38G Scientific Intelligence — Anthropology. 



Assuming the argument, it follows that a language with such a 

 destiny before it should be stripped as much as possible of all acci- 

 dental excrescences and anomalies, and rendered as perfect an in- 

 strument as skill and judgment can make it. Its phonology is re- 

 markably imperfect — its spelling is cumbersome and arbitrary be- 

 yond all reasonable limits, — and its irregularities of declension and 

 conjugation are more numerous than they need be. — Athenceum. 



2. Coffers described. — It is now pretty generally admitted that the 

 Gaffers belong to the Negro race of mankind ; but the characteristic 

 peculiarities of that race, with the exception of the woolly hair, are 

 less strongly marked in them than in the natives of Guinea or Mo- 

 zambique ; the lips are less thick, the nose less flat, the lower part 

 of the face is not remarkably prominent, and the forehead is often 

 as hioh and as amply developed as in Europeans. The colour of 

 the skin appeared to me, in most of the individuals I saw, to be a 

 dark umber brown, frequently approaching to black, while in others 

 it had a tinge of yellow or red ; but the skin is so often smeared 

 with red ochre, that it is not easy to judge accurately of its real 

 native tint. The Caffer men are in general tall, though not gi- 

 gcfntic, and extremely well proportioned : indeed their fine forms 

 and easy attitudes often remind one of ancient statues ; but they are 

 more remarkable for activity than for strength ; and it is said, have 

 generally been found inferior in muscular power to Bi'itish soldiers. 

 — Residence at the Cape of Good Hope, by Charles F. Bunbury. 

 p. 166 



3. Hottentots described. — We had been escorted in our little tour 

 into CafFerland by detachments of the Hottentot corps, or Cape 

 Mounted Rifles, who are, or were at that time, the only cavalry in 

 the colony, and seem well suited for the frontier service. The 

 officers are English, the men partly of mixed breed, and partly 

 genuine Hottentots. These latter people, of whom I saw a consi- 

 derable number in Graham's Town and its neighbourhood, have a 

 most peculiar and repulsive physiognomy. The form of the face is 

 sinifularly angular, owing to the excessive projection of the cheek- 

 bones, the shrunk and pinched appearance of the lower part of the 

 cheeks, and the sharpness of the chin ; the mouth is prominent, and 

 the lips thick ; the eyes very small and narrow, and rather obliquely 

 placed ; the foreheed depressed ; the nose flattened in a remarkable 

 def^ree, so that the upper part of it appears to be quite obliterated, 

 while the nostrils are large and wide. The plates in Le Vaillant s 

 Travels do not at all exaggerate the usual ugliness of this strange 

 race ; but whether his account of their moral qualities be correct, I 

 cannot tell. I never saw any of them in their original state of wild 

 independence ; and if they ever were such as he describes them, they 

 have become sadly deteriorated from their intercourse with civilized 

 men. Many people are struck with the likeness of the Hottentots 



