PEN PORTRAITS.
Our most interesting descriptions of the people of Africa have been
derived from the annals of Egyptian history and from the journals and
letters of the many explorers who have from time to time come in contact
with them.
According to history the ancient Egyptians were red men. They recognized
four races of men, the red, the yellow, the black, and the white. In
subsequent ages they were so desirous of preserving this aristocratic
distinction of color that they represented themselves in crimson upon
their monuments.
The present inhabitants of Egypt range from a yellow color in the north
to a deep bronze. One writer believes that the ancient Egyptians
belonged to a brown race which included the Nubian tribes and to some
extent the Berber tribes of Algiers and Tunis.
The record of the greatness of ancient Egypt is preserved in her works.
The pyramids, though but the ruins of their former grandeur, are the
marvels of mankind. The river Nile, by means of enormous embankments,
was diverted from its course to make a place for the old city of
Memphis. The artificial lake of Moero was created to make a reservoir
for the Nile waters. It measured four hundred and fifty miles in
circumference. Its depth was three hundred and fifty feet, and it
possessed subterranean channels, flood gates, locks, and dams, by means
of which a sterile wilderness could be redeemed and changed into a
fruitful valley.
The mason work of the ancient Egyptians was magnificent. In the casing
of the Great Pyramid, we are told, the joints are scarcely perceptible,
and not wider than the thickness of paper, and the cement so tenacious
that fragments of the casing stones still remain in their original
position, notwithstanding the lapse of so many centuries.
At one time the whole valley and delta of the Nile from the Cataracts to
the sea was covered with temples, palaces, tombs, pyramids, and pillars,
and almost every stone was covered with inscriptions.
The ancient Egyptians were the first mathematicians of the Old World and
the first surveyors of land. They were the first astronomers, and they
not only calculated eclipses but watched the periods of the planets and
constellations. They were even aware of the rotundity of the earth,
although Columbus has always been credited with being the first to
discover this truth.
As early as the year 1722 B.C. the signs of the zodiac were in use among
the Egyptians. A delineation of these signs was found upon a mummy case
in the British Museum, and the date to which they pointed indicated the
autumnal equinox of the year 1722 B.C.
These ancient Egyptians had clocks and dials for measuring time, and
they possessed coins of gold and silver. They were the first
agriculturists of the Old World, for history tells us that they raised
cereals, and gave attention to the rearing of cattle, horses, and sheep.
They manufactured linen fabrics of so fine a quality that, 600 B.C., a
single thread of a king's garment was comprised of three hundred and
sixty-five fibers. They worked in gold and silver, in copper, bronze,
and iron. The latter they tempered to the hardness of steel.
They were the first chemists, and manufactured glass and various kinds
of pottery. Out of earthenware they made their boats, and manufactured
vessels of paper, just as in modern times we make the wheels for railway
cars out of paper. Their dentists understood the art of filling teeth
with gold, and their farmers hatched poultry by means of artificial
heat.
They were the first musicians, and used guitars, cymbals, drums, lyres,
harps, flutes, etc. In medicine and surgery they had acquired such skill
that, several hundred years before Christ the removal of cataract from
the eye, a most delicate and difficult surgical operation, was performed
among them. Their carpenters' and masons' tools were almost identical
with those in use to-day.
All these facts of history tend to prove that ancient Egypt was a land
peopled by an intellectual and refined race whose works live after them.
The great mass of the people in Lower Egypt are known as the ploughers,
and are the descendants of the old Egyptians and of the Arabs who
invaded the land. There are still Egyptians of unmixed ancestry to be
found in the land. They are called Copts, and profess Christianity. The
Arabs of pure ancestry, descendants of the conquerors of the Egyptians,
are represented by the Bedouins, most of whom lead a wandering life,
though a few have exchanged their nomadic life for a settled one in
houses.
Among the many pleasing pictures of the nations of the interior, Dr.
Barth, an explorer, furnishes one of a fine large town in Negroland
proper. The houses were built partly of clay, with neatly thatched roofs
of reeds; while the courtyard was fenced in with the same material.
There was a cool outer building, formed of reeds and latticework, which
seemed to be a reception hall for visiting and for the transaction of
business; the whole surrounded by spreading trees. To add to the
picture, groups of children, goats, fowls, pigeons, and--if the wealth
of the family admitted--a horse or pack ox usually surrounded each hut.
The people were cheerful and kindly and seemed to enjoy all that a wise
Creator had provided for their sustenance.
At another town Dr. Barth found rude fortifications of clay. At this
town, like the one before it, there was a dyehouse, for indigo was
largely cultivated. The intervening country was exceedingly beautiful,
with a great variety of vegetation. Here were many kinds of birds, known
and unknown, and great herds of milk-white cattle were scattered over
the rich pasture lands.
The population was small, but the people were active and industrious.
Some women, bearing on their heads from six to ten calabashes filled
with various things, joined the caravan, and not long after, a troop of
men loaded with indigo plants passed by on their way to the dyehouse.
Extensive tobacco fields lay before them, and beehives, formed out of
thick, hollow logs, were fastened to the giant branches of the colossal
trees of the country. Passing through cultivated fields and populous
villages where indigo was grown and prepared, his caravan reached a
large, flourishing town, a little world in itself, different in external
form from all that is seen in European towns, yet similar in many ways.
Here was a row of shops filled with articles of native and foreign
produce, with buyers and sellers in every variety of figure, complexion,
and dress. There were all the necessaries of life; the wealthy buying
the more palatable things for their tables, the poor stopping to look
greedily upon a handful of grain.
Here was a yard neatly fenced with reeds, and a clean, snug-looking
cottage, the clay walls nicely polished, a shutter of reeds placed
against the low, well-rounded door, a cool shade for the daily household
work, a fine spreading tree, with its deep shadow during the hottest
hours of the day, or a beautiful specimen unfolding its large
featherlike leaves, or the tall date tree waving over the whole. The
matron wore a clean, black, cotton gown wound round her waist; her hair
was neatly dressed, and she was busy preparing the meal for her absent
husband, or spinning cotton, and at the same time urging the female
slaves to pound the corn. The children were naked and merry, playing
about in the yard, or chasing a stubborn goat. Earthenware pots and
wooden bowls, all cleanly washed, stood in order.
No one seemed idle; there was employment for all. Here was an open
terrace with its many dye pots, and the people engaged in the various
processes of their art. Farther on could be seen a sturdy blacksmith
wielding his clumsy tools and producing, as a result of his labors, a
dagger, the sharpness of which was, indeed, a surprise, when one saw the
crudeness of his tools. Off in another direction men and women made use
of a sheltered space along the fences to hang their cotton thread for
weaving. Here was a caravan arriving with the prized _kola nut_, which
had become as necessary to these people as tea or coffee is to the
inhabitants of more civilized lands; and there a caravan starting off
with salt for the neighboring towns. Arabs were seen leading their
camels with heavy loads of the luxuries of the north and east, and
troops of gaudy, warlike horsemen came galloping towards the palace of
the governor. Everywhere was life in all its various phases.