4 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



Equatorial Africa, "had been demonstrated'"; that there are diminutive Nanos in 

 the Pyrenees was also admitted; and also that strong evidence had been adduced as 

 to the existence of dwarf survivals in America. I could hardly believe that the 

 writer was my old friend but for a significant omission. He fully accepted my 

 discoveries, but forgot to mention my name in connection with them. Still, tO' 

 have converted him to that extent was eminently satisfactory. 



He concludes with some very sensible remarks, which are especially interesting 

 in connection with an even still more fascinating subject, " The Dwarf Domestic 

 Animals of Pygmies." " It is evident that the existence of pygmy races has passed 

 out of the region of myth and fable into that of history and science. Our infor- 

 mation regarding these strange races is still incomplete and inexact, but it is being 

 steadily augmented and brought in line with accepted results in biology and 

 anthropology. The facts already adduced suggest many interesting reflections, 

 but perhaps raise more problems than they solve. It seems clearly impossible (?) 

 to regard the pygmy races as owning a common origin, although their tendency to 

 conform to a single fairly well-defined type is very curious. 



" Is their case one of degeneration, owing to some special circumstances of 

 climate and environment, or do they represent a remnant still remaining in a stage 

 of development long since left behind by the rest of the human species ? We cannot 

 say with certainty, but such questions may yet become capable of solution, when our 

 information on the subject has become more extensive and exact." 



In 1890, when I visited Morocco to look into the subject of racial dwarfs there, 

 one of my first informants as to their small animals was a halfbreed dwarf at Tangier, 

 about four feet high, who is to be seen in the Soko, or market place there. In my 

 " Dwarfs of Mount Atlas " (p. 25), we find him say, " the dwarfs are very brave, and 

 great hunters of ostriches, having small, swift horses, that are called by a name, 

 hieaning ' those that drink the wind,' and that are fed on dates and camels' milk, 

 and are very lean, and, judged by their looks, would be set down as worthless. 

 This description of these ostrich hunters agreed with that given me by my Berber 

 servant in 1888." A Rabbi from Ternata, on the Dra, also said (see p. 29), "There 

 are many of them (the dwarfs) near the Soudan. The Arabs fear them, and pay to 

 be allowed to pass through their country. Their horses can do without water for 

 four days, and are called dwiminagh ( 'they that drink the wind' ).'.' 



There is a place called Adwarfi, two or three days to the south-east of 

 Tafilet, which is a great resort of the dwarfs, and a part of the Saharan Atlas, in 

 that region (I assume), is called the Black Mountains, where is the River Dora, and 

 where there are many caves, in which the dwarfs live with their cattle. They have 

 an Arabic name, meaning " the people that own cattle." A little Ait Atta from near 

 Adwarfi, and also afterwards a Jew from that region, described the dwarfs there as 

 living in hillocks, in which there are very small entrances, leading to a central 

 chamber, into which, at night, they drive their cattle, which are very small. Mr. 

 MacRitchie, in his " Testimony of Tradition," speaks of the " weems" of Scotland, 

 which are precisely similar structures to the hillocks of the Sahara ; and in one of 

 them, he says, in its central chamber, were found the bones of a small ox. 



In 1893 Mr. Carlo Bruzeau, of the Villa de France Hotel at Tangier, told me 

 that twenty years ago, during a time of famine, he "saw a man bringing inta 

 Mogador for sale, a string of shaggy ponies. When asked whence they came, the 

 Moor replied, 'from the mountains (the Saharan Atlas); there, horses, sheep, 

 goats, cows, men, all -are very small.' " 



In the same year the dwarf tribe that inhabits the Great Atlas, not much more 

 than a day's journey from the city of Morocco, were described to me as owning little 

 sheep, donkeys, goats, and cows ; and a Moor offered to bring some to Mogador, 

 should I wish to buy some of them. 



The Barbary donkey is well known, a pretty tiny specimen of the breed, gen- 

 erally black, and very active and strong for its size. 



