lising faculty are most conspicuous. Many of them make carvings
and rude illustrations, but only a few have the gift of carrying a
picture in their mind's eye, judging by the completeness and
firmness of their designs, which show no trace of having been
elaborated in that step-by-step manner which is characteristic of
draughtsmen who are not natural artists.

Among the races who are thus gifted are the commonly despised, but,
as I confidently maintain from personal knowledge of them, the much
underrated Bushmen of South Africa. They are no doubt deficient in
the natural instincts necessary to civilisation, for they detest a
regular life, they are inveterate thieves, and are incapable of
withstanding the temptation of strong drink. On the other hand, they
have few superiors among barbarians in the ingenious methods by
which they supply the wants of a difficult existence, and in the
effectiveness and nattiness of their accoutrements. One of their
habits is to draw pictures on the walls of caves of men and animals,
and to colour them with ochre. These drawings were once numerous,
but they have been sadly destroyed by advancing colonisation, and
few of them, and indeed few wild Bushmen, now exist. Fortunately a
large and valuable collection of facsimiles of Bushman art was made
before it became too late by Mr. Stow, of the Cape Colony, who has
very lately sent some specimens of them to this country, in the hope
that means might be found for the publication of the entire series.
Among the many pictures of animals in each of the large sheets full
of them, I was particularly struck with one of an eland as giving a
just idea of the precision and purity of their best work. Others,
again, were exhibited last summer at the Anthropological Institute
by Mr. Hutchinson.

The method by which the Bushmen draw is described in the following
extract from a letter written to me by Dr. Mann, the well-known
authority on South African matters of science. The boy to whom he
refers belonged to a wild tribe living in caves in the Drakenberg,
who plundered outlying farms, and were pursued by the neighbouring
colonists. He was wounded and captured, then sent to hospital, and
subsequently taken into service. He was under Dr. Mann's observation
in the year 1860, and has recently died, to the great regret of his
employer, Mr. Proudfoot, to whom he became a valuable servant.

Dr. Mann writes as follows:--

"This lad was very skilful in the prover