i66 Report S.A.A. Advancement of Science. 



approached, for the services of Bushmen capable of explaining and 

 interpreting would even now be difficult to obtain. The investigation 

 of these manuscripts, with the practical study of the Bushmen that 

 should accompany the work, would naturally fall within the province 

 of the bureau of ethnology. 



In dealing with the remnants of the Hottentots, the bureau would 

 naturally co-operate with the German department. 



The psychology of the native races, from the experimental aspect, 

 is almost a sealed book. There is scope for much work, under direction, 

 a great part of which could be carried on at mission stations, native 

 schools, etc. The study of the mental development of the native child, 

 correlated with the study of its physical growth, would probably help 

 us better than anything else to assign to the Bantu his proper place 

 in society. It has been proved in the case of the northern division 

 of the negro race (the Soudanese) that the sutures of the skull close 

 earlier in life than they do in the European, thus early arresting 

 brain growth and mental development. The result of this is obvious 

 on comparing the mental progress, say, at school, of the negro child 

 and the European child. The negro child, in his earlier years, does 

 not compare very unfavourably with the European, but about puberty 

 his mental development is arrested, and he becomes stupid, just at 

 the period when the brain of the young European is most receptive. 

 This fact is familiarly expressed by the Colonist when he says " the 

 native is a child, and must be treated as such." 



Observations based on correlated periodic statistics of school 

 progress and cranial growth over a large number of native children 

 are particularly desirable, especially among the Bantu and Hybrid 

 Hottentot peoples, for by the results of such observations, better than 

 by general experience, we will be able to determine, with some 

 measure of probability, to what extent it is desirable to raise the 

 several aboriginal races towards the status of the European. 



With regard to anthropometric data, we have really appallingly 

 few measurements of the South African races. While our bureau 

 could, through its officers, compile a lot of useful statistics, it could 

 do still more by encouraging this work among amateurs, and by 

 training them in the use of the instruments. The lack of information, 

 not only on dimensions, but on such points as eye-colour, skin-colour, 

 hair, shape of the ears, nose, and other features, is quite surprising, 

 when one comes to hunt up data on the aborigines of South Africa. 

 Similarly we know next to nothing about native psychology, growth, 

 teeth sequence, stature at time of birth, reproduction statistics, and 

 so forth. 



I can only touch on linguistics. Although languages are, from 

 the purely ethnological standpoint, about the least important field, 

 the bureau could be of great service in co-ordinating the work of the 

 many observers in this line. 



Not the least important, from both the anthropological and the 

 political standpoints, of the provinces in which our bureau would 

 Avork, is the study of the mixed races, such as the Griquas, races 



