We have analogous stories in the literature of almost all

nations that derive their religion or their civilization from

a foreign source. To say nothing of the Book of Mormon, a

considerable number of persons have been found to propagate

the doctrine that the English people are descended from the

tribes of Israel. But the Hebrew ancestry of the Afghans

is more worthy at least of consideration, for a respectable

number of intelligent officers, well acquainted with the

Afghans, have been strong in their belief of it; and though

the customs alleged in proof will not bear the stress laid on

them, undoubtedly a prevailing type of the Afghan physiognomy

has a character strongly Jewish. This characteristic is

certainly a remarkable one; but it is shared, to a considerable

extent, by the Kashmiris (a circumstance which led Bernier

to speculate on the Kashmiris representing the lost tribes of

Israel), and, we believe, by the Tajik people of Badakshan.

Relations with the Greeks.---In the time of Darius Hystaspes

(500 B.C.) we find the region now called Afghanistan

embraced in the Achaemenian satrapies, and various parts

of it occupied by Sarangians (in Seistan), Arians (in

Herat), Sattagydians (supposed in highlands of upper

Helmund and the plateau of Ghazni), Dadicae (suggested

to be Tajiks), Aparytae (mountaineers, perhaps of Safed

Koh, where lay the Paryetae of Ptolemy), Gandarii (in

Lower Kabul basin) and Paktyes, on or near the Indus.

In the last name it has been plausibly suggested that we

have the Pukhtun, as the eastern Afghans pronounce their

name. Indeed, Pusht, Pasht or Pakht would seem to be the

oldest name of the country of the Afghans in their traditions.

The Ariania of Strabo corresponds generally with the existing

dominions of Kabul, but overpasses their limits on the west and south.

About 310 B.C. Seleucus is said by Strabo to have given to

the Indian Sandrocottus (Chandragupta), in consequence of a

marriage-contract, some part of the country west of the Indus

occupied by an Indian population, and no doubt embracing a

part of the Kabul basin. Some sixty years later occurred

the establishment of an independent Greek dynasty in Bactria.

(See BACTRIA, MEDIA, EUCRATIDES, MENANDER of India,

EUTHYDEMUS, and PERSIA, Ancient History.) Of the details

of their history and extent of their dominion in different

reigns we know almost nothing, and conjecture is often

dependent on such vague data as are afforded by the collation

of the localities in which the coins of independent princes

have been found. But their power extended certainly over

the Kabul basin, and probably, at times, over the whole of

Afghanistan. The ancient architecture of Kashmir, the tope

of Manikyala in the Punjab, and many sculptures found in the

Peshawar valley, show unmistakable Greek influence. Demetrius

(c. 190 B.C.) is supposed to have reigned in Arachosia

after being expelled from Bactria, much as, at a later date,

Baber reigned in Kabul after his expulsion from Samarkand.

Eucratides (181 B.C.) is alleged by Justin to have warred in

India. With his coins, found abundantly in the Kabul basin,

commences the use of an Arianian inscription, in addition to the

Greek, sulnosed to imply the transfer of rule to the south of

the mountains, over a people whom the Greek dynasty sought to

conciliate. Under Heliocles (147 B.C.?), the Parthians, who

had already encroached on Ariana, pressed their conquests into

India. Menander (126 B.C.) invaded India at least to the

Jumna, and perhaps also to the Indus delta. Tbe coinage of

a succeeding king, Hermaeus, indicates a barbaric irruption.

There is a general correspondence between classical and Chinese

accounts of the time when Bactria was overrun by Scythian

invaders. The chief nation among these, called by the

Chinese Yue-Chi, about 126 B.C. established themselves

in Sogdiana and on the Oxus in five hordes. Near the

Christian era the chief of one of these, which was called

Kushan, subdued the rest, and extended his conquests over the

countries south of the Hindu Kush, including Sind as well as

Afghanistan, thus establishing a great dominion, of which

we hear from Greek writers as Indo-Scythia. (See YUE-CHI.)

Buddhism had already acquired influence over the people of the

Kabul basin, and some of the barbaric invaders adopted that

system. Its traces are extensive, especially in the plains

of Jalalabad and Peshawar, but also in the vicinity of Kabul.

Various barbaric dynasties succeeded each other. A notable

monarch was Kanishka (see INDIA, History) or Kanerkes,

whose date is variously fixed at from 58 B.C. to A.D.

125, and whose power extended over the upper Oxus basin,

Kabul, Peshawar, Kashmir and probably far into India. His

name and legends still filled the land, or at least the

Buddhist portion of it, 600 years later, when tho Chinese

pilgrim, Hsuan Tsang, travelled in India; they had even

reached the great Mahommedan philosopher, traveller and

geographer, Abu-r-Raihan Muhammad al-Biruni (see

BIRUNI), in the 11th century; and they are still celebrated

in the Mongol versions of Buddhist ecclesiastical story.

Turkoman Dynasties.---In the time of Hsuan Tsang (A.D.

630-645) there were both Indian and Turk princes in the Kabul

valley, and in the succeeding centuries both these races seem

to have predominated in succession. The first Mahommedan

attempts at the conquest of Kabul were unsuccessful, though

Seistan and Arachosia were permanently held from an early

date. It was not till the end of the 10th century that a Hindu

prince ceased to reign in Kabul, and it fell into the hands

of the Turk Sabuktagin, who had established his capital at

Ghazni. There, too, reigned his famous son Mahmud, and a

series of descendants, till the middle of the 12th century,

rendering the city one of the most splendid in Asia. We

then have a powerful dynasty, commonly believed to have been

of Afghan race; and if so, the first. But the historians

give them a legendary descent from Zohak, which is no Afghan

genealogy. The founder of the dynasty was Alauddin,

chief of Ghor, whose vengeance for the cruel death of his

brother at the hands of Bahram the Ghaznevide was wreaked

in devastating the great city. His nephew, Shahabuddin

Mahommed, repeatedly invaded India, conquering as far as

Benares. His empire in India indeed--ruled by his freedmen

who after his death became independent --may be regarded as

the origin of that great Mahommedan monarchy which endured

nominally till 1857. For abrief period the Afghan countries

were subject to the king of Khwarizm, and it was here

chiefly that occurred the gallant attempts of Jalaluddin

of Khwarizm to withstand the progress of Jenghiz Khan.

A passage in Ferishta seems to imply that the Afghans in the

Sulimani mountains were already known by that name in the first

century of the Hegira, but it is uncertain how far this may

be built on. The name Afghans is very distinctly mentioned

in `Utbi's History of Sultan Mahmud, written about A.D.

1030, coupled with that of the Khifjis. It also appears

frequently in connexion with the history of India in the

13th and 14th centuries. The successive dynasties of Delhi

are generally called Pathan, but were really so only in

part. Of the Khifjis (1288-1321) we have already spoken.

The Tughlaks (1321-1421) were originally Tatars of the Karauna

tribe. The Lodis (1450-1526) were pure Pathans. For a

century and more after the Mongol invasion the whole of the

Afghan countries were under Mongol rule; but in the middle

of the 14th century a native dynasty sprang up in western

Afghanistan, that of the Kurts, which extended its rule

over Ghor, Herat and Kandahar. The history of the Afghan

countries under the Mongols is obscure; but that regime

must have left its mark upon the country, if we judge from

the occurrence of frequent Mongol names of places, and

even of Mongol expressions adopted into familiar language.

The Mogul Dyniasty.---All these countries were included

in Timur's conquests, and Kabul at least had remained in

the possession of one of his descendants till 1501, only

three years before it fell into the hands of another and

more illustrious one, Sultan Baber. It was not till 1522

that Baber succeeded in permanently wresting Kandahar from

the Arghuns, a family of Mongol descent, who had long held

it. From the time of his conquest of Hindustan (victory at

Panipat, April 21, 1526), Kabul and Kandahar may be regarded

as part of the empire of Delhi under the (so-called) Mogul

dynasty which Baber founded. Kabul so continued till the

invasion of Nadir Shah (1738). Kandahar often changed hands

between the Moguls and the rising Safavis (or Sufis) of

Persia. Under the latter it had remained from 1642 till 1708,

when in the reign of Husain, the last of them, the Ghilzais,

provoked by the oppressive Persian governor Shahnawaz Khan

(a Georgian prince of the Bagratid house), revolted under Mir

Wais, and expelled the Persians. Mir Wais was acknowledged

sovereign of Kandahar, and eventually defeated the Persian

armies sent against him. but did not long survive (d. 1715).

Mahmud, the son of Mir Wais, a man of great courage and

energy, carried out a project of his father's, the conquest

of Persia itself. After a long siege, Shah Husain came

forth from Ispahan with all his court, and surrendered

the sword and diadem of the Sufis into the hands of the

Ghilzai (October 1722). Two years later Mahmud died mad,

and a few years saw the end of Ghilzai rule in Persia.

The Durani Dynasty.---In 1737-38 Nadir Shah both recovered

Kandahar and took Kabul. But he gained the goodwill of the

Afghans, and enrolled many in his army. Among these was a

noble young soldier, Ahmad Khan, of the Saddozai family of

the Abdali clan, who after the assassination of Nadir (1747)

was chosen by the Afghan chiefs at Kandahar to be their

leader, and assumed kingly authority over the eastern part

of Nadir's empire, with the style of Dur-i-Duran, ``Pearl

of the Age,'' bestowing that of Durani upon his clan, the

Abdalis. With Ahmad Shah, Afghanistan, as such, first took

a place among the kingdoms of the earth, and the Durani

dynasty, which he founded, still occupies its throne. During

the twenty-six years of his reign he carried his warlike

expeditions far and wide. Westward they extended nearly to

the shores of the Caspian; eastward he repeatedly entered

India as a conqueror. At his great battle of Panipat (January

6, 1761), with vastly inferior numbers, he inflicted on the

Mahrattas, then at the zenith of their power, a tremendous

defeat, almost annihilating their vast army; but the success

had for him no important result. Having long suffered from a

terrible disease, he died in 1773, bequeathing to his son Timur

a dominion which embraced not only Afghanistan to its utmost

limits, but the Punjab, Kashmir and Turkestan to the Oxus,

with Sind, Baluchistan and Khorasan as tributary governments.

Timur transferred his residence from Kandahar to Kabul, and

continued during a reign of twenty years to stave off the

anarchy which followed close on his death. He left twenty-three

sons, of whom the fifth, Zaman Mirza, by help of Payindah

Khan, head of the Barakzai family of the Abdalis, succeeded in

grasping the royal power. For many years barbarous wars raged

between the brothers, during which Zaman Shah, Shuja-ul-Mulk

and Mahmud successively held the throne. The last owed

success to Payindah's son, Fatteh Khan (known as the ``Afghan

Warwick''), a man of masterly ability in war and politics, the

eldest of twenty-one brothers, a family of notable intelligence

and force of character, and many of these he placed over the

provinces. Fatteh Khan, however, excited the king's jealously

by his powerful position, and provoked the malignity of the

king's son, Kamran, by a gross outrage on the Saddozai family.

He was accordingly seized, blinded and afterwards murdered with

prolonged torture, the brutal Kamran striking the first blow.

The Barakzai brothers united to avenge Fatteh Khan. The

Saddozais were driven from Kabul, Ghazni and Kandahar, and

with difficulty reached Herat (1818). Herat remained thus

till Kamran's death (1842), and after that was held by his

able and wicked minister Yar Mahommed. The rest of the

country was divided among the Barakzais---Dost Mahommed, the

ablest, getting Kabul. Peshawar and the right bank of the

Indus fell to the Sikhs after their victory at Nowshera in

1823. The last Afghan hold of the Punjab had been lost

long before.--Kashmir in 1819; Sind had cast off all

allegiance since 1808; the Turkestan provinces had been

practically independent since the death of Timur Shah.

The First Afghan War, 1838-42.---In 1809, in consequence

of the intrigues Of Napoleon in Persia, the Hon. Mountstuart

Elphinstone had been sent as envoy to Shah Shuja, then in

power, and had been well received by him at Peshawar. This

was the first time the Afghans made any acquaintance with

Englishmen. Lieut. Alex. Burnes (afterwards Sir Alex.

Burnes) visited Kabul on his way to Bokhara in 1832. In 1837

the Persian siege of Herat and the proceedings of Russia created

uneasiness, and Burnes was sent by the governor-general as

resident to the amir's court at Kabul. But the terms which

the Dost sought were not conceded by the government, and

the rash resolution was taken of re-establishing Shah Shuja,

long a refugee in British territory. Ranjit Singh, king

of the Punjab, bound himself to co-operate, but eventually

declined to let the expedition cross his territories.

The war began in March 1838, when the ``Army of the Indus,''

amounting to 21,000 men, assembled in Upper Sind and advanced

through the Bolan Pass under the command of Sir John Keane.

There was hardship, but scarcely any opposition. Kohandil

Khan of Kandahar fled to Persia. That city was occupied in

April 1839, and Shah Shuja was crowned in his grandfather's

mosque. Ghazni was reached 21st July; a gate of the city was

blown open by the engineers (the match was fired by Lieut.,

afterwards Sir Henry, Durand), and the place was taken by

storm. Dost Mahommed, finding his troops deserting, passed

the Hindu Kush, and Shah Shuja entered the capital (August

7). The war was thought at an end, and Sir John Keane (made a

peer) returned to India with a considerable part of the force,

leaving behind 8000 men, besides the Shah's force, with Sir

W. Macnaghten as envoy, and Sir A. Burnes as his colleague.

During the two following years Shah Shuja and his allies remained

in possession of Kabul and Kandahar. The British outposts

extended to Saighan, in the Oxus basin, and to Mullah Khan,

in the plain of Seistan. Dost Mahommed surrendered (November

5, 1840) and was sent to India, where he was honourably

treated. From the beginning, insurrection against the new

government had been rife. The political authorities were

overconfident, and neglected warnings. On the 2nd of November

1841 the revolt broke out violently at Kabul, with the massacre

of Burnes and other officers. The position of the British

camp, its communications with the citadel and the location

of the stores were the worst possible; and the general

(Elphinstone) was shattered in constitution. Disaster after

disaster occurred, not without misconduct. At a conference

(December 23) with the Dost's son, Akbar Khan, who had taken

the lead of the Afghans, Sir W. Macnaghten was murdered by

that chief's own hand. On the 6th of January 1842, after a

convention to evacuate the country had been signed, the British

garrison, still numbering 4500 soldiers (of whom 690 were

Europeans), with some 12,000 followers, marched out of the

camp. The winter was severe, the troops demoralised, the march

a mass of confusion and massacre, and the force was finally

overwhelmed in the Jagdalak pass between Kabul and Jalalabad.

On the 13th the last survivors mustered at Gandamak only twenty

muskets. Of those who left Kabul, only Dr Brydon reached

Jalalabad, wounded and half dead. Ninety-five prisoners

were afterwards recovered. The garrison of Ghazni had

already been forced to surrender (December 10). But General

Nott held Kandahar with a stern hand, and General Sale,

who had reached Jalalabad from Kabul at the beginning of

the outbreak, maintained that important point gallantly.

To avenge these disasters and recover the prisoners

preparations were made in India on a fitting scale; but

it was the 16th of April 1842 before General Pollock could

relieve Jalalabad, after forcing the Khyber Pass. After a

long halt there he advanced (August 20), and gaining rapid

successes, occupied Kabul (September 15), where Nott,

after retaking and dismantling Ghazni, joined him two days

later. The prisoners were happily recovered from Bamian.

The citadel and central bazaar of Kabul were destroyed,

and the army finally evacuated Afghanistan, December 1842.

This ill-planned and hazardous enterprise was fraught with the

elements of inevitable failute. A ruler imposed upon a free

people by foreign arms is always unpopular; he is unable to

stand alone; and his foreign auxiliaries soon find themselves

obliged to choose between remaining to uphold his power, or

retiring with the probability that it will fall after their

departure. The leading chiefs of Afghanistan perceived that the

maintenance of Shah Shuja's rule by British troops would soon

be fatal to their own power and position in the country, and

probably to their national independence. They were insatiable

in their demands for office and emolument, and when they

discovered that the shah, acting by the advice of the British

envoy, was levying from among their tribesmen regiments to be

directly under his control, they took care that the plan should

fail. Without a regular revenue no effective administration

could be organized; but the attempt to raise taxes showed that

it might raise the people, so that for both men and money the

shah's government was still obliged to rely principally upon

British aid. All these circumstances combined to render the

new regime weak and unpopular, since there was no force at

the ruler's command except foreign troops to put down disorder

or to protect those who submitted, while the discontented

nobles fomented disaffection and the inbred hatred of strangers

in race and religion among the general Afghan population.

British and Russian Relalions.--It has been said that

the declared object of this policy had been to maintain

the independence and integrity of Afghanistan, to secure

the friendly alliance of its ruler, and thus to interpose a

great barrier of mountainous country between the expanding

power of Russia in Central Asia and the British dominion in

India. After 1849, when the annexation of the Punjab had

carried the Indian northwestern frontier up to the skirts

of the Afghan highlands, the corresponding advance of

the Russians south-eastward along the Oxus river became

of closer interest to the British, particularly when, in

1856, the Persians again attempted to take possession of

Herat. Dost Mahommed now became the British ally, but on his

death in 1863 the kingdom fell back into civil war, until his

son, Shere Ali, had won his way to undisputed rulership in

1868. In the same year Bokhara became a dependency of Russia.

To the British government an attitude of non-intervention

in Afghan affairs appeared in this situation to be no longer

possible. The meeting between the amir Shere Ali and the

viceroy of India (Lord Mayo) at Umballa in 1869 drew nearer the

relations between the two governments; the amir consolidated

and began to centralize his power; and the establishment of a

strong, friendly and united Afghanistan became again the keynote

of British policy beyond the north-western frontier of India.

When, therefore, the conquest of Khiva in 1873 by the Russians,

and their gradual approach towards the amir's northern border,

had seriously alarmed Shere Ali, he applied for support to

the British; and his disappointment at his failure to obtain

distinct pledges of material assistance, and at Great Britain's

refusal to endorse all his claims in a dispute with Persia

over Seistan, so far estranged him from the British connexion

that he began to entertain amicable overtures from the Russian

authorities at Tashkend. In 1869 the Russian government

had assured Lord Clarendon that they regarded Afghanistan as

completely outside the sphere of their influence; and in 1872 the

boundary line of Afghanistan on the north-west had been settled

between England and Russia so far eastward as Lake Victoria.

Nevertheless the correspondence between Kabul and Tashkend

continued, and as the Russians were now extending their dominion

over all the region beyond Afghanistan on the north-west, the

British government determined, in 1876, once more to undertake

active measures for securing their political ascendancy in that

country. But the amir, whose feelings of resentment had by no

means abated, was now leaning toward Russia, though he mainly

desired to hold the balance between two equally formidable

rivals. The result of overtures made to him from India was

that in 1877, when Lord Lytton, acting under direct instructions

from Her Majesty's ministry, proposed to Shere Ali a treaty of

alliance, Shere Ali showed himself very little disposed to

welcome the offer; and upon his refusal to admit a British

agent into Afghanistan the negotiations finally broke down.

Second Afghan War, 1878-80.--In the course of the following

year (1878) the Russian government, to counteract the

interference of England with their advance upon Constantinople,

sent an envoy to Kabul empowered to make a treaty with the

amir. It was immediately notified to him from India that a

British mission would be deputed to his capital, but he demurred

to receiving it; and when the British envoy was turned back

on the Afchan frontier hostilities were proclaimed by the

viceroy in November 1878, and the second Afghan War began.

Sir Donald Stewart's force, marching up through Baluchistan by

the Bolan Pass, entered Kandahar with little or no resistance;

while another army passed through the Khyber Pass and took up

positions at Jalalabad and other places on the direct road to

Kabul. Another force under Sir Frederick Roberts marched up

to the high passes leading out of Kurram into the interior of

Afghanistan, defeated the amir's troops at the Peiwar Kotal,

and seized the Shutargardan Pass which commands a direct route

to Kabul through the Logar valley. The amir Shere Ali fled

from his capital into the northern province, where he died at

Mazar-i-Sharif in February 1879. In the course of the next

six months there was much desultory skirmishing between the

tribes and the British troops, who defeated various attempts

to dislodge them from the positions that had been taken up; but

the sphere of British military operations was not materially

extended. It was seen that the farther they advanced the

more difficult would become their eventual retirement;

and the problem was to find a successor to Shere Ali who

could and would make terms with the British government.

In the meantime Yakub Khan, one of Shere Ali's sons, had announced

to Major Cavagnari, the political agent at the headquarters

of the British army, that he had succeeded his father at

Kabul. The negotiations that followed ended in the conclusion

of the treaty of Gandamak in May 1879, by which Takub Khan

was recognized as amir; certain outlying tracts of Afghanistan

were transferred to the British government; the amir placed

in its hands the entire control of his foreign relations,

receiving in return a guarantee against foreign aggression;

and the establishment of a British envoy at Kabul was at last

conceded. By this convention the complete success of the

British political and military operations seemed to have been

attained; for whereas Shere Ali had made a treaty of alliance

with, and had received an embassy from Russia, his son had now

made an exclusive treaty with the British government, and had

agreed that a British envoy should reside permanently at his

court. Yet it was just this final concession, the chief and

original object of British policy, that proved speedily fatal

to the whole settlement. For in September the envoy, Sir

Louis Cavagnari, with his staff and escort, was massacred at

Kabul, and the entire fabric of a friendly alliance went to

pieces. A fresh expedition was instantly despatched across

the Shutargardan Pass under Sir Frederick Roberts, who defeated

the Afghans at Charasia near Kabul, and entered the city in

October. Yakub Khan, who had surrendered, was sent to India;

and the British army remained in military occupation of the

district round Kabul until in December (1879) its communications

with India were interrupted, and its position at the capital

placed in serious jeopardy, by a general rising of the

tribes. After they had been repulsed and put down, not without

some hard fighting, Sir Donald Stewart, who had not quitted

Kandahar, brought a force up by Ghazni to Kabul, overcoming

some resistance on his way, and assumed the supreme command.

Nevertheless the political situation was still embarrassing,

for as the whole country beyond the range of British effective

military control was masterless, it was undesirable to withdraw

the troops before a government could be reconstructed which

could stand without foreign support, and with which diplomatic

relations of some kind might be arranged. The general

position and prospect of political affairs in Afghanistan

bore, indeed, an instructive resemblance to the situation just

forty years earlier, in 1840, with the important differences

that the Punjab and Sind had since become British, and that

communications between Kabul and India were this time secure.

Reign of Abdur Rahman.---Abdur Rahman, the son of the late

amir Shere Ali's elder drother, had fought against Shere Ali

in the war for succession to Dost Mahommed, had been driven

beyond the Oxus, and had lived for ten years in exile with the

Russians. In March 1880 he came back across the river,

and began to establish himself in the northern province of

Afghanistan. The viceroy of India, Lord Lytton, on hearing

of his reappearance, instructed the political authorities

at Kabul to communicate with him. By skilful negotiations

a meeting was arranged, and after pressing in vain for

a treaty he was induced to assume charge of the country

upon his necognition by the British as amir, with the

understanding that he should have no relations with other

foreign powers, and with a formal assurance from the viceroy

of protection from foreign aggression, so long as he should

unreservedly follow the advice of the British government in

regard to his external affairs. The province of Kandahar

was severed from the Kabul dominion; and the sirdar Shere

Ali Khan, a member of the Barakzai family, was installed

by the British representative as its independent ruler.

For the second time in the course of this war a conclusive

settlement of Afghan affairs seemed now to have been attained;

and again, as in 1879, it was immediately dissolved. In July

1880, a few days after the proclamation of Abdur Rahman as amir

at Kabul, came news that Ayub Khan, Shere Ali's younger son, who

had been holding Herat since his father's death, had marched upon

Kandahar, had utterly defeated at Maiwand a British force that

went out from Kandahar to oppose him, and was besieging that

city. Sir Frederick Roberts at once set out from Kabul with

10,000 men to its relief, reached Kandahar after a rapid march

of 313 miles, attacked and routed Ayub Khan's army on the

1st of September, and restored British authority in southern

Afghanistan. As the British ministry had resolved to evacuate

Kandahar, the sirdar Shere Ali Khan, who saw that he could

not stand alone, resigned and withdrew to India, and the

amir Abdur Rahman was invited to take possession of the

province. But when Ayub Khan, who had meanwhile retreated to

Herat, heard that the British forces had retired, early in

1881, to India, he mustered a fresh army and again approached

Kandahar. In June the fort of Girishk, on the Helmund, was

seized by his adherents; the amir's troops were defeated some

days later in an engagement, and Ayub Khan took possession

of Kandahar at the end of July. The amir Abdur Rahman, whose

movements had hitherto been slow and uncertain, now acted

with vigour and decision. He marched rapidly from Kabul

at the head of a force, with which he encountered Ayub Khan

under the walls of Kandahar, and routed his army on 22nd

September, taking all his guns and equipage. Ayub Khan fled

toward Herat, but as the place had meanwhile been occupied

by one of the amir's generals he took refuge in Persia.

By this victory Abdur Rahman's rulership was established.

In 1884 it was determined to resume the demarcation, by a

joint commission of British and Russian officers, of the

northern boundary of Afghanistan. The work went on with

much difficulty and contention, until in March 1885, when

the amir was at Rawalpindi for a conference with the viceroy

of India, Lord Dufferin, the news came that at Panjdeh,

a disputed place on the boundary held by the Afghans, the

Russians had attacked and driven out with some loss the amir's

troops. For the moment the consequences seemed likely to

be serious; but the affair was arranged diplomatically, and

the demarcation proceeded up to a point near the Oxus river,

beyond which the commission were unable to settle an agreement.

During the ten years following his accession in 1880 Abdur

Rahman employed himself in extending and consolidating his

dominion over the whole country. Some local revolts among the

tribes were rigorously suppressed; and two attempts to upset

his rulership--the first by Ayub Khan, who entered Afghanistan

from Persia, the second and more dangerous one by Ishak

Khan, the amir's cousin, who rebelled against him in Afghan

Turkestan---were defeated. By 1891 the amir had enforced his

supreme authority throughout Afghanistan more completely than

any of his predecessors, In 1895 the amir's troops entered

Kafiristan, a wild mountainous tract on the north-east,

inhabited by a peculiar race that had hitherto defied all

efforts to subjugate them, but were now gradually reduced to

submission. Meanwhile the delimitation of the northern

frontier, up to the point where it meets Chinese territory

on the east, was completed and fixed by arrangements between

the governments of Russia and Great Britain; and the eastern

border of the Afghan territory, towards India, was also mapped

out and partially laid down, in accordance with a convention

between the two governments. The amir not only received a

large annual subsidy of money from the British government, but

he also obtained considerable supplies of war material; and he,

moreover, availed himself very freely of facilities that were

given him for the importation at his own cost of arms through

India. With these resources, and with the advantage of an

assurance from the British government that he would be aided

against foreign aggression, he was able to establish an

absolute military despotism inside his kingdom, by breaking

down the power of the warlike tribes which held in check, up

to his time, the personal autocracy of the Kabul rulers, and

by organizing a regular army well furnished with European

rifies and artillery. Taxation of all kinds was heavily

increased, and systematically collected. The result was

that whereas in former times the forces of an Afghan ruler

consisted mainly of a militia, furnished by the chiefs of

tribes who held land on condition of military service, and

who stoutly resisted any attempt to commute this service for

money payment, the amir had at his command a large standing

army, and disposed of a substantial revenue paid direct to his

treasury. Abdur Rahman executed or exiled all those whose

political influence he saw reason to fear, or of whose

disaffection he had the slightest suspicion; his administration

was severe and his punishments were cruel; but undoubtedly he

put down disorder, stopped the petty tyranny of local chiefs

and brought violent crime under some effective control in the

districts. Travelling by the high roads during his reign was

comparatively safe; although it must be added that the excessive

exactions of dues and customs very seriously damaged the external

trade. In short, Abdur Rahman's reign produced an important

political revolution, or reformation, in Afghanistan, which

rose from the condition of a country distracted by chronic

civil wars, under rulers whose authority depended upon their

power to hold down or conciliate fierce and semi-independent

tribes in the outlying parts of the dominion, to the rank

of a formidable military state governed autocratically. He

established, for the first time in the history of the Afghan

kingdom, a powerfully centralized administration strong enough

to maintain order and to enforce obedience over all the country

which he had united under his dominion, supported by a force

sufficiently armed and disciplined to put down attempts at

resistance or revolt. His policy, consistently maintained,

was to permit no kind of foreign interference, on any pretext,

with the interior concerns or the economical conditions of his

country. From the British government he accepted supplies of

arms and subsidies of money; but he would make no concessions

in return, and all projects of a strategical or commercial

nature, such as railways and telegraphs, proposed either

for the defence or the development of his possessions, seem

to have been regarded by the amir with extreme distrust,

as methods of what has been called pacific penetration --so

that on these points he was immovable. It was probably due

to the strength and solidity of the executive administration

organized, during his lifetime, by Abdur Rahman that, for

the first time in the records of the dynasty founded by Ahmad

Shah in the latter part of the 18th century, his death was

not followed by disputes over the succession or by civil war.

Succession of Habibullah.--The amir Abdur Rahman died

on the 1st of October 1901; and two days later his eldest

son, Habibullah, formally announced his accession to the

rulership. He was recognized with acclamation by the army,

by the religious bodies, by the principal tribal chiefs and

by all classes of the people as their lawful sovereign; while

a deputation of Indian Mahommedans was despatched to Kabul

from India to convey the condolences and congratulations

of the viceroy. The amir's first measures were designed

to enhance his popularity and to improve his internal

administration, particularly with regard to the relations of

his government with the tribes, and to the system introduced

by the late amir of compulsory military service, whereby

each tribe was required to supply a proportionate number of

recruits. With this object a council of state for tribal

affairs was established; and it was arranged that a

representative of each tribe should be associated with the

provincial governors for the adjudication of tribal cases.

In the important matter of foreign relations Habibullah showed

a determination to adopt the policy of his father, to whom

the British government had given an assurance of aid to repel

foreign aggression, on the condition that the amir should

follow the advice of that government in regard to external

affairs. This condition was loyally observed by the new

amir, who referred to India all communications of an official

kind received from the Russian authorities in the provinces

bordering on Afghanistan. But toward the various questions

left pending between the governments of India and Afghanistan

the new amir maintained also his fatber's attitude. He gave

no indications of a disposition to continue the discussion of

them, or to entertain proposals for extending or altering

his relations with the Indian government. An invitation

from the viceroy to meet him in India, with the hope that

these points might be settled in conference, was put aside

by dilatory excuses, until at last the project was abandoned,

and finally the amir agreed to receive at Kabul a diplomatic

mission. The mission, whose chief was Sir Louis Dane, foreign

secretary to the Indian government, reached Kabul early in

December 1904, and remained there four months in negotiation

with the amir personally and with his representatives. It

was found impossible, after many interviews, to obtain from

Habibullah his consent to any addition to or variation of

the terms of the assurance given by the British government in

1880, with which he professed himself entirely satisfied, so

that the treaty finally settled in March 1905 went no further

than a formal confirmation of all engagements previously

concluded with the amir's predecessor. It was felt in British

circles at the time that a very considerable concession to

Habibullah's independence of attitude was displayed in the fact

that he was styled in the treaty ``His Majesty''; but, in the

circumstances, it seems to have been thought diplomatic to

accede to the amir's determination to insist on this matter of

style. But the rebuff showed that it was desirable in the

interests both of the British government and of Afghanistan

that an opportunity should be made for enabling the amir

to have personal acquaintance with the highest Indian

authorities. A further step, calculated to strengthen the

relations of amity between the two governments, was taken

when it was arranged that the amir should pay a visit to

the viceroy, Lord Minto, in India, in January 1907; and

this visit took place with great cordiality and success.

The Anglo-Russian Convention, signed on the 31st of August 1907,

contained the following important declarations with regard to

Afghanistan. Great Britain disclaimed any intention of altering

the political status or (subject to the observance of the treaty

of 1905) of interfering in the administration or annexing any

territory of Afghanistan, and engaged to use her influence

there in no manner threatening to Russia. Russia, on her part,

recognized Afghanistan as outside her sphere of influence.

AUTHORITIES. ---MacGregor, Gazetteer or Afghanistan

(1871); Elphinstone, Account of the Kingdom of Kabul

(1809); Ferrier, History of the Afghanis (1858); Bellow,

Afghanistan and the Afghans (1879); Baber's Memoirs

(1844); Kaye, History of the War in Afghanistan (1878);

Malleson, History of Afghanistan (1879); Heusman, The

Afghan War (1881); Sir H. M. Durand, The First Afghan War

(1879); Forbes, The Afghan Wars (1892); Rawlinson, England

and Russia in the East (1875); Wyllie, Essays on the

External Policy of India (1875). A. C. Yate, Northern

Afghanistan (1888); Curzon, Problems of the Far East (1894);

Robertson, The Kafir of the Hindu Kush (1896); Holdich,

Indian Borderland (1901); Thorburn, Asiatic Neighbours

(1895); Lord Roberts, Forty-one Years in India (1898); Lady

Betty Balfour, Lord Litton's Indian Administration (1899);

Hanna, Second Afghani War (1899); Gray, At the Court of

the Amir (1895); Sultan Mohammad Khan, Constitution and

Laws of Afghanistan (1900): Life of Abdur Rahinani (1900);

Angus Hamilton, Afghanistan (1906). (H. Y.; A. C. L.)

1 We owe our knowledge of the geology of Afghanistan almost

entirely to the observations of C. U. Grierbach, and a summary

of his researches will be found in Records of the Geological

Survey of India, vol. xx. (1887), pp. 93-103, with map.

AFGHAN TURKESTAN, the most northern province of Afghanistan.

It is bounded on the E. by Badakshan, on the N. by the

Oxus river, on the N.W. and W. by Russia and the Hari Rud

river, and on the S. by the Hindu Lush, the Koh-i-Baba and

the northern watershed of the Hari Rud basin. Its northern

frontier was decided by the Anglo-Russian agreement of 1873;

and delimited by the Russo-Afghan boundary commission of

1883, which gave rise to the Panjdeh incident. The whole

territory, from the junction of the Kokcha river with the

Oxus on the north-east to the province of Herat on the

south-west, is some 500 m. in length, with an average width

from the Russian frontier to the Hindu Kush of 114 m. It thus

comprises about 57,000 sq. m. or roughly' two-ninths of the

kingdom of Afghanistan. Except in the river valleys it is a

poor territory, rough and mountainous towards the south, but

subsiding into undulating wastes and pasture-lands towards

the Turkman desert, and the Oxus riverain which is highly

cultivated. The population, which is mostly agricultural,

settled in and around its towns and villages, is estimated at

750,000. The province includes the khanates of Kunduz, Tashkurgan,

Balkh with Akcha; the western khanates of Saripul, Shibarghan,

Andkhui and Maimana, sometimes classed together as the Chahar

Vidayet, or ``Four Domains''; and such parts of the Hazara

tribes as lie north of the Hindu Kush and its prolongation.

The principal town is Mazar-i-Sharif, which in modern times

has supplanted the ancient city of Balkh; and Takhtapul, near

Mazar, is the chief Afghan cantonment north of the Hindu Kush.

Ethnically and historically Afghan Turkestan is more

connected with Bokhara than with Kabul, of which government

it has been a dependency only since the time of Dost

Mahommed. The bulk of the people of the cities are of

Persian and Uzbeg stock, but interspersed with them are

Mongol Hazaras and Hindus with Turkoman tribes in the Oxus

plains. Over these races the Afghans rule as conquerors and

there is no bond of racial unity between them. Ancient Balkh

or Bactriana was a province of the Achaemenian empire, and

probably was occupied in great measure by a race of Iranian

blood. About 250 B.C. Diodotus (Theodotus), governor of

Bactria under the Seleucidae, declared his independence, and

commenced the history of the Greco-Bactrian dynasties, which

succumbed to Parthian and nomadic movements about 126 B.C.

After this came a Buddhist era which has left its traces in

the gigantic sculptures at Bamian and the rock-cut topes of

Haibak. The district was devastated by Jenghiz Khan, and

has never since fully recovered its prosperity. For about

a century it belonged to the Delhi empire, and then fell

into Uzbeg hands. In the 18th century it formed part of the

dominion of Ahmad Khan Durani, and so remained under his son

Timur. But under the fratricidal wars of Timur's sons the

separate khanates fell back under the independent rule of

various Uzbeg chiefs. At the beginning of the 19th century

they belonged to Bokhara; but under the great amir Dost

Mahommed the Afghans recovered Balkh and Tashkurgan in 1850,

Akcha and the four western khanates in 1855, and Kunduz in

1859. The sovereignty over Andkhui, Shibarghan, Saripul and

Maimana was in dispute between Bokhara and Kabul until settled

by the Anglo-Russian agreement of 1873 in favour of the Afghan

claim. Under the strong rule of Abdur Rahman these outlying

territories were closely welded to Kabul; but after the

accession of Habibullah the bonds once more relaxed. (T. H. Ut.v)

AFIUM-KARA-HISSAR (afium, opium), the popular name of

Kara-hissar Sahib, a city of Asiatic Turkey, in the vilayet

of Brusa, nearly 200 m. E. of Smyrna, and 50 m. S.S.E. of

Kutaiah. Pop. 18,000 (Moslems, 13,000; Christians, 5000).

Called Nicopolis by Leo III. after his victory over the

Arabs in 740, its name was changed by the Seljuk Turks to

Kara-hissar. It stands partly on level ground, partly on a

declivity, and above it rises a precipitous trachytic rock

(400 ft.) on the summit of which are the ruins of an ancient

castle. From its situation on the route of the caravans

between Smyrna and western Asia on the one hand, and Armenia,

Georgia, &c., on the other, the city became a place of

extensive trade, and its bazaars are well stocked with the

merchandise of both Europe and the East. Opium in large

quantities is produced in its vicinity and forms the staple

article of its commerce; and there are, besides, manufactures

of black felts, carpets, arms and saddlery. Afium contains

several mosques (one of them a very handsome building), and

is the seat of an Armenian bishop. The town is connected

by railway with Smyrna, Konia, Angora and Constantinople.

See V. Cuinet, Turquie d'Asie (Paris, 1894), vol. iv.

A FORTIORI (Lat. ``from a stronger [reason]''), a term

used of an argument which justifies a statement not itself

specifically demonstrated by reference to a proved conclusion

which includes it; thus, if A is proved less than B, and

is known to be greater than C, it follows a fortiori that

C is less than B without further proof. The argument is

frequently based merely on a comparison of probabilities (cf.

Matt. vi. 30), when it constitutes an appeal to common sense.

AFRANIUS, LUCIUS, Roman general, lived in the times of

the Sertorian (79-72), third Mithradatic (74-61) and Civil

Wars. Of humble origin (Cic. ad Att. i. 16. 20), from

his early years he was a devoted adherent of Pompey. In 60,

chiefly by Pompey's support, he was raised to the consulship,

but in performing the duties of that office he showed an

utter incapacity to manage civil affairs. In the following

year, while governor of Cisalpine Gaul, he obtained the honour

of a triumph, and on the allotment of Spain to Pompey (55),

Afranius and Marcus Petreius were sent to take charge of the

government. On the rupture between Caesar and Pompey they were

compelled, after a short campaign in which they were at first

successful, to surrender to Caesar at Ilerda (49), and were

dismissed on promising not to serve again in the war. Afranius,

regardless of his promise, joined Pompey at Dyrrhachium,

and at the battle of Pharsalus (48) had charge of Pompey's

camp. On the defeat of Pompey, Afranius, despairing of pardon

from Caesar, went to Africa, and was present at the disastrous

battle of Thapsus (46). Escaping from the field with a strong

body of cavalry, he was afterwards taken prisoner, along with

Faustus Sulla, by the troops of Sittius, and handed over to

Caesar, whose veterans rose in tumult and put them to death.

See Hirtius, Bell. Afric. 95; Plutarch, Pompey; Dio Cassius

xxxvii., xli.-xliii.; Caesar, B.C i. 57-87; Appian, B.C ii.;

for the history of the period, articles on CAESAR and POMPEY.

AFRANIUS, LUCIUS, Roman comic poet, flourished about 94

B.C. His comedies chiefly dealt with everyday subjects

from Roman middle-class life, and he himself tells us that

he borrowed freely from Menander and others. His style was

vigorous and correct; his moral tone that of the period.

Horace, Epp. ii. 1. 57; Cicero, Brutus, 45, de Fin.

i. 3; Quitilian x 1. 100; fragments, about 400 lines, in

Ribbeck, Scaenicae Romanorum Poesis Fragmenta, ii. (1898).

AFRICA, the name of a continent representing the largest of

the three great southward projections from the main mass of

the earth's surface. It includes within its remarkably regular

outline an area, according to the most recent computations,

of 11,262,000 sq. m., excluding the islands.1 Separated from

Europe by the Mediterranean Sea, it is joined to Asia at its

N.E. extremity by the Isthmus of Suez, 80 m. wide. From the

most northerly point, Ras ben Sakka, a little west of Cape

Blanc, in 37 deg. 21' N., to the most southerly point, Cape

Agulhas, 34 deg. 51' 15'' S., is a distance approximately of

5000 m.; from Cape Verde, 17 deg. 33' 22'' W., the westernmost

point, to Ras Hafun, 51 deg. 27' 52'' E., the most easterly

projection, is a distance (also approximately) of 4600 m.

The length of coast-line is 16,100 m. and the absence of deep

indentations of the shore is shown by the fact that Europe,

which covers only 3,760,000 sq. m., has a coast-line of 19,800 m.

I. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY

The main structural lines of the continent show both the

east-to-west direction characteristic, at least in the eastern

hemisphere, of the more northern parts of the world, and the

north-to-south direction seen in the southern peninsulas. Africa

is thus composed of two segments at right angles, the northern

running from east to west, the southern from north to south, the

subordinate lines corresponding in the main to these two directions.

Main Geographical Features.--The mean elevation of the

continent approximates closely to 2000 ft., which is roughly

the elevation of both North and South America, but is

considerably less than that of Asia (3117 ft.). In contrast

with the other continents it is marked by the comparatively

small area both of very high and of very low ground, lands

under 600 ft. occupying an unusually small part of the surface;

while not only are the highest elevations inferior to those

of Asia and South America, but the area of land over 10,000

ft. is also quite insignificant, being represented almost

entirely by individual peaks and mountain ranges. Moderately

elevated tablelands are thus the characteristic feature of the

continent, though the surface of these is broken by higher

peaks and ridges. (So prevalent are these isolated peaks and

ridges that a special term [Inselberg-landschaft] has been

adopted in Germany to describe this kind of country, which

is thought to be in great part the result of wind action.)

As a general rule, the higher tablelands lie to the east and

south, while a progressive diminution in altitude towards the

west and north is observable. Apart from the lowlands and

the Atlas range, the continent may be divided into two regions

of higher and lower plateaus, the dividing line (somewhat

concave to the north-west) running from the middle of the

Red Sea to about 6 deg. S. on the west coast. We thus obtain

the following four main divisions of the continent:---(1) The

coast plains---often fringed seawards by mangrove swamps--never

stretching far from the coast, except on the lower courses of

streams. Recent alluvial flats are found chiefly in the delta

of the more important rivers. Elsewhere the coast lowlands

merely form the lowest steps of the system of terraces which

constitutes the ascent to the inner plateaus. (2) The Atlas

range, which, orographically, is distinct from the rest of

the continent, being unconnected with any other area of high

ground, and separated from the rest of the continent on the south

by a depressed and desert area (the Sahara), in places below

sea-level. (3) The high southern and eastern plateaus, rarely

falling below 2000 ft., and having a mean elevation of about

3500 ft. (4) The north and west African plains, bordered and

traversed by bands of higher ground, but generally below 2000

ft. This division includes the great desert of the Sahara.

The third and fourth divisions may be again subdivided.

Thus the high plateaus include:--(a) The South African

plateau as far as about 12 deg. S., bounded east, west and

south by bands of high ground which fall steeply to the

coasts. On this account South Africa has a general resemblance

to an inverted saucer. Due south the plateau rim is formed

by three parallel steps with level ground between them. The

largest of these level areas, the Great Karroo, is a dry,

barren region, and a large tract of the plateau proper is

of a still more arid character and is known as the Kalahari

Desert. The South African plateau is connected towards the

north-east with (b) the East African plateau, with probably a

slightly greater average elevation, and marked by some distinct

features. It is formed by a widening out of the eastern

axis of high ground, which becomes subdivided into a number

of zones running north and south and consisting in turn of

ranges, tablelands and depressions. The most striking feature

is the existence of two great lines of depression, due largely

to the subsidence of whole segments of the earth's crust, the

lowest parts of which are occupied by vast lakes. Towards

the south the two lines converge and give place to one great

valley (occupied by Lake Nyasa), the southern part of which

is less distinctly due to rifting and subsidence than the

rest of the system. Farther north the western depression,

sometimes known as the Central African trough or Albertine

rift-valley, is occupied for more than half its length by

water, forming the four lakes of Tanganyika, Kivu, Albert

Edward and Albert, the first-named over 400 m. long and the

longest freshwater lake in the world. Associated with these

great valleys are a number of volcanic peaks, the greatest

of which occur on a meridional line east of the eastern

trough. The eastern depression, known as the East African

trough or rift-valley, contains much smaller lakes, many of

them brackish and without outlet, the only one comparable

to those of the western trough being Lake Rudolf or Basso

Norok. At no great distance east of this rift-valley are

Kilimanjaro--with its two peaks Kibo and Mawenzi, the former

19,321 ft., and the culminating point of the whole continent--and

Kenya (17,007 ft.). Hardly less important is the Ruwenzori

range (over 16,600 ft.), which lies east of the western

trough. Other volcanic peaks rise from the floor of the

valleys, some of the Kirunga (Mfumbiro) group, north of Lake

Kivu, being still partially active. (c) The third division

of the higher region of Africa is formed by the Abyssinian

highlands, a rugged mass of mountains forming the largest

continuous area of its altitude in the whole continent, little

of its surface falling below 5000 ft., while the summits

reach heights of 15,000 to 16,000 ft. This block of country

lies just west of the line of the great East African trough,

the northern continuation of which passes along its eastern

escarpment as it runs up to join the Red Sea. There is,

however, in the centre a circular basin occupied by Lake Tsana.

Both in the east and west of the continent the bordering

highlands are continued as strips of plateau parallel to the

coast, the Abyssinian mountains being continued northwards

along the Red Sea coast by a series of ridges reaching in

places a height of 7000 ft. In the west the zone of high

land is broader but somewhat lower. The most mountainous

districts lie inland from the head of the Gulf of Guinea

(Adamawa, &c.), where heights of 6000 to 8000 ft. are

reached. Exactly at the head of the gulf the great peak

of the Cameroon, on a line of Volcanic action continued

by the islands to the south-west, has a height of 13,370

ft., while Clarence Peak, in Fernando Po, the first of the

line of islands, rises to over 9000. Towards the extreme

west the Futa Jallon highlands form an important diverging

point of rivers, but beyond this, as far as the Atlas

chain, the elevated rim of the continent is almost wanting.

The area between the east and west coast highlands, which north

of 17 deg. N. is mainly desert, is divided into separate basins by

other bands of high ground, one of which runs nearly centrally

through North Africa in a line corresponding roughly with the

curved axis of the continent as a whole. The best marked of

the basins so formed (the Congo basin) occupies a circular area

bisected by the equator, once probably the site of an inland

sea. The arid region, the Sahara--the largest desert in the

world, covering 3,500,000 sq. m.--extends from the Atlantic to

the Red Sea. Though generally of slight elevation it contains

mountain ranges with peaks rising to 8000 ft. Bordered N.W.

by the Atlas range, to the N.E. a rocky plateau separates it

from the Mediterranean; this plateau gives place at the extreme

east to the delta of the Nile. That river (see below) pierces

the desert without modifying its character. The Atlas range,

the north-westerly part of the continent, between its seaward

and landward heights encloses elevated steppes in places 100 m.

broad. From the inner slopes of the plateau numerous wadis

take a direction towards the Sahara. The greater part of that

now desert region is, indeed, furrowed by old water-channels.

The following table gives the approximate altitudes

of the chief mountains and lakes of the continent:--

Mountains. Ft. Lakes. Ft.

Rungwe (Nyasa) . 10,400 Chad . . . . 8502

Drakensberg . . 10,7002 Leopold II . . 1100

Lereko or Sattima . 13,2143 Rudolf . . . 1250

(Aberdare Range) Nyasa . . . 16453

Cameroon . . 13,370 Albert Nyanza . 20282

Elgon . . . 14,1523 Tanganyika . . 26243

Karissimbi . . Ngami . . . . 2950

(Mfumbiro) . 14,6833 Mweru . . . . 3000

Meru . . . 14,9553 Albert Edward . 30043

Taggharat (Atlas) . 15,0002 Bangweulu. . . 3700

Simen Mountains, . 15,1602 Victoria Nyanza. 37203

Abyssinia Abai . . . . 4200

Ruwenzori . . 16,6193 Kivu . . . . 48293

Kenya . . . 17,0073 Tsana . . . . 5690

Kilimanjaro . . 19,3213 Naivasha . . . 61353

The Hydrographic Systems.---From the outer margin of the

African plateaus a large number of streams run to the sea

with comparatively short courses, while the larger rivers flow

for long distances on the interior highlands before breaking

through the outer ranges. The main drainage of the continent

is to the north and west, or towards the basin of the Atlantic

Ocean. The high lake plateau of East Africa contains the

head-waters of the Nile and Congo: the former the longest,

the latter the largest river of the continent. The upper

Nile receives its chief supplies from the mountainous region

adjoining the Central African trough in the neighbourhood

of the equator. Thence streams pour east to the Victoria

Nyanza, the largest African lake (covering over 26,000 sq.

m.), and west and north to the Albert Edward and Albert

Nyanzas, to the latter of which the effluents of the other

two lakes add their waters. Issuing from it the Nile flows

north, and between 7 deg. and 10 deg. N. traverses a vast marshy

level during which its course is liable to blocking by floating

vegetation. After receiving the Bahr-el-Ghazal from the

west and the Sobat, Blue Nile and Atbara from the Abyssinian

highlands (the chief gathering ground of the flood-water),

it crosses the great desert and enters the Mediterranean by

a vast delta. The most remote head-stream of the Congo is

the Chambezi, which flows south-west into the marshy Lake

Bangweulu. From this lake issues the Congo, known in its

upper course by various names. Flowing first south, it

afterwards turns north through Lake Mweru and descends to the

forest-clad basin of west equatorial Africa. Traversing this

in a majestic northward curve and receiving vast supplies of

water from many great tributaries, it finally turns south-west

and cuts a way to the Atlantic Ocean through the western

highlands. North of the Congo basin and separated from it

by a broad undulation of the surface is the basin of Lake

Chad---a flat-shored, shallow lake filled principally by the

Shad coming from the south-east. West of this is the basin

of the Niger, the third river of Africa, which, though flowing

to the Atlantic, has its principal source in the far west,

and reverses the direction of flow exhibited by the Nile and

Congo. An important branch, however--the Benue--comes from the

south-east. These four river-basins occupy the greater part

of the lower plateaus of North and West Africa, the remainder

consisting of arid regions watered only by intermittent streams

which do not reach the sea. Of the remaining rivers of the

Atlantic basin the Orange, in the extreme south, brings the

drainage from the Drakensberg on the opposite side of the

continent, while the Kunene, Kwanza, Ogowe and Sanaga drain

the west corst highlands of the southern limb; the Volta,

Komoe, Bandama, Gambia and Senegal the highlands of the western

limb. North of the Senegal for over 1000 m. of coast the

arid region reaches to the Atlantic. Farther north are the

streams, with comparatively short courses, which reach

the Atlantic and Mediterranean from the Atlas mountains.

Of the rivers flowing to the Indian Ocean the only one draining

any large part of the interior plateaus is the Zambezi,

whose western branches rise in the west coast highlands.

The main stream has its rise in 11 deg. 21' 3'' S. 24 deg. 22' E.

at an elevation of 5000 ft. It flows west and south for a

considerable distance before turning to the east. All the

largest tributaries, including the Shire, the outflow of Lake

Nyasa, flow down the southern slopes of the band of high ground

which stretches across the conbnent in 10 deg. to 12 deg. S. In

the south-west the Zambezi system interlaces with that of the

Taukhe (or Tioghe), from which it at times receives surplus

water. The rest of the water of the Taukhe, known in its

middle course as the Okavango, is lost in a system of swamps

and saltpans which formerly centred in Lake Ngami, now dried

up. Farther south the Limpopo drains a portion of the

interior plateau but breaks through the bounding highlands

on the side of the continent nearest its source. The Rovuma,

Rufiji, Tana, Juba and Webi Shebeli principally drain the

outer slopes of the East African highlands, the last named

losing itself in the sands in close proximity to the sea.

Another large stream, the Hawash, rising in the Abyssinian

mountains, is lost in a saline depression near the Gulf of

Aden. Lastly, between the basins of the Atlantic and Indian

Oceans there is an area of inland drainage along the centre

of the East African plateau, directed chiefly into the lakes

in the great rift-valley. The largest river is the Omo,

which, fed by the rains of the Abyssinian highlands, carries

down a large body of water into Lake Rudolf. The rivers

of Africa are generally obstructed either by bars at their

mouths or by cataracts at no great distance up-stream.

But when these obstacles have been overcome the rivers and

lakes afford a network of navigable waters of vast extent.

The calculation of the areas of African drainage systems,

made by Dr A. Bludau (Petermanns Mitteilungen, 43,

1897, pp. 184-186) gives the following general results:--

Basin of the Atlantic . . . . . 4,070,000 sq. m.

'' '' Mediterranean . . . 1,680,000 ''

'' '' Indian Ocean . . . . 2,086,000 ''

Inland drainage area . . . . . 3,452,000 ''

The areas of individual river-basins are:--

Congo (length over 3000 m.) . . 1,425,000 sq. m.

Nile ( '' fully 4000 m.) . . 1,082,0004 ''

Niger ( '' about 2600 m.) . . 808,0005 ''

Zambezi ( '' '' 2000 m.) . . 513,500 ''

Lake Chad . . . . . . . . . 394,000 ''

Orange (length about 1300 m.) . . 370,505 ''

'' (actual drainage area) . . 172,500 ''

The area of the Congo basin is greater than that of any

other river except the Amazon, while the African inland

drainage area is greater than that of any continent but

Asia, in which the corresponding area is 4,000,000 sq. m.

The principal African lakes have been mentioned in the description

of the East African plateau, but some of the phenomena connected

with them may be spoken of more particularly here. As a rule

the lakes which occupy portions of the great rift-valleys have

steep sides and are very deep. This is the case with the two

largest of the type, Tanganyika and Nyasa, the latter of which

has depths of 430 fathoms. Others, however, are shallow,

and hardly, reach the steep sides of the valleys in the dry

season. Such are Lake Rukwa, in a subsidiary depression north

of Nyasa, and Eiassi and Manyara in the system of the eastern

rift-valley. Lakes of the broad type are of moderate depth,

the deepest sounding in Victoria Nyanza being under 50

fathoms. Apart from the seasonal variations of level, most

of the lakes show periodic fluctuations, while a progressive

desiccation of the whole region is said to be traceable,

tending to the ultimate disappearance of the lakes. Such a

drying up has been in progress during long geologic ages, but

doubt exists as to its practical importance at the present

time. The periodic fluctuations in the level of Lake Tanganyika

are such that its outllow is intermittent. Besides the East

African lakes the principal are:---Lake Chad, in the northern

area of inland drainage; Bangweulu and Mweru, traversed by the

head-stream of the Congo; and Leopold II. and Ntomba (Mantumba),

within the great bend of that river. All, exceot possibly

Mweru, are more or less shallow, and Chad appears to by drying

up. The altitudes of the African lakes have already been stated.

Divergent opinions have been beld as to the mode of origin

of the East African lakes, especially Tanganyika, which some

geologists have considered to represent an old arm of the

sea, dating from a time when the whole central Congo basin

was under water; others holding that the lake water has

accumulated in a depression caused by subsidence. The former

view is based on the existence in the lake of organisms

of a decidedly marine type. They include a jelly-fish,

molluscs, prawns, crabs, &c., and were at first considered

to form an isolated group found in no other of the African

lakes; but this supposition has been proved to be erroneous.

Islands.--With one exception---Madagascar--the African islands

are small. Madagascar, with an area of 229,820 sq. m., is,

after New Guinea and Borneo, the largest island of the world.

It lies off the S.E. coast of the continent, from which

it is separated by the deep Mozambique channel, 250 m.

wide at its narrowest point. Madagascar in its general

structure, as in flora and fauna, forms a connecting link

between Africa and southern Asia. East of Madagascar are

the small islands of Mauritius and Reunion. Sokotra lies

E.N.E. of Cape Guardafui. Off the north-west coast are

the Canary and Cape Verde archipelagoes. which, like some

small islands in the Gulf of Guinea, are of volcanic origin.

Climate and Health.---Lying almost entirely within the

tropics, and equally to north and south of the equator,

Africa does not show excessive variations of temperature.

Great heat is experienced in the lower plains and desert

regions of North Africa, removed by the great width of the

continent from the influence of the ocean, and here, too,

the contrast between day and night, and between summer and

winter, is greatest. (The rarity of the air and the great

radiation during the night cause the temperature in the Sahara

to fall occasionally to freezing point.) Farther south, the

heat is to some extent modified by the moisture brought from

the ocean, and by the greater elevation of a large part of

the surface, especially in East Africa, where the range of

temperature is wider than in the Congo basin or on the Guinea

coast. In the extreme north and south the climate is a warm

temperate one, the northern countries being on the whole

hotter and drier than those in the southern zone; the south

of the continent being narrower than the north, the influence

of the surrounding ocean is more felt. The most important

climatic differences are due to variations in the amount of

rainfall. The wide heated plains of the Sahara, and in a

lesser degree the corresponding zone of the Kalahari in the

south, have an exceedingly scanty rainfall, the winds which

blow over them from the ocean losing part of their moisture

as they pass over the outer highlands, and becoming constantly

drier owing to the heating effects of the burning soil of the

interior; while the scarcity of mountain ranges in the more

central parts likewise tends to prevent condensation. In

the inter-tropical zone of summer precipitation, the rainfall

is greatest when the sun is vertical or soon after. It is

therefore greatest of all near the equator, where the sun is

twice vertical, and less in the direction of both tropics.

The rainfall zones are, however, somewhat deflected from a

due west-to-east direction, the drier northern conditions

extending southwards along the east coast, and those of the

south northwards along the west. Within the equatorial zone

certain areas, especially on the shores of the Gulf of Guinea

and in the upper Nile basin, have an intensified rainfall,

but this rarely approaches that of the rainiest regions of the

world. The rainiest district in all Africa is a strip of

coastland west of Mount Cameroon, where there is a mean

annual rainfall of about 390 in. as compared with a mean of

458 in. at Cherrapunji, in Assam. The two distinct rainy

seasons of the equatorial zone, where the sun is vertical at

half-yearly intervals, become gradually merged into one in

the direction of the tropics, where the sun is overhead but

once. Snow falls on all the higher mountain ranges, and on

the highest the climate is thoroughly Alpine. The countries

bordering the Sahara are much exposed to a very dry wind, full

of fine particles of sand, blowing from the desert towards the

sea. Known in Egypt as the khamsin, on the Mediterranean as the

sirocco, it is called on the Guinea coast the harmattan. This

wind is not invariably hot; its great dryness causes so much

evaporation that cold is not infrequently the result. Similar

dry winds blow from the Kalahari in the south. On the eastern

coast the monsoons of the Indian Ocean are regularly felt,

and on the south-east hurricanes are occasionally experienced.

While the climate of the north and south, especially the south,

is eminently healthy, and even the intensely heated Sahara is

salubrious by reason of its dryness, the tropical zone as a

whole is, for European races, the most unhealthy portion of the

world. This is especially the case in the lower and moister

regions, such as the west coast, where malarial fever is

very prevalent and deadly; the most unfavourable factors

being humidity with absence of climatic variation (daily or

seasonal). The higher plateaus, where not only is the average

temperature lower, but such variations are more extensive,

are more healthy; and in certain localities (e.g. Abyssinia

and parts of British East Africa) Europeans find the climate

suitable for permanent residence. On tablelands over 6500

ft. above the sea, frost is not uncommon at night, even in

places directly under the equator. The acclimatization of

white men in tropical Africa generally is dependent largely

on the successful treatment of tropical diseases. Districts

which had been notoriously deadly to Europeans were rendered

comparatively healthy after the discovery, in 1899, of the species

of mosquito which propagates malarial fever, and the measures

thereafter taken for its destruction and the filling up of

swamps. The rate of mortality among the natives from tropical

diseases is also high, one of the most fatal being that known

as sleeping sickness. (The ravages of this disease, which

also attacks Europeans, reached alarming proportions between

1893 and 1907, and in the last-named year an international

conference was held in London to consider measures to

combat it.) When removed to colder regions natives of the

equatorial districts suffer greatly from chest complaints.

Smallpox also makes great ravages among the negro population.

Flora.--The vegetation of Africa follows very closely

the distribution of heat and moisture. The northern and

southern temperate zones have a flora distinct from that

of the continent generally, which is tropical. In the

countries bordering the Mediterranean are groves of oranges

and olive trees, evergreen oaks, cork trees and pines,

intermixed with cypresses, myrtles, arbutus and fragrant

tree-heaths. South of the Atlas range the conditions

alter. The zones of minimum rainfall have a very scanty

flora, consisting of plants adapted to resist the great

dryness. Characteristic of the Sahara is the date-palm,

which flourishes where other vegetation can scarcely maintain

existence, while in the semidesert regions the acacia (whence

is obtained gum-arabic) is abundant. The more humid regions

have a richer vegetation --dense forest where the rainfall

is greatest and variations of temperature least, conditions

found chiefly on the tropical coasts, and in the west African

equatorial basin with its extension towards the upper Nile;

and savanna interspersed with trees on the greater part of the

plateaus, passing as the desert regions are approached into a

scrub vegetation consisting of thorny acacias, &c. Forests also

occur on the humid slopes of mountain ranges up to a certain

elevation. In the coast regions the typical tree is the

mangrove, which flourishes wherever the soil is of a swamp

character. The dense forests of West Africa contain, in

addition to a great variety of dicotyledonous trees, two

palms, the Elaeis guincensis (oil-palm) and Raphia

vinifera (bamboo-palm), not found, generally speaking, in

the savanna regions. The bombax or silk-cotton tree attains

gigantic proportions in the forests, which are the home of

the indiarubber-producing plants and of many valuable kinds

of timber trees, such as odum (Chlorophora excelsa),

ebony, mahogany (Khaya senegalensis), African teak or

oak (Oldfieldia africana) and camwood (Baphia nitida.)

The climbing plants in the tropical forests are exceedingly

luxuriant and the undergrowth or ``bush'' is extremely

dense. In the savannas the most characteristic trees are

the monkey bread tree or baobab (Adanisonia digitata), doom

palm (Hyphaene) and euphorbias. The coffee plant grows

wild in such widely separated places as Liberia and southern

Abyssinia. The higher mountains have a special flora

showing close agreement over wide intervals of space, as

well as affinities with the mountain flora of the eastern

Mediterranean, the Himalayas and Indo-China (cf. A. Engler,

Uber die Hochgebirgsflora des tropischen Afrika, 1892).

In the swamp regions of north-east Africa the papyrus and

associated plants, including the soft-wooded ambach, flourish

in immense quantities---and little else is found in the way of

vegetation. South Africa is largely destitute of forest

save in the lower valleys and coast regions. Tropical flora

disappears, and in the semi-desert plains the fleshy, leafless,

contorted species of kapsias, mesembryanthemums, aloes and

other succulent plants make their appearance. There are, too,

valuable timber trees, such as the yellow pine (Podocarpus

elongatus), stinkwood (Ocotea), sneezewood or Cape ebony

(Pteroxylon utile) and ironwood. Extensive miniature woods

of heaths are found in almost endless variety and covered

throughout the greater part of the year with innumerable

blossoms in which red is very prevalent. Of the grasses of

Africa alfa is very abundant in the plateaus of the Atlas range.

Fauna.--The fauna again shows the effect of the characteristics

of the vegetation. The open savannas are the home of large

ungulates, especially antelopes, the giraffe (peculiar to

Africa), zebra, buffalo, wild ass and four species of

rhinoceros; and of carnivores, such as the lion, leopard,

hyaena, &c. The okapi (a genus restricted to Africa) is

found only in the dense forests of the Congo basin. Bears

are confined to the Atlas region, wolves and foxes to North

Africa. The elephant (though its range has become restricted

through the attacks of hunters) is found both in the savannas

and forest regions, the latter being otherwise poor in large

game, though the special habitat of the chimpanzee and gorilla.

Baboons and mandrills, with few exceptions, are peculiar to

Africa. The single-humped camel--as a domestic animal--is

especially characteristic of the northern deserts and steppes.

The rivers in the tropical zone abound with hippopotami and

crocodiles, the former entirely confined to Africa. The vast

herds of game, formerly so characteristic of many parts of Africa,

have much diminished with the increase of intercourse with the

interior. Game reserves have, however, been established in South

Africa, British Central Africa, British East Africa, Somahland,

&c., while measures for the protection of wild animals were

laid down in an international convention signed in May 1900.

The ornithology of northern Affica presents a close resemblance

to that of southern Europe, scarcely a species being found

which does not also occur in the other countries bordering the

Mediterranean. Among the birds most characteristic of Africa

are the ostrich and the secretary-bird. The ostrich is widely

dispersed, but is found chiefly in the desert and steppe

regions. The secretary-bird is common in the south. The weaver

birds and their allies, including the long-tailed whydahs,

are abundant, as are, among game-birds, the francolin and

guinea-fowl. Nany of the smaller birds, such as the sun-birds,

bee-eaters, the parrots and halcyons, as well as the larger

plantain-eaters, are noted for the brilliance of their

plumage. Of reptiles the lizard and chameleon are common, and

there are a number of venomous serpents, though these are not

so numerous as in other tropical countries. The scorpion is

abundant. Of insects Africa has many thousand different

kinds; of these the locust is the proverbial scourge of the

continent, and the ravages of the termites or white ants

are almost incredible. The spread of malaria by means of

mosquitoes has already been mentioned. The tsetse fly,

whose bite is fatal to all domestic animals, is common

in many districts of South and East Africa. Fortunately

it is found nowhere outside Africa. (E. HE.; F. R. C.)

1 With the islands, 11,498,000 sq. m.

2 Estimated.

3 See the calculations of Capt. T. T.

Behrens, Geog. Journal, vol. xxix. (1907).

4 The estimate of Capt. H. G. Lyons in 1905 was 1,107,227 sq. mi.

5 including waterless tracts naturally belonging to the river-basin.

II. GEOLOGY

In shape and general geological structure Africa bears

a close resemblance to India. Both possess a meridional

extension with a broad east and west folded region in the

north. In both a successive series of continental deposits,

ranging from the Carboniferous to the Rhaetic, rests on an

older base of crystalline rocks. In the words of Professor

Suess, ``India and Africa are true plateau countries.''

Of the primitive axes of Africa few traces remain. Both on

the east and west a broad zone of crystalline rochs extends

parallel with the coast-line to form the margin of the elevated

plateau of the interior. Occasionally the crystalline belt

comes to the coast, but it is usually reached by two steps known

as the coastal belt and foot-plateau. On the flanks of the

primitive western axis certain ancient sedimentary strata are

thrown into folds which were completed before the commencement

of the mesozoic period. In the south, the later palaeozoic

rocks are also thrown into acute folds by a movement acting

from the south, and which ceased towards the close of the

mesozoic period. In northern Africa the folded region of the

Atlas belongs to the comparatively recent date of the Alpine

system. None of these earth movements affected the interior,

for here the continental mesozoic deposits rest, undisturbed by

folding, on the primary sedimentary and crystalline rocks. The

crystalline massif, therefore, presents a solid block which

has remained elevated since early palaeozoic times, and against

which earth waves of several geological periods have broken.

The formations older than the mesozoic are remarkably

unfossiliferous, so that the determination of their age is

frequently a matter of speculation, and in the following table

the European equivalents of the pre-Karroo formations in many

regions must be regarded as subject to considerable revision.

Rocks of Archean age cover wide areas in the interior, in

West and East Africa and across the Sahara. Along the coastal

margins they underlie the newer formations and appear in the

deep valleys and kloofs wherever denudation has laid them

bare. The prevailing types are granites, gneisses and

schists. In the central regions the predominant strike of the

fohae is north and south. The rocks, for convenience classed as

pre-Cambrian, occur as several unconformable groups, chiefly

developed in the south where alone their stratigraphy has been

determined. They are unfossiliferous, and in the absence of

undoubted Cambrian, Ordovician and Silurian strata in Africa

they may be regarded as of older date than any of these

formations. The general occurrence of jasper-bearing rocks

is of interest, as these are always present in the ancient

pressure-altered sedimentary formations of America and

Europe. Some unfossiliferous conglomerates, sandstones

and dolomites in South Africa and on the west coast are

considered to belong to the Cambrian, Ordovician and Silurian

formations, but merely from their occurrence beneath strata

yielding Devonian fossils. In Cape Colony the Silurian age

of the Table Mountain Sandstone is based on such evidence.

The Devonian and Carboniferous formations are well

represented in the north and south and in northern Angola.

Up to the close of the palaeozoic period the relative positions

of the ancient land masses and oceans remain unsolved; but the

absence of marine strata of early palaeozoic age from Central

Africa points to there being land in this direction. In late

Carboniferous times Africa and India were undoubtedly united to

form a large continent, called by Suess Gondwana Land. In each

country the same succession of the rocks is met with; over both

the same specialized orders of reptiles roamed and were entombed.

The interior of the African portion of Gondwana Land

was occupied by several large lakes in which an immense

thickness--amounting to over 18,000 ft. in South Africa---of

sandstones and marls, forming the Karroo system, was laid

down. This is par excellence the African formation,

and covers immense areas in South Africa and the Congo

basin, with detached portions in East Africa. During the

whole of the time---Carboniferous to Rhaetic--that this

great accumulation of freshwater beds was taking place,

the interior of the continent must have been undergoing

depression. The commencement of the period was marked by one

of the most wonderful episodes in the geological history of

Africa. Preserved in the formation known as the Dwyka

Conglomerate, are evidences that at this time the greater

portion of South Africa was undergoing extreme glaciation,

while the same conditions appear to have prevailed in India

TABLE OF FORMATIONS

Sedimentary. Igneous.

Recent Alluvium; travertine;

coral; sand dunes; continental } Some volcanic islands;

dunes. Generally distributed } rift-valley volcanoes.

Pleistocene. Ancient alluviums and }

gravels; travertine. }

Generally distributed. } A long-continued

Pliocene. N. Africa; Madagascar. } succession in the

} central and northern

Miocene. N. Africa. } regions and among

} the island groups.

Oligocene. N. Africa. } Doubtfully represented

} south of the Zambezi.

Eocene. N. Africa, along east and }

west coasts; Madagascar. }

Cretaceous Extensively developed in } Diamond pipes of S.

N. Africa; along coast } Africa; Kaptian

and foot-plateaus in east } fissure eruptions;

and west; Madagascar. } Ashangi traps of

} Abyssinia

{Jurassic N. Africa; E. Africa;

K{ Madagascar; Stormberg } Chief volcanic period

a{ period (Rhaeric) in S. } in S. Africa

r{ Africa }

r{Trias. Beaufort Series in S. }

o{ Africa; Congo basin; }

o{ Central Africa; Algeria; }

{ Tunis. }

{Permian. Ecca Series in S. Africa. } Feebly, if anywhere

} developed.

Carboniferous. N. Africa; Sabaki Shales }

in E. Africa; Dwyka }

and Wittebery Series in }

South Africa }

Devonian. N. Africa; Angola; Bokkeveld } Not recorded.

Series in S. Africa }

Silurian. {Table Mountain Sandstone }

{ in S. Africa, Silurian(?). }

Ordovician. { Doubtfully represented } Klipriversberg and

{ in N. Africa, French } and Ventersdorp Series

Cambrian { Congo, Angola. and by } of the Transvaal (?).

{ Vaal River and Waterberg }

{ Series in S. Africa }

Pre-Cambrian. Quartzites, conglomerates }

phyllites, jasper-bearing } S. Africa and generally.

rocks and schists. }

Generally distributed. }

Archeaan. Gneisses and schists of the } Igneous complex of

continental platform. } sheared igneous

} rocks;granites.

and Australia. At the close of the Karroo period there

was a remarkable manifestation of volcanic activity which

again has its parallel in the Deccan traps of India.

How far the Karroo formation extended beyond its present

confines has not been determined. To the east it reached

India. In the south all that can be said is that it extended

to the south of Worcester in Cape Colony. The Crystal

Mountains of Angola may represent its western boundary; while

the absence of mesozoic strata beneath the Cretaceous rocks

of the mid-Sahara indicates that the system of Karroo lakeland

had here reached its most northerly extension. Towards the

close of the Karroo period, possibly about the middle, the

southern rim of the great central depression became ridged

up to form the folded regions of the Zwaarteberg, Cedarberg

and Langeberg mountains in Cape Colony. This folded belt

gives Africa its abrupt southern termination, and may be

regarded as an embryonic indication of its present outline.

The exact date of the maximum development of this folding is

unknown, but it had done its work and some 10,000 ft. of strata

had been removed before the commencement of the Cretaceous

period. It appears to approximate in time to the similar earth

movement and denudation at the close of the palaeozoic period in

Europe. It was doubtless connected with the disruption of

Gondwana Land, since it is known that this great alteration

of geographical outline commenced in Jurassic times.

The breaking up of Gondwana Land is usually considered to have

been caused by a series of blocks of country being let down by

faulting with the consequent formation of the Indian Ocean. Other

blocks, termed horsts, remained unmoved, the island of Madagascar

affording a striking example. In the African portion Ruwenzori

is regarded by some geologists to be a block mountain or horst.

In Jurassic times 1he sea gained access to East Africa

north of Mozambique, but does not appear to have

reached far beyond the foot-plateau except in Abyssinia.

The Cretaceous seas appear to have extended into the central

Saharan regions, for fossils of this age have been discovered

in the interior. On the west coast Cretaceous rocks extend

continuously from Mogador to Cape Blanco. From here they are

absent up to the Gabun river, where they commence to form a

narrow fringe as far as the Kunene river, though often overlain

by recent deposits. They are again absent up to the Sunday

river in Cape Colony, where Lower Cretaceous rocks (for long

considered to be of Oolitic age) of an inshore character are met

with. Strata of Upper Cretaceous age occur in Pondoland and

Natal, and are of exceptional interest since the fossils show an

intermingling of Pacific types with other forms having European

affinities. In Mozambique and in German East Africa, Cretaceous

rocks extend from the coast to a distance inland of over 100 m.

Except in northern Africa, the Tertiary formations only

occur in a few isolated patches on the east and west

coasts. In northern Africa they are well developed and of much

interest. They contain the well-known nummulitic limestone

of Eocene age, which has been traced from Egypt across Asia to

China. The Upper Eocene rocks of Egypt have also yielded

primeval types of the Proboscidea and other mammalia.

Evidences for the greater extension of the Eocene seas than

was formerly considered to be the case have been discovered

around Sokoto. During Miocene times Passarge considers that

the region of the Zambezi underwent extreme desiccation.

The effect of the Glacial epoch in Europe is shown in northern

Africa by the moraines of the higher Atlas, and the wider

extension of the glaciers on Kilimanjaro, Kenya and Ruwenzori,

and by the extensive accumulations of gravel over the Sahara.

The earliest signs of igneous activity in Africa are to be found

in the granites, intrusive into the older rocks of the Cape

peninsula, into those of the Transvaal, and into the gneisses

and schists of Central Africa. The Ventersdorp boulder beds

of the Transvaal may be of early palaeozoic age; but as a

whole the palaeozoic period in Africa was remarkably free from

volcanic and igneous disturbances. The close of the Stormberg

period (Rhaetic) was one of great volcanic activity in South

Africa. Whilst the later Secondary and Tertiary formations

were being laid down in North Africa and around the margins

of the rest of the continent, Africa received its last great

accumulation of strata and at the same time underwent a

consecutive series of earth-movements. The additional strata

consist of the immense quantities of volcanic material on

the plateau of East Africa, the basalt flows of West Africa

and possibly those of the Zambezi basin. The exact period

of the commencement of volcanic activity is unknown. In

Abyssinia the Ashangi traps are certainly post-Oolitic. In

East Africa the fissure eruptions are considered to belong

to the Cretaceous. These early eruptions were followed by

those of Kenya, Mawenzi, Elgon, Chibcharagnani, and these

by the eruptions of Kibo, Longonot, Suswa and the Kyulu

Mountains. The last phase of vulcanicity took place along

the great meridional rifts of East Africa, and though feebly

manifested has not entirely passed away. In northern Africa

a continuous sequence of volcanic events has taken place from

Eocene times to latest Tertiary; but in South Africa it is

doubtful if there have been any intrusions later then Cretaceous.

During this long continuance of vulcanicity, earth-movements

were in progress. In the north the chief movements gave

rise to the system of latitudinal folding and faulting of the

Moroccan and Algerian Atlas, the last stages being represented

by the formation of the Algerian and Moroccan coast-outline

and the sundering of Europe from Africa at the Straits of

Gibraltar. Whilst northern Africa was being folded, the East

African plateau was broken up by a series of longitudinal

rifts extending from Nyasaland to Egypt. The depressed areas

contain the long, narrow, precipitously walled lakes of East

Africa. The Red Sea also occupies a meridional trough.

Lastly there are the recent elevations of the northern coastal

regions, the Barbary coast and along the east coast. (W. G.*)

III. ETHNOLOGY In attempting a review of the races and

tribes which inhabit Africa, their distribution, movements

and culture, it is advisable that three points be borne in

mind. The first of these is the comparative absence of natural

barriers in the interior, owing to which intercommunication

between tribes, the dissemination of culture and tribal

migration have been considerably facilitated. Hence the

student must be prepared to find that, for the most part,

there are no sharp divisions to mark the extent of the

various races composing the population, but that the number

of what may be termed ``transitional'' peoples is unusually

large. The second point is that Africa, with the exception

of the lower Nile valley and what is known as Roman Africa

(see AFRICA, ROMAN), is, so far as its native inhabitants

are concerned, a continent practically without a history,

and possessing no records from which such a history might be

reconstructed. The early movements of tribes, the routes by

which they reached their present abodes, and the origin of such

forms of culture as may be distinguished in the general mass of

customs, beliefs, &c., are largely matters of conjecture. The

negro is essentially the child of the moment; and his memory,

both tribal and individual, is very short. The third point

is that many theories which have been formulated with respect

to such matters are unsatisfactory owing to the small amount

of information concerning many of the tribes in the interior.

The chief African races.

Excluding the Europeans who have found a home in various

parts of Africa, and the Asiatics, Chinese and natives of

India introduced by them (see section History below), the

population of Africa consists of the following elements:

--the Bushman, the Negro, the Eastern Hamite, the Libyan

and the Semite, from the intermingling of which in various

proportions a vast number of ``transitional'' tribes has

arisen. The Bushmen (q.v.), a race of short yellowish-brown

nomad hunters, inhabited, in the earliest times of which

there is historic knowledge, the land adjoining the southern

and eastern borders of the Kalahari desert, into which

they were gradually being forced by the encroachment of

the Hottentots and Bantu tribes. But signs of their former

presence are not wanting as far north as Lake Tanganyika, and

even, it is rumoured, still farther north. With them may be

classed provisionally the Hottentots, a pastoral people of

medium stature and yellowish-brown complexion. who in early

times shared with the Bushmen the whole of what is now Cape

Colony. Though the racial affinities of the Hottentots have

been disputed, the most satisfactory view on the whole is

that they represent a blend of Bushman, Negroid and Hamitic

elements. Practically the rest of Africa, from the southern

fringe of the Sahara and the upper valley of the Nile to

the Cape, with the exception of Abyssinia and Galla and

Somali-lands, is peopled by Negroes and the ``transitional''

tribes to which their admixture with Libyans on the north,

and Semites (Arabs) and Hamites on the north-east and east,

has given rise. A slight qualification of the last statement

is necessary, in so far as, among the Fula in the western

Sudan, and the Ba-Hima, &c., of the Victoria Nyanza, Libyan

and Hamitic elements are respectively stronger than the

Negroid. Of the tracts excepted, Abyssinia is inhabited mainly

by Semito-Hamites (though a fairly strong negroid element can

be found), and Somali and Galla-lands by Hamites. North of

the Sahara in Algeria and Morocco are the Libyans (Berbers,

q.v.), a distinctively white people, who have in certain

respects (e.g. religion) fallen under Arab influence. In

the north-east the brown-skinned Hamite and the Semite mingle

in varied proportions. The Negroid peoples, which inhabit the

vast tracts of forest and savanna between the areas held by

Bushmen to the south and the Hamites, Semites and Libyans to

the north, fall into two groups divided by a line running from

the Cameroon (Rio del Rey) crossing the Ubangi river below the

bend and passing between the Ituri and the Semliki rivers, to

Lake Albert and thence with a slight southerly trend to the

coast. North of this line are the Negroes proper, south are the

Bantu. The division is primarily philological. Among the

true Negroes the greatest linguistic confusion prevails; for

instance, in certain parts of Nigeria it is possible to

find half-a-dozen villages within a comparatively small area

speaking, not different dialects, but different languages,

a fact which adds greatly to the difficulty of political

administration. To the south of the line the condition of

affairs is entirely different; here the entire population

speaks one or another dialect of the Bantu Languages (q.v..)

As said before, the division is primarily linguistic and,

especially upon the border line, does not always correspond

with the variations of physical type. At the same time it

is extremely convenient and to a certain extent justifiable

on physical and psychological grounds; and it may be said

roughly that while the linguistic uniformity of the Bantu is

accompanied by great variation of physical type, the converse

is in the main true of the Negro proper, especially where least

affected by Libyan and Hamitic admixture, e.g. on the Guinea

coast. The variation of type among the Bantu is due probably

to a varying admixture of alien blood, which is more apparent

as the east coast is approached. This foreign element cannot

be identified with certainty, but since the Bantu seem to

approach the Hamites in those points where they differ from

the Negro proper, and since the physical characteristics

of Hamites and Semites are very similar, it seems probable

that the last two races have entered into the composition

of the Bantu, though it is highly improbable that Semitic

influence should have permeated any distance from the east

coast. An extremely interesting section of the population

not hitherto mentioned is constituted by the Pygmy tribes

inhabiting the densely forested regions along the equator

from Uganda to the Gabun and living the life of nomadic

hunters. The affinities of this little people are undecided,

owing to the small amount of knowledge concerning them. The

theories which connected them with the Bushmen do not seem to be

correct. It is more probable that they are to be classed among

the Negroids, with whom they appear to have intermingled to

a certain extent in the upper basin of the Ituri, and perhaps

elsewhere. As far as is known they speak no language peculiar

to themselves but adopt that of the nearest agricultural

tribe. They are of a dark brown complexion, with very broad

noses, lips but slightly everted, and small but usually

sturdy physique, though often considerably emaciated owing

to insufficiency of food. Another peculiar tribe, also

of short stature, are the Vaalpens of the steppe region

of the north Transvaal. Practically nothing is known of

them except that they are said to be very dark in colour

and live in holes in the ground, and under rock shelters.

Principal ethnological zones.

Having indicated the chief races of which in various degrees of

purity and intermixture the population of Africa is formed, it

remains to consider them in greater detail, particularly from

the cultural standpoint. This is hardly possible without drawing

attention to the main physical characters of the continent,

as far as they affect the inhabitants. For ethnological

purposes three principal zones may be distinguished; the first

two are respectively a large region of steppes and desert in

the north, and a smaller region of steppes and desert in the

south. These two zones are connected by a vertical strip of

grassy highland lying mainly to the east of the chain of great

lakes. The third zone is a vast region of forest and rivers

in the west centre, comprising the greater part of the basin

of the Congo and the Guinea coast. The rainfall, which also

has an important bearing upon the culture of peoples, will

be found on the whole to be greatest in the third zone and

also in the eastern highlands, and of course least in the

desert, the steppes and savannas standing midway between the

two. As might be expected these variations are accompanied by

certain variations in culture. In the best-watered districts

agriculture is naturally of the greatest importance, except

where the density of the forest renders the work of clearing

too arduous. The main portion therefore of the inhabitants

of the forest zone are agriculturists, save only the nomad

Pygmies, who live in the inmost recesses of the forest and

support themselves by hunting the game with which it abounds.

Agriculture, too, flourishes in the eastern highlands, and

throughout the greater part of the steppe and savanna region

of the northern and southern zones, especially the latter. In

fact the only Bantu tribes who are not agriculturists are the

Ova-Herero of German South-West Africa, whose purely pastoral

habits are the natural outcome of the barren country they

inhabit. But the wide open plains and slopes surrounding

the forest area are eminently suited to cattle-breeding,

and there are few tribes who do not take advantage of the

fact. At the same time a natural check is imposed upon the

desire for cattle, which is so characteristic of the Bantu

peoples. This is constituted by the tsetse fly, which renders

a pastoral life absolutely impossible throughout large tracts

in central and southern Africa. In the northern zone this

check is absent, and the number of more essentially pastoral

peoples, such as the eastern Hamites, Masai, Dinka, Fula,

&c., correspondingly greater. The desert regions yield

support only to nomadic peoples, such as the Tuareg, Tibbu,

Bedouins and Bushmen, though the presence of numerous oases

in the north renders the condition of life easier for the

inhabitants. Upon geographical conditions likewise depend to

a large extent the political conditions prevailing among the

various tribes. Thus among the wandering tribes of the desert

and of the heart of the forests, where large communities are

impossible, a patriarchal system prevails with the family as the

unit. Where the forest is less dense and small agricultural

communities begin to make their appearance, the unit expands

to the village with its headman. Where the forest thins to

the savanna and steppe, and communication is easier, are found

the larger kingdoms and ``empires'' such as, in the north those

established by the Songhai, Hausa, Fula, Bagirmi, Ba-Hima, &c.,

and in the south the states of Lunda, Kazembe, the Ba-Rotse, &c.

But if ease of communication is favourable to the rise of

large states and the cultural progress that usually accompanies

it, it is, nevertheless, often fatal to the very culture

which, at first, it fostered, in so far as the absence of

natural boundaries renders invasion easy. A good example

of this is furnished by the history of the western Sudan

and particularly of East and South-East Africa. From its

geographical position Africa looks naturally to the east,

and it is on this side that it has been most affected by

external culture both by land (across the Sinaitic peninsula)

and by sea. Though a certain amount of Indonesian and

even aboriginal Indian influence has been traced in African

ethnography, the people who have produced the most serious

ethnic disturbances (apart from modern Europeans) are the

Arabs. This is particularly the case in East Africa, where

the systematic slave raids organized by them and carried

out with the assistance of various warlike tribes reduced

vast regions to a state of desolation. In the north and

west of Africa, however, the Arab has had a less destructive

but more extensive and permanent influence in spreading

the Mahommedan religion throughout the whole of the Sudan.

The characteristic African culture.

The fact that the physical geography of Africa affords fewer

natural obstacles to racial movements on the side most exposed

to foreign influence, renders it obvious that the culture

most characteristically African must be sought on the other

side. It is therefore in the forests of the Congo, and among

the lagoons and estuaries of the Guinea coast, that this

earlier culture will most probably be found. That there is a

culture distinctive of this area, irrespective of the linguistic

line dividing the Bantu from the Negro proper, has now been

recognized. Its main features may be summed as follows:---a

purely agricultural life, with the plantain, yam and manioc (the

last two of American origin) as the staple food; cannibalism

common; rectangular houses with ridged roofs; scar-tattooing;

clothing of bark-cloth or palm-fibre; occasional chipping

or extraction of upper incisors; bows with strings of cane,

as the, principal weapons, shields of wood or wickerwork;

religion, a primitive form of fetishism with the belief

that death is due to witchcraft; ordeals, secret societies,

the use of masks and anthropomorphic figures, and wooden

gongs. With this may be contrasted the culture of the Bantu

peoples to the south and east, also agriculturists, but in

addition, where possible, great cattle-breeders, whose

staple food is millet and milk. These are distinguished

by circular huts with domed or conical roofs; clothing of

skin or leather; occasional chipping or extraction of lower

incisors; spears as the principal weapons, bows, where found,

with a sinew cord, shields of hide or leather; religion,

ancestor-worship with belief in the power of the magicians as

rain-makers. Though this difference in culture may well

be explained on the supposition that the first is the older

and more representative of Africa, this theory must not be

pushed too far. Many of the distinguishing characteristics

of the two regions are doubtless due simply to environment,

even the difference in religion. Ancestor-worship occurs

most naturally among a people where tribal organization

has reached a fairly advanced stage, and is the natural

outcome of patriotic reverence for a successful chief and his

councillors. Rain-making, too, is of little importance in

a well-watered region, but a matter of vital interest to an

agricultural people where the rainfall is slight and irregular.

Within the eastern and southern Bantu area certain cultural

variations occur; beehive huts are found among the Zulu-Xosa

and Herero, giving place among the Bechuana to the cylindrical

variety with conical roof, a type which, with few exceptions,

extends north to Abyssinia. The tanged spearhead characteristic

of the south is replaced by the socketed variety towards the

north. Circumcision, characteristic of the Zulu-Xosa and

Bechuana, is not practised by many tribes farther north;

tooth-mutilation, on the contrary, is absent among the

more southern tribes. The lip-plug is found in the eastern

area, especially among the Nyasa tribes, but not in the

south. The head-rest common in the south-east and the

southern fringe of the forest area is not found far

north of Tanganyika until the Horn of Africa is reached.

In the regions outside the western area occupied by the Negro

proper, exclusive of the upper Nile, the similarities of

culture outweigh the differences. Here the cylindrical type

of hut prevails; clothing is of skin or leather but is very

scanty; iron ornaments are worn in profusion; arrows are not

feathered; shields of hide, spears with leather sheaths are

found and also fighting bracelets. Certain small differences

appear between the eastern and western portions, the dividing

line being formed by the boundary between Bornu and Hausaland.

Characteristic of the east are the harp and the throwing-club

and throwing-knife, the last of which has penetrated into

the forest area. Typical of the west are the bow and the

dagger with the ring hilt. The tribes of the upper Nile

are somewhat specialized, though here, too, are found the

cylindrical hut, iron ornaments, fighting bracelets, &c.,

characteristic of the Sudanese tribes. Here the removal of

the lower incisors is common, and circumcision entirely absent.

Throughout the rest of the Sudan is found Semitic culture

introduced by the Arabized Libyan. Circumcision, as is usual

among Mahommedan tribes, is universal, and tooth-mutilation

absent; of other characteristics, the use of the sword has

penetrated to the northern portion of the forest area. The

culture prevailing in the Horn of Africa is, naturally, mainly

Hamito-Semitic; here are found both cyhnddcal and bee-hive

huts, the sword (which has been adopted by the Masai to the

south), the lyre (which has found its way to some of the Nilotic

tribes) and the head-rest. Circumcision is practically universal.

As has been said earlier, the history of Africa reaches back

but a short distance, except, of course, as far as the lower

Nile valley and Roman Africa is concerned; elsewhere no records

exist, save tribal traditions, and these only relate to very

recent events. Even archaeology, which can often sketch

the main outlines of a people's history, is here practically

powerless, owing to the insufficiency of data. It is true

that stone imple. ments of palaeolithic and neolithic types

are found sporadically in the Nile valley, Somaliland, on the

Zambezi, in Cape Colony and the northern portions of the

Congo Free State, as well as in Algeria and Tunisia; but the

localities are far too few and too widely separated to warrant

the inference that they are to be in any way connected.

Moreover, where stone implements are found they are, as a rule,

very near, even actually on, the surface of the earth; nothing

occurs resembling the regular stratification of Europe, and

consequently no argument based on geological grounds is possible.

The lower Nile valley, however, forms an exception; flint

implements of a palaeolithic type have been found near Thebes.

not only on the surface of the ground, which for several

thousand years has been desert owing to the contraction of

the river-bed, but also in stratified gravel of an older

date. References to a number of papers bearing on the

discussion to which then discovery has given rise may be

found in an article by Mr H. R. Hall in Man, 1905, No. 19.

The Egyptian and also the Somali land finds appear to be true

palaeoliths in type and remarkably similar to those found in

Europe. But evidence bearing on the Stone age in Africa,

if the latter existed apart from the localities mentioned,

is so slight that little can be said save that from the

available evidence the palaeoliths of the Nile valley alone

can with any degree of certainty be assigned to a remote

period of antiquity, and that the chips scattered over

Mashonaland and the regions occupied within historic times

by Bushmen are the most recent; since it has been shown

that the stone flakes were used by the medieval Makalanga to

engrave their hard pottery and the Bushmen were still using

stone implements in the 19th century. Other early remains,

but of equally uncertain date, are the stone circles of

Algeria, the Cross river and the Gambia. The large system of

ruined forts and ``cities'' in Mashonaland, at Zimbabwe and

elsewhere, concerning which so many ingenious theories have

been woven, have been proved to date from medieval times.

Origin and spread of the racial stocks.

Thus while in Europe there is a Stone age. divided into

periods according to various types of implement disposed

in geological strata, and followed in orderly succession by

the ages of Bronze and Iron, in Africa can be found no true

Stone age and practically no Bronze at all. The reason is

not far to seek; Africa is a country of iron, which is found

distributed widely throughout the continent in ores so rich

that the metal can be extracted with very little trouble

and by the simplest methods. Iron has been worked from

time immemorial by the Negroid peoples, and whole tribes are

found whose chief industry is the smelting and forging of the

metal. Under such conditions, questions relating to the

origin and spread of the racial stocks which form the

population of Africa cannot be answered with any certainty;

at best only a certain amount of probability can be attained.

Five of these racial stocks have been mentioned: Bushman,

Negro, Hamite, Semite, Libyan, the last three probably related

through some common ancestor. Of these the honour of being

considered the most truly African belongs to the two first.

It is true that people of Negroid type are found elsewhere,

principally in Melanesia, but as yet their possible connexion

with the African Negro is little more than theoretical,

and for the present purposes it need not be considered.

The origin of the Bushman is lost in obscurity, but he may be

conceived as the original inhabitant of the southern portion

of the continent. The original home of the Negro, at first an

agriculturist, is most probably to be found in the neighbourhood

of the great lakes, whence he penetrated along the fringe

of the Sahara to the west and across the eastern highlands

southward. Northerly expansion was prevented by the early

occupation of the Nile valley, the only easy route to the

Mediterranean, but there seems no doubt that the population

of ancient Egypt contained a distinct Negroid element. The

question as to the ethnic affinities of the pre-dynastic Egyptians

is still unsolved; but they may be regarded as, in the main,

Hamitic, though it is a question how far it is just to apply

a name which implies a definite specialization in what may

be comparatively modern times to a people of such antiquity.

The Horn of Africa appears to have been the centre from

which the Hamites spread, and the pressure they seem to have

applied to the Negro tribes, themselves also in process of

expansion, sent forth larger waves of emigrants from the

latter. These emigrants, already affected by the Hamitic

pastoral culture, and with a strain of Hamitic blood in

their veins, passed rapidly down the open tract in the

east, doubtless exterminating their predecessors, except

such few as took refuge in the mountains and swamps. The

advance-guard of this wave of pastoral Negroids, in fact

primitive Bantu, mingled with the Bushmen and produced the

Hottentots. The penetration of the forest area must certainly

have taken longer and was probably accomplished as much from

the south-east, up the Zambezi valley, as from any other

quarter. It was a more peaceful process, since natural

obstacles are unfavourable to rapid movements of large bodies

of immigrants, though not so serious as to prevent the spread

of language and culture. A modern parallel to the spread

of Bantu speech is found in the rise of the Hausa language,

which is gradually enlarging its sphere of influence in the

western and central Sudan. Thus those qualities, physical and

otherwise, in which the Bantu approach the Hamites gradually

fade as we proceed westward through the Congo basin, while

in the east, among the tribes to the west of Tanganyika and

on the upper Zambezi, ``transitional'' forms of culture are

found. In later times this gradual pressure from the

south-east became greater, and resulted, at a comparatively

recent date, in the irruption of the Fang into the Gabun.

The earlier stages of the southern movement must have

been accompanied by a similar movement westward between

the Sahara and the forest; and, probably, at the same

time, or even earlier, the Libyans crossing the desert had

begun to press upon the primitive Negroes from the north.

In this way were produced the Fula, who mingled further

with the Negro to give birth to the Mandingo, Wolof and

Tukulor. It would appear that either Libyan (Fula) or, less

probably, Hamitic, blood enters into the composition of the

Zandeh peoples on the Nile-Congo watershed. These Libyans or

Berbers, included by G. Sergi in his ``Mediterranean Race,''

were active on the north coast of Africa in very early times,

and had relations with the Egyptians from a prehistoric

period. For long these movements continued, always in the

same direction, from north to south and from east to west;

though, of course, more rapid changes took place in the open

country, especially in the great eastern highway from north to

south, than in the forest area. Large states arose in the

western Sudan; Ghana flourished in the 7th century A.D.,

Melle in the 11th, Songhai in the 14th, and Bornu in the 16th.

Meanwhile in the east began the southerly movement of the

Bechuana, which was probably,spread over a considerable

period. Later than they, hut proceeding faster, came the

Zulu-Xosa (``Kaffir'') peoples, who followed a line nearer

the coast and outflanked them, surrounding them on the

south. Then followed a time of great ethnical confusion

in South Africa, during which tribes flourished, split up

and disappeared; but ere this the culture represented by

the ruins in Rhodesia had waxed and waned. It is uncertain

who were the builders of the forts and ``cities,'' but it

is not improbable that they may be found to have been early

Bechuana. The Zulu-Xosa, Bechuana and Herero together form

a group which may conveniently be termed ``Southern Bantu.',

Finally began a movement hitherto unparalleled in the

history of African migration; certain peoples of Zulu

blood began to press north, spreading destruction in their

wake. Of these the principal were the Matabele and

Angoni. The movement continued as far as the Victoria

Nyanza. Here, on the border-line of Negro, Bantu and

Hamite, important changes had taken place. Certain of the

Negro tribes had retired to the swamps of the Nile, and had

become somewhat specialized, both physically and culturally

(Shilluk, Dinka, Alur, Acholi, &c.). These had blended with

the Hamites to produce such races as the Masai and kindred

tribes. The old Kitwara empire, which comprised the plateau

land between the Ruwenzori range and Kavirondo, had broken

up into small states, usually governed by a Hamitic (Ba-Hima)

aristocracy. The more extensive Zang (Zenj) empire, of which.

the name Zanzibar (Zanguebar) is a lasting memorial, extending

along the sea-board from Somaliland to the Zambezi, was also

extinct. The Arabs had established themselves firmly on the

coast, and thence made continual slave-raids into the interior,

penetrating later to the Congo. The Swahili, inhabiting the

coast-line from the equator to about 16 deg. S., are a somewhat

heterogeneous mixture of Bantu with a tinge of Arab blood.

In the neighbourhood of Victoria Nyanza, where Hamite, Bantu,

Nilotic Negro and Pygmy are found in close contact, the ethnic

relations of tribes are often puzzling, but the Bantu not under

a Hamitic domination have been divided by F. Stuhlmann into

the Older Bantu (Wanyamwezi, Wasukuma, Wasambara, Waseguha,

Wasagara, Wasaramo, &c.) and the Bantu of Later Immigration

(Wakikuyu, Wakamba, Wapokomo, Wataita, Wachaga, &c.), who are

more strongly Hamitized and in many cases have adopted Masai

customs. These peoples, from the Victoria Nyanza to the

Zambezi, may conveniently be termed the ``Eastern Bantu.''