They were eventually taken to a city, the inhabitants of which were black.
Near this city ran a considerable river whose course was from west to
east, and in which crocodiles were found. In his account of the Akkas, Mr.
Stanley believed that he had discovered the representatives of the Pigmies
mentioned in this history. Speaking of one of these, he says,[A]
"Twenty-six centuries ago his ancestors captured the five young Nasamonian
explorers, and made merry with them at their villages on the banks of the
Niger." It may be correct to say that, at the period alluded to, the dwarf
races of Africa were in more continuous occupancy of the land than is now
the case, but such an identification as that just mentioned gives a false
idea of the position of the Pigmies of Herodotus. De Quatrefages, after a
most careful examination of the question in all its aspects, finds himself
obliged to conclude, either that the Pigmy race seen by the Nasamonians
still exists on the north of the Niger, which has been identified with the
river alluded to by Herodotus, but has not, up to the present, been
discovered; or that it has disappeared from those regions.
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