274 Dr Beke on the Languages of 



doubted that they are of cognate origin with the negro in- 

 habitants of the valley of the White River, and that, conse- 

 quently, their language belongs to the Nubian class (xiv.) 



As regards the Dokos, I believe I was the first, in 1841, to 

 make public mention of these people,* from information ob- 

 tained by Dr Krapf and myself from a slave of the king of 

 Shoa, named Dilbo ; but the particulars then furnished were 

 far from going to the extent of those which have since been 

 given by Dr Krapf, and after him by Major Harris. Ethnolo- 

 gists w^ill remember the marvellous stories related respecting 

 these Dokos, who are described as a nation of pigmies, of 

 scarcely human character, " not taller than boys nine or ten 

 years of age, and never exceeding that height, even in the 

 most advanced age," and who are said to be employed as do- 

 mestic servants by the people of Kaffa. It is sufficient to re- 

 fer to Dr Prichard's Natural History of Man,\ for Dr Krapf 's 

 Report on this subject, which was originally published in the 

 Monatsberichte of the Geographical Society of Berlin. J 



I must here repeat the expression of the doubts which I 

 entertained from the outset,§ on many of the points thus re- 

 lated by Dilbo. When questioned by Dr Krapf and myself, 

 his statements were such as to entitle him to full credit ; and 

 I am afraid that he was subsequently induced to enter into 

 these fanciful and exaggerated details, by a feeling not mi- 

 common among uneducated persons, when jyressed to furnish 

 information, that the more wonderful they make their story, 

 the greater praise they will obtain ; and probably, also, the 

 greater reward. 



The description given by M. d' Abbadie of the Dokos, is re- 

 markably at vai'iance with that furnished by Dilbo to Dr Krapf. 

 The former traveller says, || — " My Sidama interpreter was 

 a Dokko, freed by his master's death. This man remained 

 nearly two years with me, and was eighteen centimetres 



vol. xvii. p. 44, et seq.; Bulletin de la Sociele de Geographic de Paris, 3d Series, 

 vol. viii. p. 356, ct seq. ; Edinhurgk New Philosophical Journal, vol. xlv. p. 238, 

 ct sey.— 22d November 1848. 



* See Friend of Africa (October 1841), vol. i. p. 187 ; Joztrn. Roy. Geonr. Soc, 

 vol. xii. p. 87 ; vol. xiii. p. 265, et seq. 



t 2d Edit., p. 553, et seq. J \'ol. iv. p. 181, ct se^'. 



§ See Literary Gazette of Dec. 30, 1843, No. 1406. 



II Athenceum, of March 8, 1845, No. 906, p. 243. 



