42 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
asked us a leaf of tobacco for an egg, and four leaves 
for a bunch of bananas. Missionaries, who, like Messrs. 
Preston and Best, resided amongst them for years, have 
observed that, though a mild and timid people, they are 
ever involved in quarrels with their neighbours. I can 
hardly understand how they “ bear some resemblance to 
the dwarfish Dokos of the eastern coast,” seeing that the 
latter do not exist. 
The Dikele grammar proves the language, which is 
most closely allied to the Benga dialect, to be one of 
the great South African family, variously called Kaffir, 
because first studied amongst these people ; Ethiopia 
(very vague), and Nilotic because its great fluvial basin 
is the Zambezi, not the Nile. As might be expected 
amongst isolated races, the tongue, though clearly re- 
lated to that of the Mpongwe and the Mpangwe, has 
many salient points of difference ; for instance, the 
liquid “r” is wholly wanting. According to Mr. T. 
Leighton Wilson, perhaps one word in two is the same, 
or obviously from the same root ; consequently verbal 
resemblances are by no means striking. The orthography 
of the two differs materially, and in this respect Dikele 
more resembles the languages of the eastern coast than 
its western neighbour, at the same time less than the 
Fiote or the Congoese. It has a larger number of de- 
clensions, and its adjectives and pronouns are more 
flexible and complicated. On the other hand, it pos- 
sesses few of the conjugations which form so conspicuous 
a feature in the tongues of the Lower River, and, 
reversing the usage of the Mpongwe, it makes very 
little use of the passive. 
Running the gauntlet of cheer and chaff from the 
noisy inmates of the many Bakele villages, and worried 
by mangrove-flies, we held our way up the muddy and 
rapidly narrowing stream, whose avenues of rhizophoras 
and palms acted as wind-sails ; when the breeze failed 
the sensation was stifling. Lyamba ( Cannabis sativa) 
grew in patches upon the banks, now apparently wild, 
like that about Lagos and Badagry. Not till evening 
did the tide serve, enabling us to send our papers for 
