56 
MADAGASCAR. 
feet, circle by circle; they fell prostrate before 
him, and swore allegiance to him as king of 
Madagascar! He consented to become their 
monarch, and was beginning to draw up a legis¬ 
lative code for their better government, when an 
attack—prompted, doubtless, by jealousy—was 
made upon his settlement by the French in 1786, 
and Benyowsky was slain. But his memory is 
still cherished by the children of those who had 
sworn fealty to him, and a cairn of stones, raised 
by them, still marks the lonely burial-place of 
this friend of the people. 
The Kimos are now extinct, and no traces of 
them can anywhere be found, although diligent 
and patient search has been made for any relics 
of them by modern explorers. They were a 
community of pigmies, little more than three 
feet high, and of very amiable disposition, ex¬ 
cellent craftsmen, and given to industry. For¬ 
mer travellers make frequent allusions to them 
and their peculiarities; but they have now passed 
away, and their existence is only a tradition. 
The vast number of slaves brought into the 
island by Arab traders from the African main¬ 
land for over two centuries, has given to the 
population on the west coast an almost African 
character entirely. The slaves, known familiarly 
in Madagascar as “ Mozambiques,” were much 
in demand for carrying purposes. They were 
