Chap. XXIV. THE NEGRO TYPE. 501 



humour sent him to tell Chinsamba "to take good care 

 of the corn in the stockades, for they meant to return for 

 it in a month or two." 



Chinsamba's people were drumming with might and main 

 on our arrival, to express their joy at their deliverance from 

 the Mazitu. The drum is the chief instrument of music 

 among the Manganja, and with it they express both their 

 joy and grief. They excel in beating time. Chinsamba 

 called us into a very large hut, and presented us with a 

 huge basket of beer. The glare of suulight from which we 

 had come enabled him, in diplomatic fashion, to have a 

 good view of us before our eyes became enough accustomed 

 to the dark inside to see him. He has a Jewish cast of 

 countenance, or rather the ancient Assyrian face, as seen 

 in the monuments brought to the British Museum by Mr. 

 Layard. This form of face is very common in this country, 

 and leads to the belief that the true type of the negro is 

 not that met on the West Coast, from which most people 

 have derived their ideas of the African. The majority of 

 heads here are as well shaped as those depicted in the an- 

 cient Assyrian and Egyptian monuments. The lips are more 

 like those of Europeans than of the West Coast negroes. 

 They may be described as full, but not unpleasantly so ; 

 and more heads may be observed prolonged a little back- 

 wards and upwards like that of Julius Caesar, than among 

 ourselves. A large ring in one ear reminds one of the 

 Egyptian monuments, and so do some of the fashions of 

 dressing the hair. The legs do not, as a rule, present the 

 high calves, which are supposed to distinguish the African 

 race ; nor do we meet what is termed the lark-heel any 

 oftener here than among the civilized races of Europe. We 

 have noticed a peculiar length of thigh-bone in several 

 instances, but have not had an opportunity of ascertaining 



