Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/282

Rh 260 A F E I C A [ETHNOLOGY. The most important among the reptiles is the crocodile, which inhabits nearly all the large rivers and lakes within the tropics, and is still abundant in the Nile below the first cataract. The chameleon is common in Africa. Among the veno mous species of snakes are the purple naja, the cerastes or horned viper, the ringed naja, and the darting viper. sues. Edible fish are found almost everywhere in great variety and quantity. The fresh waters of Egypt produce the gigantic bishir, the coffres, and numerous species of the pimelodes. Many varieties of fish exist in the great inte rior lakes ; five large species found in the Tanganyika are described by Burton. The greater number of the fish of the Red Sea resemble the saxatiles of the warm seas of Asia. On the west coasts are found the fish belonging to equatorial latitudes, while the shores of the Mediterranean produce those of France and Spain. The seas of the southern extremity possess the species common to the latitudes of the antarctic, south of the three great capes. The fish of the east coast are the same as those of the Indian Sea. .sects Of the insect tribes Africa also contains many thousand different kinds. The locust has been, from time imme morial, the proverbial scourge of the whole continent ; scor pions, scarcely less to be dreaded than noxious serpents, are everywhere abundant; and the zebub, or fly, one of the instruments employed by the Almighty to punish the Egyptians of old, is still the plague of the low and cultivated districts. In the interior of Africa a venomous fly occurs in certain regions of the south and east, which is fatal to nearly all domestic animals. It is called tsetse (Glossina morsitans), and its size is almost that of the common blue fly which settles on meat; but the wings are larger. On the absence of this insect greatly depended the success of recent explorers in that quarter, as, where it appeared, their cattle infallibly fell victims to its bite. There are large tribes which cannot keep either cattle or sheep, because the tsetse abounds in their country. Its bite is not, however, dangerous to man; wild animals likewise are undisturbed by it. The termites or white ants are likewise a scourge to the country where they occur in great numbers. This destructive creature devours everything in the shape of wood, leather, cloth, &c., that falls in its way; and they march together in such swarms, that the devastation they commit is almost incredible. jophytea. Of the class of zoophytes, the brilliant polypi of every variety, and madrepores, abound on the coasts of Africa. The shores of the Mediterranean produce the finest coral, and those of the Red Sea bristle with extensive reefs of the same mollusca. [an. From the shores of the Mediterranean to about the lati tude of 20 N., the population of Africa consists largely of tribes not originally native to the soil, but of Arabs and Turks, planted by conquest, with a considerable number of Jews, the children of dispersion; and the more recently introduced French. The Berbers of the Atlas region, the Tuaricks and Tibbus of the Sahara, and the Copts of Egypt, may be viewed as the descendants of the primitive stock, while those to whom the general name of Moors is applied, are perhaps of mixed descent, native and foreign. From the latitude stated to the Cape Colony, tribes com monly classed together under the title of the Ethiopic or Negro family are found, though many depart very widely from the peculiar physiognomy of the Negro, which is most apparent in the natives of the Guinea coast. In the Cape Colony, and on its borders, the Hottentots form a distinct variety in the population of Africa, most closely resembling the Mongolian races of Asia. The Copts, or as they are correctly pronounced, either Ckoobt or Ckibt, are considered to be the descendants of the ancient Egyptians. They do not now compose more than one sixteenth part of the population of Egypt, their number not exceeding 145,000, about 10,000 of whom reside at Cairo. Conversions to the Mohammedan faith, and intermarriages with the Moslems, have occasioned this decrease in their numbers ; to which may be added the- persecutions which they endured from their Arabic invaders and subsequent rulers. They were forced to adopt distinc tions of dress, and they still wear a turban of a black or blue, or a grayish or light brown colour, in contradistinction to the red or white turban. In some parts of Upper Egypt there are villages exclusively inhabited by the Ccpts. Their complexion is somewhat darker than that of the Arabs, their foreheads flat, and their hair of a soft and woolly character; their noses short, but not flat; mouths wide, and lips thick ; the eyes large, and bent upwards in an angle like those of the Mongols ; their cheek-bones high, and their beards thin. They are not an unmixed race, their ancestors in the earlier ages of Christianity having intermarried with Greeks, Nubians, and Abyssinians. With the exception of a small proportion, the Copts are Christians of the sect called Jacobites, Eutychians, Monophysites, and Monothelites, whose creed was condemned by the Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 451. They are extremely bigoted, and bear a bitter hatred to all other Christians; -they are of a sullen temper, extremely avaricious, great dissemblers, ignorant, and faith less. They frequently indulge in excessive drinking; but in their meals, their mode of eating, and the manner in which they pass their hours of leisure, which is chiefly in smoking their pipes and drinking coffee, they resemble the other in habitants of the country. Most of the Copts in Cairo are employed as secretaries and accountants, or tradesmen; they are chiefly engaged in the government offices; and as merchants, goldsmiths, silversmiths, jewellers, architects, builders, and carpenters, they are generally considered more skilful than the Moslems. The Coptic language is now understood by few persons, and the Arabic being employed in its stead, it may be considered as a dead language. The countries above Egypt are inhabited by two tribes of people resembling each other in physical characters, but of distinct language and origin. One is, perhaps, the aboriginal or native, the other a foreign tribe. Dr Prichard terms them Eastern Nubians, or Nubians of the lied Sea, and Nubians of the Nile, or Berberines. All these tribes are people of a red-brown complexion, their colour in some instances approaching to black, but still different from the ebony hue of the Eastern negroes. Their hair is often fri/zled and thick, and is described as even woolly; yet it is not precisely similar to the hair of the negroes of Guinea. The Eastern Nubians are tribes of roving people who inhabit the country between the Nile and the Red Sea; the northern division of this race are the Ababdeh, who reach northward in the eastern desert as far as Kosscir, and, towards the parallel of Deir, border on the Bisluui. The Bishari reach thence towards the confines of Abyssinia. The latter are extremely savage and inhospitable ; they are said to drink the warm blood of living animals ; they are for the most part nomadic, and live on flesh and milk. They are described as a handsome people, with beautiful features, fine expressive eyes, of slender and elegant forms ; their complexion is said to be a dark brown, or a dark chocolate colour. The Barabra or Berberines are a people well known in Egypt, whither they resort as labourers from the higher country of the Nile. They inhabit the valley of that name from the southern limit of Egypt to Sennaar. They are a people distinct from the Arabs and all the surrounding nations. They live on the banks of the Nile ; and wherever there is any soil, they plant date- trees, set up wheels i-jr irrigation, and sow durra and some