Lastly; the class in question is not strictly ethnological, and that for the following reasons:—It is based upon elements other than those of affiliation and descent. Thus in respect to descent, the Negro of Sennaar has his closest relations in the way of language, manners, and blood, with the Africans of Kordofan, Abyssinia, and the parts about his own country. Not so, however, his physical conformation. These are with the Africans of Senegambia and Guinea; a fact brought about by the common conditions of heat, moisture, and a low sea-level; conditions, however, which render the group artificial and provisional rather than natural and permanent. The same would be the case if we threw all the mountaineers of Europe in one and the same class, irrespective of their real ethnological differences, simply on the ground of their all exhibiting certain common phænomena of colour, stature, and habits.
I repeat the statement, therefore, that the class of the Negro Atlantidæ is only partially an ethnological one.
The chief area of the Negro is Western Africa, and the point at which the notice of the Negro group most conveniently begins is the mouth of the Senegal, the most northern locality of the Western Negro Atlantidæ.
WESTERN NEGRO ATLANTIDÆ.
Area.—The Lower Senegal and Gambia, the coast as far as the Kong Mountains, the Lower Niger, and the coast south of that river.
Chief divisions.—1. The Woloffs. 2. The Sereres. 3. The Serawolli. 4. The Mandingo. 5. The Sapi-Felúp. 6. The Ibo-Ashantí.
Of these the most northern are—
THE WOLOFF (IOLOF, JOLOFF, OUOLOFF).
Locality.—The Lower Senegal, i.e. Cayor on its north, and the coast as far as Cape Verde on its south bank. Conterminous with the Fulahs, Sereres, Serawolli, Mandingos, Berbers, and Moors of the Western Sahara.
Religion.—Feticism.