The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

IXHABITANTS OF SOUTH AFEICA. 107have all retreated bej-ond the Orange. But the ostrich is still fouud iu the wildstate iu a few remote districts of the colouy aud iu the Kalahari. Accordiujj toAnderson, there exist two distinct species of this bird iu South Africa, both differiugfroui the Mauritaniau variety.Amongst the other characteristic birds of the Cai^e region sjiecially noteworthyare the repuhUcan or philhetwros, whose colonies build enormous nests protected bya sort of roof, and the secretary (Serpentaritis repfilioorus), which seizes snakes andkills them -with blows of the wing, or else bears them aloft and breaks theirvertebra) by dropping them from great heights on the hard ground. It is forbiddento kill or huut this useful bird.The reptile world is represented by numerous species, amongst which areseveral venomous serpents and snakes, such as the cobra, the garter snake, andthe much dreaded puff-adder, which fortunatelj' for the ^^'ayfa^er is of somewhatsluggish motion. The inlets along the seaboard are also infested by severalspecies of electric fishes, and by others rendered dangerous by their venomousdarts or poisonous flesh.IxU.VIilTANTSOF SoUTH AfIUCA.More than half of the native inhabitants of Austral Africa, south of theCuneue and Zambose rivers, belong to the widespread Bautu family. It may bosaid in a general waj' that a line drawn from Algoa Bay in the extreme southnorthwards to the latitude of Lake Ngami will form the western limit of the Bantupeoples, separating them from the Bushmen and Hottentot domain stretchingthence to the Atlantic. The eastern slopes of the mountains, the valleys of theUpper Orange, the colony of Natal, and the whole of the Limpopo basin, form partof this vast ethnical region of the Bantus, that is "Men " in a pre-eminent sense, aregion whiuh further comprises the whole of the south torrid zone, and evenextends beyond the equator as far as the Kameroon highlands. Like the vegetable.sjjecies of the equatorial regions, which have gradually invaded the seaboard,attracted, so to say, by the warm nuirine currents carrj'iug their seeds fromshore to shore ; like the northern animals which have spread along the coast ofthe Indian Ocean to the southern extremity of the continent ; the victoriousBantu tribes, also from the north, have in the same way carried their conqueringarms from river basin to river basin, at last reaching the shores of the SouthernOcean, which stretches away to the everlasting snows and ice of the Antarcticwaters.The Bantus of the British and Dutch possessions are roughly designated by thegeneral name of Kafirs, extended to them by the Portuguese at the time of thediscovery. But the word itself is of Arabic origin, meaning " unbeliever," andis in this sense freely applied by the followers of the Prophet to all heathenor uon-Mohammedan populations, and especially to such as have formally rejectedthe teachings of the Koran. Hence there are Kafirs iu Asia—the Siah-Posh ofKafiristan—as well as in Africa. But in the latter continent this generic term has