58 



NATURE 



[July 14, 1910 



is the chief result of the Scotch Commission and the many 

 further inquiries set going by it. Physical training has 

 shared in the benefits of more scientific direction. The 

 rest of the history is written in the statutes and adminis- 

 trative orders and circulars now current in Great Britain. 

 A movement so wide and so costly could have emerged 

 only from a great national awakening, and this report, 

 the first of the new medical department, shows how far 

 advanced the organisation already is. The report contains 

 all the administrative detail necessary to enable the 

 interested sociologist to grasp the significance of the 

 movement. 



Naturally, in a first report, questions of organisation and 

 administration bulk relatively large. Dr. Newman makes 

 very clear the relation of the new school medical officers 

 to the public health service. This was a matter of great 

 concern at the outset, but the solution of difficulties seems 

 to have gone forward smoothly, and to-day any dissociation 

 of services is the exception, not the rule. Subordination 

 of the school medical officer to the medical oflScer of health, 

 or some, definite form of cooperation, seems to have been 

 established practically in every educational area. " There 

 is an interdependence and solidarity in these matters which 

 can only be ignored or neglected at the price of inefficiency 

 and failure " (p. 17). 



Whole-time medical assistants are the rule, part-time 

 assistants the exception. " There fiave been no cases of 

 Authorities commencing with a few whole-time assistants 

 and changing to many part-time assistants " (p. 19). This 

 is a very significant fact. Of the 307 educational areas, 

 160 have been provided with one school medical officer 

 each — the minimum necessary under the Code. In the 

 other 147 areas, "there are in all 616 assistant medical 

 officers " — 122 whole-time, 494 part-time. The arrange- 

 ments for twenty-one other areas have not yet been finally 

 approved, but, approximately, 1084 medical officers are at 

 work "in the school medical service in England and 

 Wales " (p. 18). This is certainly a splendid record. The 

 qualifications of officers, the part played by the teacher, 

 the school nurse, the general scope of the work, all are 

 discussed with quantitative references. It is estimated 

 that, for England and Wales, not fewer than 1,328,000 

 children were medically inspected during 1907-8, and when 

 to these are added 250,000 " specials," that is, children 

 specially brought under the medical inspector's notice as 

 needing attention, the total amounts to not less than 

 ij million children. The general experience with parents 

 is that they have appreciated the work warmly, and some- 

 tim»s enthusiastically, there being a few, but only a few, 

 complainers. 



As to treatment, the facts are, of course, very meagre 

 as yet, but not discouraging. So far as facts are avail- 

 able, the number medically attended to through the 

 parents themselves runs from 20 to 60 per cent, of those 

 brought to their notice by the education authorities. There 

 is here abundant room for organisation and propaganda. 

 The cost of medical inspection, so far as salaries go, runs 

 from 4'7q<i. per child in average attendance in the counties 

 to 7-64(i. in the municipal boroughs and 7-5611. in the 

 urban districts, or, in the same order, from 0-15^. of rate 

 to o-23d. and o-28(l. — no great outlay for so great a 

 service. 



The rest of the volume is taken up with details of the 

 results of medical inspection in the discovery of defects or 

 diseases. The results are necessarily " tentative and frag- 

 mentary " (p. 39), but more than enough to justify the 

 institution of the system and to indicate the immense 

 amount of administrative energy now directed to the 

 amelioration of evil conditions, both environmental and 

 personal. Cleanliness is steadily improving under the 

 pressure of definite administrative direction. For instance, 

 in 124 London schools Dr. Kerr found, of 92,185 children 

 examined, 16,060 verminous, and 222S were excluded for 

 prosecution^the parents of 255 children being prosecuted, 

 and fined in sums varying from \s. 6d. to 20s. As a rule, 

 the first " notice " is enough to secure cleansing. Ring- 

 worm is diminishing. Teeth are beginning to be treated, 

 as, for instance, in Cambridge. Many other diseases now 

 familiar to the general public are here recorded — adenoidal 

 growths, ear discharges, short sight, &-c. There is a good 

 series of piragraphs dealing with tuberculosis, in particular 



with phthisis. The results in percentages for phthisis vary 

 widely — from well below i to well above 4. Obviously 

 there are differences both in the localities and in the 

 methods of diagnosis. This is a disease that has not yet 

 found its " level " in the professional mind. There are 

 sections dealing with the new syllabus of hygiene, with 

 schools for defective children, open-air schools, and many 

 other matters of current importance. 



The report, as a whole, reflects every credit on the 

 system of medical inspection and on the Board of Educa- 

 tion itself. Only the experienced administrator can read 

 from these records the enormous difiSculties to be over- 

 come and the skill shown in overcoming them. 



NOTES OX THE ORIGIN OF THE HAUSAS.' 



IM^EXT to the Filani, the most important race in northern 

 Nigeria is the Hausa, whose origin is undetermined. 

 These people occupy at present most of the land between 

 the ninth and fourteenth parallels north latitude, and the 

 fourteenth and • eleventh ■ meridians east longitude. Their 

 number is variously estimated ; perhaps 4,000,000 is fairly 

 accurate. They are the traders and soldiers of West 

 Africa, and are very good agriculturists, and workers in 

 brass and leather, but seem to have been unable to conquer 

 under their own leaders. 



The Hausas have not the fine features of the Filani, nor 

 yet the very thick lips and flat noses of the coast negro ; 

 they are rather short and stumpy, with woolly hair. Their 

 original country in northern Nigeria consisted of seven 

 States, the " Hausa Bokkoi," to which an equal number, 

 " Banza Bokkoi," were afterwards added. These States 

 were independent of — though dependent on — one another. 

 There are two principal theories as to their origin, viz. 

 (i) that they were indigenous, and (2) that they came from 

 Egypt or Ethiopia. I cannot see why these two appar- 

 ently opposite ideas cannot be modified and reconciled. 



It would seem that the following statements are per- 

 missible : — 



(i) The religion is in too many points similar to that 

 of the ancient Egyptians to imagine that it was formed 

 quite independently. 



(2) The Hausas have the trading and wandering instincts 

 of the Semites, and have travelled voluntarily and without 

 external pressure, ■ whereas the people of most West African 

 negro tribes have kept together, unless conquered and 

 driven out of their countr_v. 



(3) The cephalic index is one which we would naturally 

 expect in the descendants of a mixture of races, some 

 having a greater, some a less, index. Because the ."Vrabic 

 element was in the minority, and because of the influence 

 of environment, the Hausa cephalic index is nearer to 

 that of the Egyptian Copts and mixed races than to that 

 of the Arabs. The present Hausa race is a further mix- 

 ture of the . people who came, in a.d. iooo, with the 

 aborigines. 



(4) Arabic has had some, influence in the formation of 

 the Hausa grammar, as wellas supplying about one-third 

 of the words, and so some of the people who formed the 

 Hausa vocabulary must have known Arabic. ."Vgain, since 

 two-thirds of . the words present no similarity to any 

 Semitic language, it is evident that other elements are 

 present, and some of these are related to Coptic. The 

 word Habeshi was a term of contempt applied by .\rabs to 

 mixed races, and Hausa (Ba-haushe) is a modification. 



. (5) The people came, from the East (ancient Ethiopia) 

 and brought the horse. . Arabs had horses at this time 

 (1000 A.D.), and. the mixture which arrived no doubt spoke 

 a certain- amount of ..Arabic. They may have been 

 Hamites, but it is much more likely that they were a 

 mixture of Hamites and Semites, together with elements 

 of local populations encountered en route, and the original 

 inhabitants of the country now forming the Hausa States. 

 There is probably a little Berber blood also, and even a 

 further addition of .'\rabic. Being ashamed of their humble 

 origin, they invented one for themselves, and called their 

 mythical ancestor Babushe, w^hich is really Ba-(ha)beshi 

 and Ba-hab(e)shi or Ba-haushe. 



1 From a paper hy Capt. A.J.N. Treme-ne in the Journal o' the Royal 

 Society of Arts, July 8 



!I24, VOL. 84] 



