354 NATIVES OF EASTERN BRITISH EAST AFRICA part hi 



Mr. Joseph Thomson/ and the discussion of the affinities of the 

 language by Mr. H. H. Johnston.^ 



There is now no doubt that they are a mongrel race between the 

 Nilotic group of Hamites and the Negroes. Their social organisation 

 and language is Nilotic, but their physical characters indicate a con- 

 siderable intermixture of Negro blood. It has been suggested that the 

 Masai ought to be included among the Hamites ; but, as in that case 

 the Njempsians and the Kikuyu would have also to be transferred, it 

 seems best to leave them all in the intermediate Negroid group. 



3. The Njempsians ( Wa-kwafi) 



Hopes are held out by some travellers who have had experience of 

 the Masai, that they may be induced to cease from raiding, to take 

 service as a native police, and thus help to civilise the regions to which 

 they are now nothing but a curse. It is not impossible that by firm 

 and judicious administration this may be done. Mr. Hall, the present 

 superintendent of Fort Smith, has engaged a force of Masai, which 

 has settled beside the fort and helps him to keep the Kikuyu in 

 order. That the Masai may change their habits is also thought 

 possible from the present condition of the people known as Wa-kwafi, 

 who are generally regarded as a section of this tribe. 



Joseph Thomson ^ tells us that they are " unquestionably Masai in 

 race, and only separated from that tribe through the loss of their cattle, 

 and the consequent necessity of breaking their cherished convictions by 

 cultivating the soil." According to this, which is the popularly accepted 

 theory, the Wa-kwafi, only some five and twenty years ago, were a 

 powerful clan of Masai, which lived in Laikipia. Then there is said 

 to have been a war between them and the other Masai, in which the 

 Wa-kwafi were defeated, deprived of tlieir cattle and pasturage, and 

 expelled from Laikipia. They are said to have then settled at Njemps, 

 and adopted an agricultural mode of life. 



There seems to be no doubt that in some places, as in the KiUma- 

 Njaro district, Masai have accepted such a change of life; and where they 

 have done so they are called Wa-kwafi. It is probable, however, that 

 this name is applied by the Suahili to several distinct races in the Masai 

 district, which till the soil and speak languages allied to Masai. In 

 that case the term, like Wa-shenzi and Wa-nderobbo, has no scientific 

 ethnographical value. Krapf, moreover, used the term as a synonym 

 of Masai. The only so-called "Wa-kwafi" I met were those at 

 Njemps, and to them I propose to refer as Njempsians, which leaves 

 their relation to the other "Wa-kwafi " an open question. 



It is quite possible that the story of the origin of the Njempsians 



1 Through Masai Land, chap. x. 



- The Kilima-Njaro Expedition, pp. 446-477, 501-520. 



2 Through Masai Land, 4th ed. , p. 450. 



