General View of the State of Africa

General view of the state of Africa — Attempts to explore — Supposed origin of the Hottentots — How population extended — Origin of the Bushmen Tribes — Their extent — Bechuana Bushmen — Their suffering and degradation — Variety of dialect accounted for — The Tamahas — Melancholy view of Bushman country — The Kafir origin and character — Countries of the Basutos and Bechuanas — Namaquas and Damaras — Description of the Karroo — A dry and barren country.

The continent of Africa, though probably the most ancient field of geographical enterprise, still is, and there is reason to believe that it will long continue to he, the least explored portion of our earth. Though once the nursery of science and literature, the empo¬ rium of commerce, and the seat of an empire which contended with Rome for the sovereignty of the world, — the cradle of the ancient church, and the asylum of the infant Saviour, yet Africa still presents a comparative blank on the map, as well as in the history of the world. Though, according to Herodotus, it was circumnavigated by the Phoenicians long before the Christian era, and its coast was the first object of STATE OF AFRICA.

maritime discovery, after the compass had inspired seamen with confidence to leave shores and landmarks, and stand forth on the houndless deep; yet to this day its interior regions continue a mystery to the white man, a land of darkness and of terror to the most fearless and enterprising traveller. Although in no country has there been such a sacrifice of men to the enterprise of discovery — of men the most intelligent and undaunted, of men impelled not by gross cupidity, but by refined philanthropy; — yet, notwithstanding such suffering and waste of human life, we are only acquainted with the fringes of that immense continent, and a few lineaments at no great distance from its shores.

Africa had once her churches, her colleges, her repositories of science and learning, her Cyprians and bishops of apostolic renown, and her noble army of martyrs; but now the funeral pall hangs over her wide-spread domains, while her millions, exposed to tenfold horrors, descend like a vast funereal mass to the regions of woe. Christendom has been enriched by her gold, her drugs, her ivory, and bodies and souls of men — and what has been her recompense? A few crucifixes planted around her shores, guarded by the military fort and the roar of cannon. Had it not been for British power and British sympathy, under the favour of Heaven, Africa, to this day, with scarcely one exception, might have had the tri¬ coloured flag waving on her bosom, bearing the ensigns of the mystery of Babylon, the crescent of the false prophet, and the emblems of pagan darkness, from the shores of the Mediterranean, to the colony of the Cape of Good Hope.

The countries extending throughout by far the greater portion of the vast surface just mentioned, are, as regards soil and capabilities, among the finest in the world; but the population of the whole, with the exception of Egypt in ancient times, and the population of the shores of the Mediterranean when under the Carthaginian, the Roman, and the brighter days of Arab sway, have been, through every age, and are still, sunk into the lowest depths of ignorance, superstition, disorganization, and debasement; the glimmer of civilization, which for a time appeared in Nubia and Abyssinia, compared with the whole, scarcely forming an exception.”*

Before entering into a detail of Missionary operations, it may be proper to glance briefly at the position, extent, and character of some of the fields which have been occupied.

The bold and mountainous promontory of the Cape was first discovered by Bartholomew Diaz, the Portuguese navigator, and was taken possession of by the Dutch, in 1652. At that period the whole of what is now designated the Colony, was inhabited by Hottentots proper, whose history and origin, from their physical appearance, language, and customs, continue involved in profound mystery. They resemble none of the Kafir, Bechuana and Damara nations, which bound the different tribes of that remarkable people, extending from Angra, Pequena IHy, on the west, to the Great Fish River on the east. The whole race is distinct from all others with which we are acquainted. Taking the Hottentots,

* APQucen’s Geographical Survey of Africa.

Corannas, Namaquas, and Bushmen, as a whole, they are not swarthy or black, but rather of a sallow colour, and in some cases so light, that a tinge of red in the cheek is perceptible, especially among the Bushmen. They are generally smaller in stature than their neighbours of the interior; their visage and form very distinct, and in general the top of the head broad and flat; their faces tapering to the chin, with high cheek bones, flat noses, and large lips. Since the writer has had opportunities of seeing men, women, and children from China, he feels strongly inclined to think, with Barrow, that they approach nearest, in their colour and in the construction of their features, to that people than to any other nation. Since his arrival in England, this supposition has been strengthened by seeing two blind Chinese children, whom, had he not been previously informed, he would have taken for Hottentots; and if they had had their eyesight, the resemblance would have been much more striking. It is well known that the Hottentots inhabit the southern point of Africa, and spread northward; while the Bushmen, the most northerly, exist among the inhabited regions, where they continue perfectly distinct, and, which is very remarkable, do not become darker in their complexion, as is the case with all the other tribes that inhabit, or have inhabited the Torrid Zone. If they had been gipsies from Egypt, as some have thought, it is another singular circumstance, that they should not, during the successive ages which they must have required slowly to advance through nearly 5000 miles of territory, have adopted one word of the language of the myriads with whom they came in contact, or one of their customs of any description, not even that of sowing seed in the earth. It may not he considered chimerical to suppose that when the sons of Ham entered Africa, by Egypt, and the Arabians, by the Red Sea, that the Hottentot progenitors took the lead, and gradually advanced in proportion as they were urged forward by an increasing population in their rear, until they reached the ends of the earth. It may also he easily conceived, by those acquainted with the emigration of tribes, that during their progress to the south, parties remained behind, in the more sequestered and isolated spots, where they had located while the nation moved onward, and research may yet prove that that remarkable people originally came from Egypt.* At all events, it is evident that they have arisen from a race distinct from that of their neighbours, and extended inland, inhabiting the most fertile spots, till their course was arrested on the east by the hold and warlike Kafirs, and on the north by the Bechiiana and Damara. It is probable that they stretched out into Great Namaqualand, along the western division of the Colony, till prevented by a desert country, beyond which lay the Damaras; and then again they proceeded from Little Namaqua¬ land, eastward, along the cooling banks of the Gariep

* A few evenings ago I was in the company of a Syrian who lately came from Egypt. On giving him a specimen and a description of the Hottentot language, he remarked that he had seen slaves in the market at Cairo, brought a great distance from the interior, who spoke a similar language, and were not near so dark coloured as slaves in general. This corroborates the statements of ancient authors, whose description of a people inhabiting the interior remons of northern Africa, answers to that of the Hottentots and Irishmen.

or Orange !River, richly fringed with overhanging willows, towering acacias, and kharree trees and shrubs, umbrageous at all seasons of the year. Thus, by the localities of the country they became separated into three great divisions, Hottentots, Corannas, and lesser and greater Namaquas. From time immemorial these have been the boundaries of their habitations, while the desert wastes and barren mountainravines, which intervened, became the refuge and domains of the Bushmen, who are emphatically the children of the desert.

All these possess nearly the same physical characteristics, the same manners and customs. I have had in my presence genuine Hottentots, Corannas, and Namaquas, who had met from their respective and distant tribes, for the first time, and they conversed with scarcely any difficulty. All use the same weapons, the quiver, bow, and poisoned arrows, of which the tribes beyond are ignorant, except such as border on them, like the Batlapis, who say they adopted that new mode of warfare in order to compete with them and the Bushmen, from both of whom they obtained these weapons, which they have not yet learned to manufacture.

The Bushmen are the most remarkable portion of the Hottentot nation. Various opinions have been offered on the origin and state of the Hottentots, among which is that of Gibbon, that they were the connecting link between the rational and irrational creation.’’ If he had been acquainted with the Bush¬ men, who are unquestionably inferior to the Hottentots, he would have felt more confidence in this strange and long exploded theory. Some say they are the progenitors of the nation; others, that they are an entirely distinct race; and others, again, that they are Hottentots, who have been directly or indirectly plundered of their cattle by the Dutch farmers. That the Bushmen are the people from whom the Hottentot tribes have descended, is irreconcilable with existing facts; that they are a distinct race, is still farther from probability; and that they are plundered Hottentots, is, in my humble opinion, a preposterous notion, resulting from limited information on the subject. If this were to be admitted, then we must also admit that the Hottentots, in being deprived of their cattle, and becoming Bushmen, were deprived of their language also; for it is well known, from the earliest records that can be obtained on the subject of their language, — which has, in addition to the klick of the Hottentot, a croaking in the throat, — that they never understood each other without interpreters.

Another fact is, that the Bushmen are to be found scattered, though thinly, among all the Bechuana tribes of the interior with which we are acquainted, even as far as the Mampoor lake, about eight hundred miles north of Lattakoo. The Marosa, or Baroa Bushmen, are found of the same description as those just beyond the boundaries of the Colony; and from the oldest traditions we can find among the Corannas and Namaquas, who are the unmixed Hottentots, as also from the Bechuanas, it may be demonstrated, that they existed a wandering people without homes, or cattle, or even nationality of character. That they descended from Hottentots, requires little argument to prove. Probably there are connected with all the tribes of Africa numbers of a nomadic character.

whose origin will throw light on the history of the Bushmen. A parallel is furnished by the following facts of the case, which have hundreds of times come under my own observation, during a residence of more than twenty years among the Bechuana tribes. Connected with each of the towns among that people, there are great numbers of what are called ‘‘ Balala,” poor ones, who stand in the same relation to the Bechuanas as the Bushmen formerly stood in to the Hottentots, and whose origin doubtless was of the same nature. These Balala were once inhabitants of the towns, and have been permitted or appointed to live in country places for the purpose of procuring skins of wild animals, wild honey, and roots, for their respective chiefs. The number of these country residents was increased, by the innate love of liberty, and the scarcity of food in towns, or within the boundaries to which they were confined by water and pasture. These again formed themselves into small communities, though of the most temporary character, their calling requiring migration, having no cattle of any description. Accustomed from infancy to the sweets of comparative liberty, which they vastly preferred to a kind of vassalage in the towns, or kraals, they would make any sacrifice to please their often distant superiors, rather than be confined to the irksomeness of a town life. Such is their aversion, that I have known chiefs take armed men, and travel a hundred miles into desert places, in order to bring back Balala, whom they wished to assist them in watching and harvesting the gardens of their wives; and in such seasons they will frequently wander about, and fix their domiciles in the most desert and unfrequented spots, to escape this easy, but to them galling duty, which is only required in a year of plenty.

Though in general they are able to state to what chief or tribe they belong, yet, from want of inter¬ course, and from desolating wars, which are only waged where there is a prospect of plunder, great numbers of them become, in their isolated position, independent. They are never permitted to keep cattle, and are exposed to the caprice, cupidity, and tyranny of the town lords, whenever they happen to come in their way. They live a hungry life, being de¬ pendent on the chase, wild roots, berries, locusts, and indeed any thing eatable that comes within their reach; and when they have a more than usual supply, they will bury it in the earth, from their superiors, who are in the habit of taking what they please. Resistance on their part would he instantly avenged with the deadly javelin. When hunting parties go out to kill game, the Balala, men and women, are employed to carry grievous burdens of flesh to the rendezvous of the hunters; in return for which they receive the offals of the meat, and are made drudges so long as the party remains. They are never permitted to wear the furs of foxes and other animals they obtain. The flesh they may eat; but the skins are conveyed to the towns, for which they obtain a small piece of tobacco, or an old spear or knife. Indeed, all the valuable skins of the larger animals, which they sometimes procure by hunting and pitfalls, as well as the better portions of the meat, they have to yield to their nominal masters, except when they succeed in secretin”: the whole for their own use. From the

o famishing life to which they are exposed, their external appearance and stature are precisely to the Bechuanas, what the Bushmen are to the Hottentots. Those, however, who live in places which afford a better supply of food, are generally of equal stature with those who live in towns. The natives I have observed throuHiout southern Africa are, like plants on a sterile soil and bleak aspect, stunted in growth, while in a more genial situation the same species are trees instead of shrubs.

The next problem is the variety of languages spoken by the Bushmen, even when nothing but a range of hills, or a river intervenes between the tribes, and none of these dialects is understood by the Hottentots. This may be solved with still greater ease, by again referring to the Balala. The dialects of the Sechuana, as spoken by these people, especially in districts remote from the towns, are so different from that spoken by the nation generally, that interpreters are frequently required. In order to account for this, it is necessary to become acquainted with their habits. In the towns, the purity and harmony of the language are kept up by their pitches or public meetings, at which the finest language is spoken, by their festivals and ceremonies, as well as by their songs and their constant intercourse; for, like the Athenians of old, they are ever telling or hearing some ‘‘ new thing,” and the first question a person who has come from a neighbouring village is asked will be, “Lo yelang gona?” What do you eat there? or “’Mpulela mahuke.” Tell me the news. There is no end to conversation, excepting when sleep overcomes or pinching hunger prevails. With the isolated villages of the desert, it is far otherwise. They have no such meetings, no festivals, no cattle, nor any kind of manufactures, to keep their energies alive; riches they have none, their sole care being to keep body and soul together; to accomplish this, is with them their “chief end they are compelled to traverse the wilds often to a great distance from their native village. On such occasions, fathers and mothers, and all who can hear a burden, often set out for weeks at a time, and leave their children to the care of two or more intirm old people. The infant progeny, some of whom are beginning to lisp, while others can just master a whole sentence, and those still farther advanced romping and playing together, the children of nature, through the livelong day, become habituated to a language of their own. The more voluble condescend to the less precocious, and thus from this infant Babel proceeds a dialect composed of a host of mongrel words and phrases joined together without rule, and in the course of a generation the entire character of the language is changed. Their servile state, their scanty clothing, their exposure to the inclemency of the weather, and their extreme poverty, have, as may he easily conceived, a deteriorating influence on their character and condition. They are generally less in stature, and though not deficient in intellect, the life they lead gives a melancholy cast to their features, and from constant intercourse with beasts of prey and serpents in their path, as well as exposure to harsh treatment, they appear shy, and have a wild and frequently quick suspicious look. Nor can this he wondered at, when it is remembered that they associate with savage beasts, from the lion that roams

abroad by night and day, to the deadly serpent which infests their path, keeping them always on the alert during their perambulations. All this and much more which might be said of the Balala, may also with the strictest propriety he affirmed of the Bush¬ men. Any one familiarly acquainted with the interior, can have no douht as to the origin and the correct¬ ness of the description given of the “Bechuana Bushmen,” as Mr. Campbell calls them, and of whom he says, they are a people greatly despised by all the surrounding tribes.” Their numbers have also been increased by fugitives from other towns and villages, which have been reduced by devastating wars from peace and plenty, to the most abject poverty, and the inhabitants forced to flee to the desert for sustenance, hardly disputed with the beasts of prey. From this class of people, the Tamahas, or Red people, as the etymology of the word imports, who are by the Griquas called Red Kafirs, arose. They formed a considerable body in the days of Molehabangue, the father of Mothibi, the present chief of the Batlapis, who, in his commandoes for the capture of cattle, was wont to take them with him. Taught this mode of warfare, and being of an intrepid character, they sallied forth and took cattle for themselves, which Molehabangue’s generous dis¬ position allowed them to keep, and they became an independent tribe, continuing the faithful allies of the Batlapis.

That such were the Bushmen formerly, there can be no doubt; and it is equally certain their numbers were increased by parties of Hottentots, robbed, and compelled to abandon for ever the land of their ancestors; and who naturally sought to satisfy their wants by a predatory warfare, and thus taught the Bushmen to become the pirates of the desert. Hence arose that kind of policy, once sanctioned by the Cape colonial government, of extermination, on which it is impossible to reflect without horror. It appears from the earliest records on the subject, and especially from the journals of those engaged in the work, that the Bushmen were once very numerous. I have traversed those regions in which, according to the testimony of the farmers, thousands once dwelt, drinking at their own fountains, and killing their own game; but now, alas, scarcely a family is to be seen! It is impossible to look over these now uninhabited plains and mountain-glens without feeling the deepest melancholv, while the winds moanins: in the vale seem to echo hack the sound, Where are they?” In this more enlightened age, the farmers cannot refer to the melancholy history of that unfortunate race without feelings of regret, while it is hut justice to add, that many of the farmers made strenuous efforts, and collected thousands of cattle and sheep, which they presented to the neighbouring Bushmen, hoping to induce them to settle, and live by breeding cattle; but these efforts always failed. It was too late; past sufferings, and past offences on both sides, had produced a spirit of hatred so universal, that it was of no avail to pacify one party, while thousands were thirst¬ ing for revenge and plunder. Their numbers are now comparatively few, even among the tribes far beyond the ]) resent limits of the Colony, from the same mutual strife.

It will he evident from the preceding statements, that the Bushmen were originally ])oor IlottentotS;

and will in all probability, like their progenitors, in course of time, cease to be a distinct people, by becoming gradually mixed with the tribes among whom they are scattered. Some additional remarks on this people will be found under the head, Missions to the Bushmen.

The Kafirs, the next African tribe to which I shall briefly refer, live beyond the Fish Kiver, on the eastern boundary of the Colony. At an earlier period they possessed much of that part of Albany now in¬ habited by English farmers and Hottentots, though it is presumed, on very good grounds, that the Hottentot country formerly extended a considerable distance into that of the Kafirs. The Kafirs form one tribe of the Great Bechuana family, and probably emigrated from the direction of Delagoa Bay, till they came in contact with the Hottentots along the coast. Their origin must be traced to the same source as that of the numerous tribes of the Bechuanas, from the affinity of languages spoken throughout the eastern part of the continent of Africa. Their national character is bold and warlike, and their maintaining their independence to the present day, after all their conflicts with the Colony, and especially in the late war, when no less a sum than 241,884L was expended in the destructive, but fruitless conflict, in order to drive them from the mountain -passes, and the impenetrable jungles, a country over which their ancestors had swayed the sceptre for ages, is a decisive evidence of their martial spirit. Their country is bounded by the ocean on the south, and a range of mountains on the north, and beyond them lie the Amapondo and Zoolu tribes.

North of Kafir-land, between the Winterberg moantains and the higher branches of the Yellow River, lies the country inhabited by the Basutos, a tribe of Bechuanas. Since the days of Chaka, the tyrant of the Zoolus, who oppressed them from the east, while the Bergenaars on the west were exercising dreadful barbarities, and reduced most of the tribes to extreme poverty; they have risen again in a fertile country, to comparative affluence. The commencement of missions among them by the brethren of the Evangelical Missionary Society at Paris, and subsequently by the Wesley ans, is the cause of this improvement in their circumstances.

Beyond the Basutos, to the north of the Orange River, lie the other Bechuana tribes, whose numbers and extent we have not yet been able to learn. There is some reason for supposing that they formerly extended much farther to the southward than their present limits, the 28° south latitude, for the places as far as the Orange River have Bechuana names; and even the Lokualo”^ of the Bechuana is to he found on stones near the present boundaries of the Colony; hut this may have been done by herdsmen taken or escaped from those tribes. Few, except Balala, lie farther west than the 23° east longitude. Between 23° and 19°, lies what Mr. Campbell calls the southern Zahara, which, from what I have seen on the east, south, and western boundaries of it, is a fearful

* Lokualo, from which w’e derive the word writing or printing, is formed generally by herd-boys, who with a stone make various figures on stones with a flat surface, without any reference to shape. Marks are made by striking the stone on another till curved lines, circles, ovals, and zigzag figures are impressed on its surface, exhibiting the appearance of a white strip of about an inch broad, like a confused coil of a rope.

expanse of sand, though undulating, and in many places covered with acacias and other trees of gigantic size. The eastern parts are inhabited by the Balala of the Bechuana; the southern, near the Orange River, by Bushmen; and the western, by Namaqua Bushmen, but none of them are able to keep cattle. They subsist on game, water-melons, and roots.

The country from the limits of the desert to the west coast is called Great Namaqualand, containing a thin population of the Hottentot race. To the north of the Namaquas lie the Damara tribes, of whom comparatively little is known, except that from their physical appearance and black colour, they approximate to the negroes and natives of Congo on the west coast. These tribes inhabit a country extending from the tropic of Capricorn to the Cape of Good Hope, and from the Atlantic to the shore of the Indian Ocean. The climate varies from that in which thunder storms and tornadoes shake the mountains, and the scorching rays of an almost vertical sun produce the mirage, to that which is salubrious and mild within the boundaries of the Colony along Kafir-land to the fruitful and well watered plains of the Zoolu country in the vicinity of Port Natal, while the more mountainous and elevated regions are visited by keen frosts and heavy falls of snow. The Colony extends, from west to east, about 600 miles, its average breadth being about 200, containing a variety of climate, the healthiest perhaps to be found in any part of the world. Between the coast and the vast chain of mountains beyond which lie the Karroo, the country is well watered, fertile, and temperate. The other portions of the Colony, with few exceptions and without a change in the seasons appear to be doomed to perpetual sterility and drought. The Karroo country, which is the back ground of the Colony, is, as Lich¬ tenstein correctly describes it, a parched and arid plain, stretching out to such an extent, that the vast hills by which it is terminated, or rather which divide it from other plains, are lost in the distance. The beds of numberless little rivers (in which water is rarely to be found) cross like veins in a thousand directions this enormous space. The course of them might in some places be clearly distinguished by the dark green of the mimosas spreading along their banks. Excepting these, as far as the eye can reach, no tree or shrub is visible. Nowhere appear any signs of life, nor a point on which the eye can dwell with pleasure. The compass of human sight is too small to take in the circumference of the whole — the soul must rest on the horrors of the wide spread desert.

This is only a part of the Karroo, viewed from the top of a hill by that intelligent traveller; but even on these hills and sun-burnt plains, thousands of sheep pasture on a thin sprinkling of verdure and esculents. One morning, after travelling several days in those Karroo plains, Mr. Campbell stood still, and remarked with great emphasis to Mrs. Moffat and myself, “Sirs, it would require a good pair of spectacles to see a blade of grass in this world.”

The entire country, extending in some places hundreds of miles on each side of the Orange River, and from where it empties itself into the Atlantic to beyond the 24th degree east longitude, ay)pears to have the curse of Gilboa resting on it. It is rare

that rains to any extent or quantity fall in those regions. Extreme droughts continue for years together. The fountains are exceedingly few, precarious, and latterly many of these have been dried up altogether. The causes and consequences of the diminution of the rains will be noticed as the writer traverses the different fields which have come under his own immediate observation; and if his long experience and inquiry on that and a variety of other subjects of interest and scientific research, should in any degree throw additional light on doubtful points, he will consider his labour amply rewarded, but his theme is man.

This is a brief sketch of the different tribes which have been the objects of missionary labour, and the limits of which are defined in the accompanying map, intended more as a directory to the position of missionary stations and divisions of tribes, than a minute view of general topography.

I have deemed it proper to be more particular on the Hottentot and Bushman character, as the follow¬ ing chapters present little more than an outline of the labours of missionaries among that people. This section of our operations is so well known from the copious journals and letters so long before the public, as well as from Mr. Campbelks first and second “Travels,” and the “Researches” of the Rev. Dr. Philip, besides the works of other writers on the same subject, that it is the less necessary for me to make large additions to the valuable information thus supplied.

Pitblishcd by Snow Tatxmostrr Mon’ ZonMap-.JS’f^.