THE PYGMIES OF THE GREAT CONGO FOREST. 483 



lects of the bettor-looking- people who are nearest to them. Some of 

 these ape-like men have skins of a dirt}- yellowish brown. The head 

 hair is hlack and thick. .Beard, mustache, and whiskers are fairl}- abun- 

 dant. The eyes are deep set and the overhung- brow ridge is extremely 

 marked. The upper lip is long, and neither of the lips is so much 

 everted as in the ordinary negro. The body is covered nearly all over 

 b}' a tine 3'ellowish down, not apparent at any great distance, but tend- 

 ing to accentuate the yellow appearance of the skin. There is great 

 prognathism, and the chin is weak and retreating. They appear to be 

 rather stupid, timid, and unintelligent. They live in very rude hab- 

 itations of boughs and leaves and spend their time chieHy luuiting and 

 trapping small mammals. They also live a good deal on honey and 

 bee grubs. It would seem, however, on the western tlanks of Kuwen- 

 zori and in the forests northwest of the Semliki Riv(M- as though 

 superior I'aces had occupied the country once given over to the ape- 

 like type and had mixed with this inferior people, so that the ape-like 

 physiognomy may crop out again and again in races whose average 

 numbers exhibit a higher type of feature and tigure. 



THE DESCENDANTS OF THE PYGMIES OF HERODOTUS. 



The Congo forest also shelters within its recesses at the present da}' 

 those curious l\ygmy negroes who appear to be connected distantiv 

 with the Bushmen of South Africa. These p3^gmies were, in all prob- 

 al)ility. well known to the ancient Egyptians. Traders and slave 

 traders who journeyed up the Nile from Egypt in ancient dav-v, and 

 who brought back curious beasts from the black man's coiuitrv. also 

 returned with specimens of these little dwarfs. The pygmies also are 

 written about by Herodotus, as everybody knows. The ''cranes ' with 

 whom they fought were probably the ostriches of the Sudan. Per- 

 sistent stories have been circulated from time to time of the existence 

 of pygmy race-, or pygmy types in the forests of the Atla> Mountains 

 in northwest Africa. Still more remaikable, fos>il remains in Sicily, 

 Sardinia, and the Pyrenees would seem to indicate the existence in 

 Mediterranean Europe at one time of a negrito type, and a rude stat- 

 uette found in the Pyrenees, and attributed to the Stone Age, would 

 seem to show that these pygmies lingered on long after the invasion 

 of the country l\y -uperior races. ^" '' ''" 



The little ])ygmies of the Congo forest do not lliemsclves cultivate 

 or till the soil, but live mainly on the Hesli of beasts, bird<, and lep- 

 tiles, on white ants, bee giubs, and larv.x^ of certain burrowing beetles. 

 Nevertheless they are tond of i)ananas, and to satisfy their hankering 

 for this sweet Iruit they will come at night and rob the plantations of 

 their Dig, black agnculturai neighbors. If the robbery is taken m 

 good part, or if gifts in the shape of ripe bananas aie laid out in a 

 likely «-pot for the pygmy visitor who comes silently <n the darkness 



