; 
‘CHARACTERS. 
as well as the defensive against their 
neighbours ; who would then per- 
haps think themselves very happy 
to preserve peace. 
‘At the distance of two or ‘three 
days journey from Fort Dauphin, 
the inhabitants of that part of the 
country shew a number of small 
barrows, or earthen hillocks, in the 
‘form of graves, which, as is said, 
‘owe their origin to a great massacre 
“of the HOS: who were defeated in 
‘the field by their ancestors. How- 
‘ever this may be, a tradition gene- 
rally believed in that district, as 
well as in the whole island of Mada- 
gascar, of the actual existence of the 
Kimos, leaves us no room to doubt 
that a part at Jeast of what we are 
told respecting these people is true. 
It is astonishing that every thing 
‘which we know of this nation is 
‘collected from their neighbours ; 
“that no one has yet made observations 
‘on the spot where they reside; and 
that neither the governor of the isles 
of France and Bourbon, nor the 
commanders at the different settle- 
ments which the French possessed 
on the coast of Madagascar, ever 
atteinpted to penetrate into the in- 
eerie parts of the country, with a 
‘view of adding this discovery to 
“many others which they might have 
“made at the same time. 
To return to the Kimos, I can de- 
‘clare, as being an eye-witness, that 
in the voyage which I made to Fort 
“Dauphin, about the end of the year 
1770, the Count de Modave, the 
last governor, who had already com- 
municated to me one part of his 
observations, at Jength afforded me 
‘the satisfaction of seeing among his 
sslaves a Kimos woman, aged about 
‘thirty, and three feet seven inches 
in height. Her complexion was in- 
milo | 
359 
deed the fairest | had seen among 
the inhabitants of the island; and I 
remarked that she was well limbed 
though so low of stature, and far 
from being ill-proportioned, that her 
arms were exceedingly long, and 
could reach without bending the 
body as far as the knee; that her 
hair was short and woolly ; that her 
features, which were agreeable, ap- 
proached nearer ‘to those of an 
European than to ‘an inhabitant of 
Madagascar ; and that she had na- 
turallya pleasant look,and was good- 
humoured, sensible, and obliging, 
as far as could be judged from, her 
behaviour. With regard to breasts, 
I saw no appearance of them, ex- 
cept the nipple: but this single 
observation is not at all sufficient 
to establish a variation from the 
common laws of nature. 
A little before our departure from 
Madagascar, a desire of recovering 
her liberty, as much as a dread of 
being carried away from her native 
country, induced this little slave to 
make her escape into the woods. 
Every thing considered, I am in- 
clined firmly to believe in this new 
variety of the human species, who 
have their characteristic marks as 
well as their peculiar manners, and 
who inhabit mountains from sixteen 
to eighteen hundred fathoms high 
above the level of the sea. 
Diminution of stature, in respect 
to that of the Laplanders, is almost 
graduated as from the Laplapder to 
the Kimos. Both inhabit the cold- 
est regions and the highest moun- 
tains in the world. Those of Mada- 
gascar, where the Kimos live, are, 
as I have already observed, sixteen 
or eighteen hundred fathoms high 
above the level of the sea. The 
vegetable productions which grow 
ZA on 
