STRANGE PIGMY RACE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8374, 21 July 1905, Page 2

STRANGE PIGMY RACE.

DANCE FOR HOURS AT A STRETCH WITHOUT FATIGUE. Colonel Harrison, who recently returned to London after a four months' expedition to t"ho Congo Forest, gives come interesting facts concerning tlio pigmy denizens of the country, six of whom h« has brought back to Cairo. Apart from the pigmies, Colonel Harrison cays there is no sign of human lifa in the' forest. Partly from superstition and largely owing to fear of the pigmies, he informed a Router's representative, the natives avoid, and will not enter it. Even the pigmies do not penetrate for mo-re than about two days into its recesses, and Avhite men do not go there. Messages were "sent to the little people by means of a pigmy boy, who spoke Swa'hili, and who was with Colonel Harrison's party, announcing the approach of a white man and explaining the object of the visit. " When once I had gained their confidence," says the colonel, "they were quite friendly, and eventually cix of them — four men and two women — volunteered to come with me to England. They freely conducted me to their little villages, and at night time erected leafy structures, under which. I slept. They are of an extremely low order of intelligence, and know, absolutely nothing of what goes on around them. They seem to have no religious instincts, and possess no idea of a Supreme Being. WOMEN TALLER THAN MEN. • " Their average height is .from four feet to four feet three and a half, and, curiously enough, as a rule the women are taller than the men. The women have also better physical development. The men seem to me to be starved to death. "The actual villages were some distance from the clearings, the tiny huts being packed hidden away between the trees, sometimes in almost inaccessible places. One of them consisted of some dozen little leafed-in arbours, seven feet in diameter, and 1<?93 than four feet high at the highest point. In front of these burned a bright fire, while "within each of the dwellings crouched from eight to ten of the pigmies.^ They are great dancers, and they wijl perform for hours at a stretch without fatigue. . " Their movements are in perfect time and by no means ungraceful. About 100 form up a line, and dance round a couple of native drums. These, . with the shrill whistles they employ when out hunting, appear to be their only musical instruments. On the first nis-lit on which they danced for me, only thirty-five came out, all the women being kept in the huts, but on subsequent occasions I have had as many as 100 performing. . " \ striking characteristic or the people is their extraordinary silence; they will sit for hours without uttering a word. They are nomadic, and their only wealth is in spears. The number of spears determines the number of wives these people can afford. MODEST PERSONAL BELONGINGS. " They are practically nude. The women's only clothing is a few leaves, while the men's attire consists of a scrap of skin round the waist. Their whole personal belongings consist of a poisoned 6pear or two and an old clay cooking-pot. The women carry their infants slung across their sides. " Tho •piprmies are fearless hunters, and will holdly attack an elephant by rushing up to it and planting a poisoned 6pear in the brute. They are also very warlike little people, and only a short while before my, arrival in the forest thoy sallied out, attacked, and" looted a Belgian caravan and killed seventeen porters. There were no white men with the caravan, and the native itoldiors bolted. " They eat like animals, even gnawing the bones of their prey. . When an animal is caught they cut it up, skin and all, and put it in the oooking-pot. "Life in the, forest is ..dreary in* the extreme. It is always twilight, ■&© sun never penetrates through the dense foliage, and for nine months of the year .it ooiirs with rain."' After living for three weeks in. tfce forest, Colonel Harrison, together with the six pigmies who had volunteered to return with him, started for Cairo.