wherein very small people had been deposited in tombs or coffins of stone. The greatest length of the skeletons was nineteen inches. The bones were strong and well set, and the whole frames were well formed. Some of the people appeared to have lived to a great age, their teeth being worn smooth and short, while others were full and long. The graves were about two feet deep; the coffins were of stone, and made by laying a flat stone at the bottom, one at each side, or each end, and one over the corpse. The dead were all buried with their heads toward the east, and in regular order, laid on their backs, and with their hands on their breasts. In the bend of the left arm was found a cruse, or vessel, that would hold nearly a pint, made of ground stone, or shell, of a grey colour, in which were found two or three shells. One of these skeletons had about its neck ninety-four pearl beads. Near one of these burying-places was the appearance of the site of an ancient town.
Webber, in his ‘Romance of Natural History,’ refers to the diminutive sarcophagi found in Kentucky and Tennessee; and he describes these receptacles to be about three feet in length, by eighteen inches deep, and constructed, bottom, sides, and top, of flat, unhewn stones. These he conjectures to be the places of sepulture of a pigmy race, that became extinct at a period beyond reach even of the tradition of the so-called Indian aborigines.
Newspapers for 1866 tell us that General Milroy, who had been spending much time in Smith County, Tennessee, attending to some mining business, discovered near Watertown in that county some remarkable graves, which were disclosed by the washing of a small creek in its
passage through a low bottom. The graves were from eighteen inches to two feet in length, most of them being of the smaller size, and were formed by an excavation of about fifteen inches below the surface, in which were placed four undressed slabs of rock—one in the bottom of the pit, one on each side, and one on the top. Human skeletons, some with nearly an entire skull, and many with well-defined bones, were found in them. The teeth were very diminutive, but evidently those of adults. Earthen crocks were also found with the skeletons. General Milroy could not gain any satisfactory information respecting these pigmy graves. The oldest inhabitants of the vicinity knew nothing of their origin or history, except that there was a large number of similar graves near Statesville in the same county, and also a little burial-ground at the mouth of Stone River, near the city of Nashville. General Milroy deposited the bones found by him in the State Library at Nashville.”
That a race of dwarfs live in Central Africa, is now well known. Ronzo de Leo, who travelled in Africa, for many years with Dr. Livingstone, at one time almost stood alone in his assertion of this fact. But he was supported in his statement by G. Eugene Wolff, who had been in Central Africa with Stanley, and he maintained that, on the southern branches of the Congo, he had seen whole villages of Lilliputians, of whom the men were not over four and a half feet high, whilst the women were a great deal smaller. He described them as being both brave and cunning, expert with bow and arrow, with which they readily bring down the African bison, antelope, and even elephants. As trappers of small animals they are unsurpassed. In a close pinch they use the lance
with astonishing dexterity, and an ordinary sling, in their hands, is wielded with wonderful skill.
These dwarfs collect the sap of the palm, with which they make soap. The men are smooth-faced, and of a rich mahogany colour, while the hair is short, and as black as night. Tens of thousands of them live on the south branch of the Congo.
Mr. Stanley in his expedition for the relief of Emin Pacha,[21] encountered some tribes of these pigmies, but he does not agree with the account which Mr. Wolff gives of them, who describes them as an affable, kind-hearted people, of simple ways, and devoid of vicious tendencies to a greater degree than most semi-barbaric races. The women are industrious and amiable.
Stanley, on the contrary, found them very annoying, and had a lively recollection of their poisoned arrows—but, at the present writing, he not having returned, and we, having no record but his letters, had better suspend our judgment as to the habits and tempers of these small people.
Wolff says they stand in awe of their bigger neighbours, but are so brave and cunning that, with all the odds of physique against them, the pigmies are masters of the situation.