INTRODUCTORY 21

fin the later history given to us by Arab records of every one of the superior black kingdoms which established themselves upon the borders of the desert from Kordofan to the Atlantic, there is to be found at some point in the description the information that to the south of this country

lies the country of the *' Lem-Lems," or it may be of the

**Yem-yems," or the " Dem-dems," or the "Rem-rems," or the '' Gnem-gnems," and after the double name comes invariably the same explanation, **who eat men." In fol-

lowing the history of kingdom after kingdom it becomes

clear that a belt of cannibalism, of which the Nyam-nyams of the Congo may be counted among the present survivors, extended along the south of the Negro belt across the whole breadth of Africa. M. de Lauture, a French writer of much knowledge and acquaintance with his subject,

takes the latitude of 10° north as forming in his day,

1853, the northern limits of habitation of the debased

pagan negro. Between 10° and 17° he places the finer races, which he qualifies generally as Mussulman negroes. To-day I believe it will be found that there has been a still further recession southwards of the inferior races, and

9° north would perhaps be nearer to the limit of their northern extension. It is interesting to observe that

Northern Nigeria stretches from 7° to 14°, thus including within its limits both classes of natives. ^

The modern history of Negroland may be said to date from the period at which it accepted the Moslem religion, but the finer black races had established their domination

over the inferior, and ruled by force of superior intelligence and cultivation long before that time. Es-Sadi, the same writer who speaks of Kuka as a town which existed in the days of the Pharaohs, speaks also in turning to the west of a kingdom extending to the Atlantic Ocean of which

Ghana was the capital, and adds : ** They say that twenty- two white kings had reigned over this country before

the year of the Hegira. Their origin is unknown." It is also in this neighbourhood, about the sources of the Senegal, that the original home in Africa of the Fulani,

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