Late travellers in Africa have found more than trees and streams in the forest depths. They have found there a distinct and peculiar race of men, negro-like in many particulars, yet differing from the negroes in others, and specially marked by their dwarfish stature, which is indicated in the name of Pygmies, usually given them. These diminutive beings were known as long ago as the days of Homer, and their legendary combats with the cranes are spoken of by him in his poems. He was not aware of what is known now, that these forest dwarfs would disdain the cranes as antagonists, and are quite capable of overcoming the lordly elephant. In truth, they know no equals in the forest, and, while destitute of any knowledge of agriculture, are the most skilful, considering the primitive character of their weapons, of the hunters of the earth. The forest is the home of the Pygmy, as in all probability it was of the man-ape. He dwells in its deepest recesses, its moist and sultry depths, and pines when removed from his native realm in the heart of the tropic woods. In truth, he is almost as fully arboreal as was his tree-dwelling ancestor and as are his forest relatives, the anthropoid apes of to-day; not inhabiting the limbs of trees, indeed, but living under their shade, and forming the true man of the woodland, the nomad hunters of the vast equatorial forests. It must be said, however, that this is not wholly the case. There are tribes seemingly belonging to this race in South Africa who dwell in the open desert, but retain there, in great measure, the habits of their forest kin. The first of modern travellers to see the Pygmies was Du Chaillu, in his journey through the African woodlands in 1867. He describes them as averaging four feet seven inches in height, their complexion of a pale yellow brown, the hair of their head short, but their bodies covered with a thick growth of hair, as if the loss of their ancestral covering had not been completed. The tribe seen by him was known as the Obongo, and dwelt in Ashango Land, occupying the forest region between the Gaboon and the Congo. Dr. Schweinfurth, whose exploration extended from 1868 to 1870, was the next to meet these nomads of the forests, of whom he has given an interesting description in his "Heart of Africa." He met with them in the country of the Manbuttoo, on the Welle River, between three degrees and four degrees north latitude. The tribe seen by him, known as the Akka, was made up of very diminutive individuals, none being over four feet ten inches high, and some only four feet. Their bodies were in due proportion to their height, so that they resembled half-grown boys in size.