]
[Footnote 222: Cf. Nachtigal, ii. 504.]
[Footnote 223: Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1007.]
[Footnote 224: [Red Patas monkey, _Erythrocebus patas_.]]
[Footnote 225: Cf. Rohlfs, ii. 37.]
[Footnote 226: [_Papis sp._ Some West African baboon, probably either
_P. nigeriae_ or _P. sphinx_.]]
[Footnote 227: [One of the many West African bush-babies.]]
[Footnote 228: [Small fruit bat = _Eidolon helvum_.]]
[Footnote 229: Cf. Barth, v. 387.]
[Footnote 230: Barth, iii. 58.]
[Footnote 231: Dominik, _Vom Atlantik zum Tschadsee_, p. 186.]
[Footnote 232: Kund, _loc. cit._, p. 21.]
[Footnote 233: Denham, i. 260.]
[Footnote 234: Cf. Dominik, _loc. cit._, p. 181.]
[Footnote 235: Barth, iii. 168.]
[Footnote 236: [Also known as _Vulpes cerda_. On Appendix, p. 182 of
Denham, first edition, there is a drawing and description of this
animal.]]
[Footnote 237: Barth, iii. 293 (German ed.) and iv. 49 (German ed.).]
[Footnote 238: Dominik, _loc. cit._, p. 291 ff. [for illustration vid.
Mecklenburg, i. 63].]
[Footnote 239: Nachtigal mentions four species of hyena in the
neighbouring country of Bagirmi, vid. Nachtigal, ii. 544. But it is very
probable that it is only a question of varieties of the same species.]
[Footnote 240: Cf. also Nachtigal, ii. 38.]
[Footnote 241: Rohlfs, ii. 107.]
[Footnote 242: [There is also a kind of malodorous badger, Kanuri,
‘mbachamma’, Hausa, ‘tunku’, grey with a white-tipped tail and sharp
head. The Kanuris, however, consider its scent ‘sweet’, but their taste
in perfume is peculiar. According to Koelle, they think that the odour
of bugs and the odour of Heaven are of the same nature; vid. ‘be̥rmade̥’
in Vocab.]]
[Footnote 243: Cf. Barth, iii. 320; Nachtigal, i. 598 and 635.]
[Footnote 244: Nachtigal, ii. 490.]
[Footnote 245: Cf. Foureau, _D’Alger au Congo_, p. 646.]
[Footnote 246: Cf. Nachtigal, ii. 544.]
[Footnote 247: Cf. Barth, iii. 285; Rohlfs, ii. 78.]
[Footnote 248: Nachtigal, i. 629.]
[Footnote 249: Perhaps, however, it belongs to a species of its own.]
[Footnote 250: Nachtigal, i. 561.]
[Footnote 251: Cf. Rohlfs, i. 286.]
[Footnote 252: The German members of the Yola-Chad Boundary Commission
observed giraffe even on the northern border of Adamawa, close to the
foot of the Mandara Hills.]
[Footnote 253: Cf. Barth, ii. 244 and 326; iii. 45 and 357; iv. 20;
Nachtigal, i. 533, 561 ff., 572; ii. 34.]
[Footnote 254: [In addition to these, some of which are not found in
British Bornu, there are the common red cob antelope, the white-stern
gazelle, and the sittatunga. There was a specimen of the latter in
captivity in Maiduguri in 1911—the only one so far observed in Bornu. It
was obtained near Mulgue on the River Yedseram.]]
[Footnote 255: Nachtigal, ii. 488 and 544.]
[Footnote 256: Dominik, _loc. cit._, p. 248.]
[Footnote 257: Barth, ii. 190-1.]
[Footnote 258: Barth, ii. 42 (German edition).]
[Footnote 259: Denham, i. 75; ii. 147.]
[Footnote 260: Kund, _loc. cit._, p. 5.]
[Footnote 261: Barth, iii. 162.]
[Footnote 262: Nachtigal, i. 565. [The Customs Clerk when proceeding to
Kauwa, inside the Chad Game Reserve, in 1908, reported that he was held
up for an hour by an elephant on the road who stood and looked at him. A
subordinate Customs Officer, one Shegorama, a man of imagination,
assured me that once when riding inside the Reserve he had had his cap
taken off by an elephant.]]
[Footnote 263: [The whole of the British shore of Chad is a strict game
reserve. There are a considerable number of elephants there, whose
destructive habits have entirely driven the natives off the rich farming
land there.]]
[Footnote 264: Cf. Barth, iii. 313; Kund, _loc. cit._, p. 4; Stieber,
_loc. cit._, p. 118; Dominik, _loc. cit._, p. 260 ff. [The rhinoceros is
also found on the Bornu-Yola border and along the Gongola. The Kanuri
say there are two kinds of rhino which they call ‘Kargadan’ (large) and
‘Kumarima’ (small).]]
[Footnote 265: Nachtigal, ii. 542.]
[Footnote 266: Barth, iii. 311.]
[Footnote 267: Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1008.]
[Footnote 268: _La Géographie_, _loc. cit._, p. 332.]
[Footnote 269: Barth, ii. 326; Rohlfs, i. 331.]
[Footnote 270: Nachtigal, ii. 288.]
[Footnote 271: Nachtigal, ii. 573.]
[Footnote 272: Nachtigal, i. 566.]
[Footnote 273: [Cf. Benton, _Notes on Some Languages_, p. 286, the ‘ayo’
or ‘manatee’. There is a photo of one on p. 208, vol. ii of Chudeau,
_Missions au Sahara_.]]
[Footnote 274: Barth, iii. 325; Nachtigal, i. 660; _La Géographie_, ix
(1904), p. 342. A similar animal, the ‘Ayu’, identical with the _Manatus
senegalensis_, is found in the Benue.]
[Footnote 275: Cf. Rohlfs, i. 286.]
[Footnote 276: Barth, iii. 240.]
[Footnote 277: [_Palaeornis docilis_.]]
[Footnote 278: The grey parrot is not found in Bornu. Its distribution
does not extend beyond that of the oil-palm.]
[Footnote 279: Barth, iii. 354.]
[Footnote 280: [_Lophoceros erythrorhynchus_. Kanuri, ‘zogum’; there is
also a black-billed hornbill, Kanuri, ‘kogoji’.]]
[Footnote 281: [_Bucorvus abyssinicus_, called in Hausa, ‘burtu’,
Kanuri, ‘kagum’.]]
[Footnote 282: Vid. also plate in Foureau, _D’Alger au Congo_, p. 727.]
[Footnote 283: The other species, such as the green _Merops Persicus
Saharae_, are much rarer and always appear in pairs.]
[Footnote 284: [Red-headed falcon—_Falco ruficollis_.]]
[Footnote 285: Cf. Barth, iii. 287.]
[Footnote 286: [_Lophoaetus occipitalis_.]]
[Footnote 287: Cf. Nachtigal, i. 547.]
[Footnote 288: Cf. Barth, iv. 169. [_Buphagus Africanus_.]]
[Footnote 289: [North African golden oriole.]]
[Footnote 290: Barth relates that in one place he observed thousands of
turtle-doves, whose presence required special precautions to be taken
for the protection of the farms. Barth, ii. 205.]
[Footnote 291: [There are also the sand-grouse, Kanuri, ‘fe̥r-fe̥r’, and
the little black ‘rock-partridge’. The latter is about the size of a
bantam; I have only seen it twice in Bornu, once at Gujba, and once near
Wupti on the Maiduguri-Yola road. P. A. B.]]
[Footnote 292: Denham observed flocks of guinea-fowl of as many as 100
birds. Denham, i. 70.]
[Footnote 293: Nachtigal, i. 561.]
[Footnote 294: Barth, ii. 238.]
[Footnote 295: [Denham took home four black ostriches, which were put in
the royal menagerie at Windsor, vid. Denham, Appendix, p. 199 (first
edition). The Niger Company at Nafada now do a very large trade in
ostrich feathers, but they nearly all come from Kanem and Wadai.]]
[Footnote 296: Denham, i. 254. The _Otis senegalensis_, which is also
found, is very widely distributed.]
[Footnote 297: Denham, i. 120.]
[Footnote 298: [White-bellied stork.]]
[Footnote 299: [Saddle-billed stork—_Ephippiorhynchus_.]]
[Footnote 300: [Crown-bird or demoiselle crane, Kanuri, ‘gubori’, Hausa,
‘goraka’.]]
[Footnote 301: Cf. Nachtigal, ii. 488.]
[Footnote 302: Denham, i. 63.]
[Footnote 303: Rohlfs, i. 331 ff. Cf. also Foureau, _D’Alger au Congo_,
p. 650.]
[Footnote 304: [Including the very common and succulent whistling-teal,
the mallard, and rarely the miniature goose, often called the cotton-
teal.]]
[Footnote 305: According to an oral statement by the English
ornithologist Boyd Alexander, it belongs to a species of its own.
Personally I cannot detect the slightest difference.]
[Footnote 306: The author brought one of these home with him alive. It
has not been determined to what species belonged the turtle observed by
Barth in Kanem. Barth, iii. 67 (German edition).]
[Footnote 307: Chudeau even met with the crocodile in the Lake of
Gadabuni. _La Géographie_, xv (1907), p. 334.]
[Footnote 308: Cf. Vogel in _Petermann’s Mitteilungen_, 1857, p. 168.]
[Footnote 309: Barth, iii. 57. One that was brought to me alive by some
Shuwa Arabs at Ulugo was over four metres long.]
[Footnote 310: Cf. Foureau, _D’Alger au Congo_, p. 638.]
[Footnote 311: Cf. also Rohlfs, i. 287.]
[Footnote 312: [For a very full native account of the snakes of Bornu,
vid. Koelle, _African Native Literature_, p. 189. They are enumerated
there as follows:
(1) ‘Kulutshi’, a python, speckled, 12 ft. long, and as thick as two
men.
(2) ‘Abr’, spotted, 9 ft. long, poisonous.
(3) ‘Gangu’, spotted, 6 ft. long, harmless.
(4) ‘Komontugu’, yellow, 6 ft. long, harmless.
(5) ‘Tshibato’ [jibado], black, 9 ft. long, said to spit poison and
blind its victims; venom used for arrow poison; nicknamed ‘Koana lage̥te̥’
= the villainous felon. Rears itself erect and distends its head. [Adder
or cobra?]
(6) ‘Rokodimi’, square red spots on the skin, 1 ft. long, has four legs,
very poisonous, venom used for arrow poison.
(7) ‘Shargo’, striped black and white, 3 ft. long, nicknamed ‘Kadi
mallam’ = the priest snake, harmless, much admired for its beauty, and
sometimes domesticated.
(8) ‘Kadi ke̥li’ = green snake, 3 ft. long, poisonous.
(9) ‘Kadi tse̥lim’ = black snake, small, lives in wells, poisonous.
To these may be added from personal information:
(10) ‘Wofe’, light yellow, poisonous but not aggressive. Lives inside
houses. About 3 ft. long.
(11) ‘Fushi’, striped, poisonous and aggressive. Lives in holes in the
ground in dry weather, but in the grass in wet weather. About 18 inches
long.
(12) ‘Gergeshi’, speckled, poisonous and aggressive. Lives at the bottom
of trees. About 2 ft. long.
(13) ‘Karua’, dull green, poisonous and aggressive. Lives in the water
in Chad. About 9 inches long.
(14) ‘Kadi suni uguwa’ = snake of the five shepherds. Green. Lives in
hollows of trees. Very poisonous. It will kill five or more men if they
put their hands into the hollow. About 18 inches long.
(15) ‘Silla’, black, harmless, lives in houses. About 6 inches long.
(16) ‘Kadi digalbu’ = the bed-snake. Striped. Lives at bottom of native
beds. Poisonous but not aggressive. About 18 inches long.
In spite of the number of snakes found in Bornu, one seldom hears of a
death from snake-bite. Can the explanation be the same as given in the
old Greek epigram?
‘A snake once on a Cappadocian
Its deadliest venom tried.
Was the man killed? Dismiss the notion;
The snake it was that died.’
(_Memoir of Herbert Kynaston_, by E. D. Stone).]]
[Footnote 313: Cf. Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1054, and
Hassert, p. 154. [In Chevalier, _Mission Chari-Lac Tchad_, p. 437, there
is an Appendix on Fish.]]
[Footnote 314: Barth, iii. 241 (?); Nachtigal, i. 660; Foureau, _D’Alger
au Congo_, p. 714; Dominik, _loc. cit._, p. 187.]
[Footnote 315: Barth, iii. 36.]
[Footnote 316: Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1054.]
[Footnote 317: _Idem_, and Nachtigal, ii. 495.]
[Footnote 318: Cf. Kolbe, _Berliner ent. Zeitschrift_, li. Jahrg., 1906,
p. 334 ff., and Ch. Kerremans, ‘Buprestides des environs du Lac Tchad,’
in _Ann. de la Société ent. de Belge_, Brussels, 1907. [Cf. Chevalier,
_Mission Chari-Lac Tchad_, p. 703, Appendix on Coleoptera.]]
[Footnote 319: Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1021.]
[Footnote 320: [These beetles are known among Europeans in Bornu as the
Colorado beetle. I do not know if the term is a correct one. A small sum
is spent every year in their extermination in the vicinity of Government
stations.—P. A. B.]]
[Footnote 321: Cf. also Barth, iii. 240.]
[Footnote 322: Barth, ii. 337; Nachtigal, i. 666.]
[Footnote 323: Barth, iii. 341. According to Nachtigal there is one
species of ant which is the termite’s chief foe. Nachtigal, ii. 556.
[This is the large black travelling ant, Hausa, ‘Kwalkwassa,’ Kanuri,
‘Kanam leïrabe’.]]
[Footnote 324: Barth, iii. 397. From the description there given it
appears that Barth regarded ants as termites.]
[Footnote 325: Rohlfs, ii. 9.]
[Footnote 326: Nachtigal, ii. 556.]
[Footnote 327: Cf. also Rohlfs, i. 287.]
[Footnote 328: Cf. Nachtigal, i. 662 [silk-moths].]
[Footnote 329: Denham, i. 119.]
[Footnote 330: Denham, ii. 30; cf. also ii. 92 and Barth, iii. 251
(German edition); Nachtigal, ii. 386.]
[Footnote 331: [It has been suggested that there is a mention of the
tsetse-fly in the Bible. The 18th and 19th verses of the 7th chapter of
Isaiah, in prophesying threatened scourges, read as follows: ‘And it
shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall hiss (i.e. whistle)
for the fly that is in the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt, and
for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. And they shall come and
shall rest all of them in the desolate valleys, and in the holes of the
rocks, and upon all thorns, and upon all bushes [in margin, or
commendable trees].’ The ‘uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt’ can
hardly mean anything else than the headwaters of the Nile, viz. the
Victoria Nyanza, whilst by the usual law of antithesis in Hebrew
composition, the first half of the 19th verse will refer to the bee and
the second half to the fly, i.e. that the flies shall rest ‘upon all
thorns and upon all bushes’, and it is the well-known habit of the
tsetse-fly to rest on the thorny ambach-shrubs near the Lake.
Arguing from this in an article in the _Royal Geographical Society’s
Journal_ for February, 1913, Dr. Felix Oswald remarks that although
sleeping sickness only entered Uganda eleven years ago from the west, it
is not improbable that it may have existed in the region of the great
African lakes in past ages, subsequently disappearing. In the discussion
on the paper, Sir Percy Girouard gave it as his opinion that the disease
had spent its force in West Africa through centuries, and had become
endemic.]]
[Footnote 332: The only species as yet known in Bornu, the _Glossina
tachinoides_, is found in places on the bushy banks of streams.
[_Glossina submorsitans_, has also been found. The only case of
sleeping-sickness so far observed in Bornu was that of a prison warder
who was proved to have contracted the disease which proved fatal, at
Loko in Nassarawa Province three years before. The case was described by
Dr. D. Alexander in the _Journal of Tropical Medicine_, for 1911.]]
[Footnote 333: Barth, iii. 315 and 463 (?); Rohlfs, ii. 15; Nachtigal,
ii. 573.]
[Footnote 334: Barth, ii. 301; Nachtigal, ii. 486.]
[Footnote 335: According to Barth termites are not found in the Musgu
country, which is exposed to floods for long periods of the year (Barth,
iii. 199). Here again Barth has certainly confused termites with ants.
On the edges of the swampy ‘firki’ patches the hills erected by the
termites are to be found everywhere.]
[Footnote 336: Cf. also Barth, iii. 37 and 302.]
[Footnote 337: Marquardsen, _Der Niger-Benue_, p. 46.]
[Footnote 338: Cf. also Nachtigal, ii. 555.]
[Footnote 339: Rohlfs, ii. 16. Nachtigal also mentions a species of
locust being used as an article of food, Nachtigal, i. 666. [For an
account of six different kinds of locusts found in Bornu, and of the
method of cooking the edible ones, vid. Koelle, _African Native
Literature_ p. 198.]]
[Footnote 340: Barth, iii. 263. [‘Kari’ is the regular Kanuri word for a
‘tick’.]]
[Footnote 341: Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1060. It is
certain, however, that the large land-crabs observed by me in Adamawa
are also found in Bornu during the rainy season. [Cf. Chevalier,
_Mission Chari-Lac Tchad_, p. 701.]]
[Footnote 342: [There is a detailed study of the Chad shells in Tilho
_Doc. sc._, ii. 165 ff.]]
[Footnote 343: The species adduced to confirm a correspondence between
the molluscs of Lake Chad and of the Nile are:
_Vivipara unicolor_ [the pond or river snail].
_Melania tuberculata_.
_Corbicula fluminalis_.
In addition to these, I found in a pool on the Yedseram the following
varieties, which belong to the fauna of the Nile, and which were
identified by Professor Dr. Boettger:
_Ampullaria ovata_ (a very common species) [i.e. the apple snail].
_Lanistes ovum_.
_Cleopatra bulimoides_.
[Cf. [97].] [In Chevalier, _Mission Chari-Lac Tchad_, p. 459, there is
an Appendix on Molluscs, with a plate at the end of the volume, and a
Bibliography on p. 587.]]
[Footnote 344: Cf. also Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_, ii. 1060
ff.]
[Footnote 345: Cf. Passarge, _loc. cit._, pp. 57, 237, 292, and 400 ff.,
and the views there expressed as to the rôle played by the earth-worm.]
[Footnote 346: [Also several kinds of intestinal worms.]]
[Footnote 347: Nachtigal, i. 672 ff.]
[Footnote 348: Nachtigal, i. 687; Foureau, _Documents scientifiques_,
ii. 1033 and 1039.]
[Footnote 349: Cf. Nachtigal, i. 682. [Cf. Appendix XVI.]]
[Footnote 350: [The Bornu cattle are periodically decimated by a disease
called ‘fufu’, generally described as ‘lung-sickness’, i.e.
pleuropneumonia (‘fufu’ means ‘a lung’ in Kanuri). Tilho, _Doc. sc._ i.
32, mentions an epizootic liver disease, called in Budduma ‘banami’, as
attacking Budduma cattle, and says that it is caused by the bad quality
of stagnant water. There is a disease called ‘gisu’ in Kanuri which
attacks sheep and goats, and consists of a tumour in the side.]]
[Footnote 351: Nachtigal, i. 616.]
[Footnote 352: [This is a curious statement. Dogs are as numerous and as
noisy in Bornu as in the other countries of the Western Sudan.]]
[Footnote 353: Foureau, _D’Alger au Congo_, p. 506.]
VII
POPULATION
Bornu offers to the ethnologist, as well as to the botanist and
zoologist, phenomena well worthy of notice. Especially he finds
confirmed here the interesting fact that in a relatively short time a
nation essentially uniform in character can be built up out of various
races. The predominant race and the one that inhabits the largest
districts in the country is the Kanuri.[354] They are a mixed race of
the kind mentioned above; their speech and character are uniform,
although single individuals often show ‘throw-backs’ in their external
appearance which point unmistakably to the bodily peculiarities of the
tribes which have contributed to the creation of the new breed. We have
here in front of us one of the most difficult problems of general
ethnology, because all the conditions favouring the creation of a state
of miscegenation from very heterogeneous elements, such as continued
migrations, lack of natural boundaries, and the universal and widespread
practice of slavery, coincide to a degree known scarcely anywhere else.
Absolute clearness regarding the origin of the race is still more
difficult to obtain to-day than it was in Barth and Nachtigal’s time,
because since then the campaigns of Rabeh have introduced new elements
into the population of Bornu.[355]