158 TRAVELS IN 
figures. The particular causes to which they are indebted for 
their fine forms and athletic strength of body I do not pre- 
tend to develope, but, it may be observed, that they are 
exempt from many of those causes that, in more civilized 
societies, contribute to impede and cramp the growth of 
the body. Their diet is extremel}^ simple; their exercise 
that of the most salutary nature ; their limbs are not encum- 
bered with clothing ; the air they breathe is pure ; their rest 
is not disturbed by violent love, nor their minds ruffled 
by jealousy ; they are free from those licentious appetites 
which proceed frequently more from a depraved imagination 
than a real natural want : their frame is not shaken and 
enervated by the use of intoxicating liquors, for they are 
not acquainted with them ; they eat when they are hungry, 
and sleep when nature demands it. With such a mode of 
life, languor and listlessness and melancholy have little to do. 
The countenance of a Kaflfer is indeed always cheerful ; and 
his whole demeanor bespeaks content and peace of mind. 
Though black, or very nearly so, they have not one line 
of the African negro in the shape and turn of their person. 
The comparative anatomist might indeed be a little per- 
plexed in arranging the skull of a KafFer in the chain, which 
he has so ingeniously put together, comprehending all the 
links from the most perfect European to the Ourang-Outang, 
and from it through all the monkey-tribe. The head of a 
Kaffer is not more elongated than that of an European ; the 
frontal and the occipital bones form nearly a semicircle ; and 
a line from the forehead to the chin drawn over the nose is as 
finely rounded and as convex as the profile of a Roman or 
2 
