Africa, one of the four principal divisions of the globe, and the third in magnitude. The origin of its name is uncertain. Its general form is triangular, the northern part being the base, and the southern ex- tremity the vertex. Its length may be reckoned about 70 degrees of latitude, or 4990 miles ; and its greatest breadth something more than 4090 miles. Until the late researches of Livingstone and Barth, its interior was almost unknown.
Only very rough estimates can be made of the pop- ulation of Africa. They vary from 60,000,000 to 200,000,000 and more. Most of the recent discoveries indicate, however, the existence of a dense population in the interior of Africa, and favor the highest esti- mates of the aggregate population. The natives are partly negroes, comprising the negroes proper, the Caffres, Betchuanas, Foolahs, Fellatas, Hottentots, Bushmen., etc. ; partly Caucasians, among whom be- long the Copts, Moors, Barbarians, Arabs, Abyssinians, Nubians, etc. Malays are to be found in Madagas- car, and numerous Europeans have settled in the Eu- ropean colonies.
Until the beginning of the present centuiy a very large portion of Africa was yet entirely unknown to the civilized world. The Arabs, who had extended their rule in Africa in the 7th century, conquered the whole of the northern coast, and became acquainted with the western coast as far as the Senegal, and the eastern coast nearly as far as the Cape of Good Hope. For a better knowledge of the western coast we are indebted to the Portuguese, who, after the expulsion of the Moors from their country, pursued them to Africa, and gradually advanced routhward on the western coast. Steadily pushing forward, they cir- cumnavigated, in 1497, under Vasco de Gama, the Cape of Good Hope, and soon after explored the south-east- ern shore. The Portuguese were soon followed by English travellers (since 1550), who considerably con- tributed to a better knowledge of the entire coast. But the interior still remained an unknown land ; and even the bold travellers who were sent out by the African Society of London (established in 1788) could not overcome the immense obstacles, and many of them, as Ledyard, Lucas, Houghton. Mungo Park, Horne- mann, and Rontgen, lo>t their lives.
Since the beginning of the present century the explo- rations into the interior of Africa have grown rapidly in number and in importance. The progress of the French rule in Algeria and in Senegambia, the increased pros- perity of the English colonies, the success of the numer- ous missionary societies, many of whose missionaries, as Livingstone, Moffat, Knoblecher, Kray.f, and Isen- berg, belong among the chief explorers of the interior, the construction of the Suez Canal, and the efforts made by European governments and the Geographical Societies of London, Paris, Berlin, etc., have given a wonderful impulse to the exploration of the interior. Important discoveries have quickly succeeded each other; and quite recently (1862) even the great prob- lem of many centuries, the discovery of the sources of the Nile, has been successfully solved by Captains Grant and Speke. All these discoveries and explora- tions have an important bearing upon the prospects of Christianity, for they give us a better knowledge of the religious views of the natives, of their habits and their languages, and thus teach the missionaries and the missionary societies what they have to over- come.
The political divisions of Africa are much more nu- merous than those of any other of the grand divisions
AFRICA
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AFRICA
of the earth's surface. On the north we have the em- pire of Morocco, the French province of Algeria, the pashaliks of Tunis, Tripoli, and Barca, and the oasis of Fezzan, dependencies of the Turkish empire ; Egypt, a vice-royalty of the Turkish empire, though in a state of quasi independency. On the east, Nubia and Kor- dofan, dependencies of Egypt; the empire of Abys- sinia, which has been recently enlarged by the subjec- tion of a number of savage tribes ; the countries bor- dering on the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean, and stretching south-westward for more than 1000 miles. The names of the principal countries are Adel, Ajan, Berbera, Zanguebar, and Mozambique, the coast of which is held by the Portuguese. East of Mozam- bique is the populous island of Madagascar. In South Africa Great Britain has several important colonies. Cape Colony is the oldest of these, and occupies the southern portion of the continent ; above it, on the south-east, are Caffraria, Natal, and the Zulu country ; west of these, and separated from them by the Kalamba Mountains, are the Orange River and Transvaal re- publics, composed mostly of Dutch settlers and their Hottentot or Bechuana dependants. On the west coast, north of the Orange River, and extending about 300 miles into the interior, is the Hottentot country ; and lying between this and the Transvaal republics is the land of the Bechuanas. North of the Hottentot country is Lower Guinea, a country composed of nu- merous chieftaincies and some Portuguese colonies. Among the best known of these chieftaincies are An- gola, Congo, and Loango. Between this and the east- ern coast lies a vast tract, varying in width from ten to twenty-eight degrees of longitude, and extending from nearly ten degrees above to sixteen degrees be- low the equator, almost wholly unexplm-ed by Euro- peans. Upper Guinea, long known as the slave coast, is occupied by several native states, the largest being the kingdom of Dahomey. North of these is that re- gion known formerly as Soudan and Nigritia, com- posed of numerous and constantly changing states (Bornou, Timbuctoo, etc.), part of them Mohammedan, and part pagan. Turning again northward, we find the republic of Liberia and the British colony of Sierra Leone, both settled in great part by free negroes. Lying between this and the Great Desert is the coun- try of Senegambia ; the larger portion has already be- come a dependency of France. England has a settle- ment, Bathurst, at the mouth of the Gambia. The Great Desert, which extends eastward from this coun- try to the confines of Egypt and Nubia, is inhabited by tribes of Arab, or half Arab origin.