The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

448 SOUTH AND KAST AFRICA.and tremblinn^. Here sacrifices are even occasionally olfcrcd in order to conjurethe evil spirits hovering about these ill-omened bites.Social Condition.In a country like Madagascar, which is passing through a period of rapid transformation,and almost of revolution, the social condition necessarily presents thegreatest discrepancies, according as the various tribes and castes take part in orstill hold aloof from the onward national movement. The influence of the whitesis predominant in the high places, and amongst a large number of tribal communitiesthe leading families boast of ihcir descent from Europeans, just as their predecessorsplumed themselves on their Arab blood. Like the Japanese—and hereinmay be noticed another point of 'resemblance between the two races—they haveplunged with a sort of frenzy into the broad stream of European culture. Dress,ornaments, furniture, style of dwellings, ceremonies, military parades, politephraseology, religions themselves : all has been eagerly adopted from their Englishor French visitors, and the work of assimilation thus gradually spreads in everwidening circles from the capital to the remotest extremities of the empire.Even during the interval of reaction, when all foreigners were expelled, themovement still continued, and those who were temporarily banished from Tananarivowere surprised on their return after the war to find a large increase in thenumber of buildings constructed in the European style of architecture. At presentthe whites, whether traders or missionaries, freely traverse the island fromend to end, and hundreds especially of the dealers from Mauritius and Reunion,are hospitably welcomed by the still independent people on the seaboard andcentral plateaux.Under all these influences schools have been multiplied in the towns and ^illages.The Hova language, henceforth fixed by the adoption of the Roman writing system,has become a literary tongue, and possesses a yearly increasing number of printedbooks and periodicals.* English, French, and Portuguese terms are freely borrowed,although in a greatly modified form to suit the phonetic system and structureof the national speech. Christianity, represented by four different Protestantsects and the Roman Catholic form, has been the State religion since the j'ear1869, and the Queen now bears the title of " Head of the Assembly of Believers."Madagascar has also its learned societies. Radama II., who on ascending thethrone in 1861, began by declaring in a great kahari, or national council, thathenceforth all the whites " formed part of his family," had even the intention offounding an Academy of Sciences. He fancied, like so many other sovereigns,that he could thus create genius.But beyond the influence of the ruling class the peoples of the more secluded• The Antananarivo Annual and Madagascar Magazine, a learned, scientific, and literary publication,has regularly appeared for many years in the capital. It is written in English, chiefly by the membersof the London Missionarj- Society, but entirely set up and printed by native craftsmen, on whose skilland intelligence it reflects much credit. The first numlier was issued in 1875 under the editorship of theRev. Jamas Sibree, by whom our knowledge of the island and its inhabitants has been greatly enlarged.— £oiTOB.