118 
HISTORY OF MADAGASCAR. 
tration. Besides the two classes just described, there are? 
3. blacks having straight hair, and, 4. blacks with curly or 
frizzly hair. But, ordinarily, the straight hair is with the 
olive-coloured; and the curly or frizzly, with the black. 
Besides the distinctions arising from colour and hair, 
which would exhibit the people in two great classes, the 
olive and the black, the population of the island may be 
considered as comprised in four chief or principal political 
divisions, occupying as many large geographical sections, 
which are also in a certain sense identical; as the designa¬ 
tion of the people and the country they inhabit is frequently 
the same. These divisions are, first, the Hova; second, 
the Sakalava; third, the Betsileo; fourth, the Betanimena 
and Betsimisaraka. 
In the early part of the reign of the father of the late 
Radama, a period not more than seventy years ago, the 
Malagasy were divided into not fewer than fifty distinct 
tribes, governed by their respective chieftains, and inde¬ 
pendent of each other; the chief of each tribe exercising 
absolute power over the lives, property, and services of his 
subjects. Since that period the processes of amalgamation 
have been rapid and effectual, and the principal divisions 
now recognized are those already named: all the rest are 
either subdivisions of these, or people belonging to one or 
the other intermixed. That they are all nearly the same, 
is manifest from their general colour, language, customs, and 
the names of towns, rivers, hills, and productions. 
That they are in some measure also distinct tribes, 
is manifest from their dialects, and some peculiar cus¬ 
toms. That they have intermingled, is manifest from their 
intestine wars, which have not been extirminating wars, 
nor wars prosecuted wholly for obtaining slaves for exporta¬ 
tion, but wars of conquest, booty, and domestic slavery. 
