The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

;172 SOUTH AND EAST AFRICA.llie wliiilc iinpulatiuu. Thanks to tho Pax JJrU 'inn ica now prevailing among allthe tribes, tho imiiuul rate of increase is considerable. Accurate statistics arc stillwanting, but most resident Eurojjeans are unanimous in asserting that the steadygrowth of the population caused by the natural excess of births over the mortalityis altogether phenomenal, llencc of all South i\irican regions Kafirland isalready the most densely peopled in proportion to its extent.In 1877 the variousestimates ranged from four hundred thousand to five hundred thousand, and atpresent the number of inhabitants considerabl)' exceeds half a million in an areaof not :norc than sixteen thousand squaremiles, or about thirty-two to the squaremile. Exclusive of Pondoland, the census of 1885 gave a population of 333,000.Should this rate of increase be maintained, it may be asked whether the nativesmay not again gradually acquire the upi^er hand, as they have already done inCentral America and in parts of South America.In the widespread family of Bantu peoples theKafirs take a foremost positionfor physical beauty, strength, courage, and intelligence. In many ethnologicalworks representing the various types of mankind, the European whites are figuredby the statues of gods and goddesses, borrowed from the classic period of the plasticarts.But while the noble " Caucasian," son of Prometheus, thus presents himselfunder the ideal form portrayed by the great artists of antiquity, the members ofother races, black, yellow, or red, are shown in these collections handsome or ugly,young or old, healthy or infirm, just as they happen to pass before the objectglassof the photographer, and occasionally even as figured bj" the j)encil of thecaricaturist. But such a method of procedure is unfair to the so-called "inferiorraces."At any rate, it is certain that were the artist to reproduce at haphazard agiven nimiber of Europeans and of Kafirs, he would find, not amongst the former butamongst the latter, the largest number of individuals apjjroaching the standard ofperfect beauty, both as regards regularity of features and symmetrical proportions.The superiority claimed by the white race is true only when the comparison isrestricted to picked specimens. In this case the cultured race is undoubtedlj- thefiner of the two, and here the same difference is observed between the fair and thedark human types as between the -wild beast and the animal improved by the stockbreeder.The noblest specimens of the Kafir race -would appear to be preciselythose dwelling in the neighbourhood of the Europeans and under their influencefor, as Gustav Fritsch well remarks, " Civilisation alone can complete the humanideal." The Kafir features have never the same delicacy as is foimd in those ofthe finest Europeans.The}' are decidedly coarse in comparison, and the lips especiallyare nearly always too thick and tumid. But the Kafirs, as well as the Hottentots,are usually endowed with far greater keenness of vision, and Daltonism isan affection unknown among the natives of Africa.The valoui' of the Kafirs, andespecially their power of dogged resistance, the English have had ample occasionto admire and respect during the long warfare carried on between the two races.A memorable instance was certainly the heroic endurance displayed by the Ama-Kosa people during the terrible year of voluntary famine, to which they fellvictims in tens of thousands.