358 



THE LIVING RACES OF MANKIND 





of Bantu tribes. In the villages they implicitly obey the elders, who govern the community. 

 Over the elders there are two chiefs the Laibon, the great medicine-man of the tribe, and the 

 Beijan, or political chief. In their absence the kraals are managed by a kind of commit! 

 of elders, of whom the superior are the lygonani, or speaking-men. 



THE NJEMPSIANS. 



On the islands of Lake Baringo and around its shores dwell a tribe of people who are 

 usually regarded as Masai altered by the loss of their cattle, just as the Bushmen of the Cape 

 were once thought to be Hottentots whose cattle had been taken by the Dutch. Similar 

 tribes of agricultural people allied to the Masai occur in other parts of Masailand, as on the 

 slopes of Kilima Njaro. Such people are called Wakwafi. Those of Kilima Njaro are said by 

 Johnston to differ from the Masai only in mode of life, except when the tribe has beet 

 affected by the adoption of Bantu women as concubines. These Kilima Njaro Wakwafi are 

 therefore probably agricultural Masai; but in regard to the natives of Njemps it is more 

 probable that they are the remnants of an older tribe, which has been broken up by the 



Masai invasion. 



The Njempsians were described by Thomson as "singularly 

 honest and reliable," and as characterised by "their honesty, 

 their unassuming ways, and their charming unsophisticated 

 manners." The Njempsians are taller and slimmer than the Masai, 

 but have the same general features, high cheek-bones and fore- 

 heads, and often oblique eyes. They dress in long leather cloaks, 

 and wear brass armlets, bracelets, and leg-rings; they have 

 elaborate earrings similar to those of the Masai and Kikuyu, and 

 are armed with spears with short, broad blades. Their language, 

 though allied to that of the Masai, differs materially. They 

 have some similar religious beliefs: for instance, they will not 

 eat zebra or allow any part of the animal inside their villages 

 while the seed of their crops is in the ground. The writer 

 was once camped outside Njemps during a period of famine, 

 when his party had to be fed on zebra meat; the people 

 accordingly refused to allow any of the men to enter the village 

 until they had fasted for several hours. But the Njempsians 

 are less fastidious in food than the Masai, for they eat fish and 

 even rats. 



The Njempsians dwell in huts grouped together in villages, 

 defended by a powerful stockade, and entered by a narrow gateway 

 that can be easily closed by a heavy beam. Their staple food 

 is dhurra. 



THE NEGKOES OF KAVIRONDO. 



In Kavirondo, on the eastern shore of the Victoria Nyanza, 

 is a group of tribes who are often grouped together as the 

 Wakavirondo, but who have been shown by Mr. C. W. Hobley to 

 include a considerable number of different races, including Bantu 

 and Nilotic Negroes. Hobley enumerates sixty tribes or clans in 

 this group, and eays there are more. The people in the western 

 part of the country, along the shores of the lake, mainly belong 

 Photo by Richard Buchta. to * ne Nilotic group, and are most nearly related to the Shuli. 



A MADI MAN. The people of the Nilotic group are generally naked: the 



