The Mpongwe, whom the French call "les Gabons," are the
aristocracy of the coast, the Benga being the second, and the
Banoko and Bapuka ranking third. They are variously estimated at
5,000 to 7,000 head, serviles included. They inhabit both sides
of the Gaboon, extending about thirty-five miles along its banks,
chiefly on the right; on the left only seawards of the Shekyani.
But it is a wandering race, and many a "mercator vagus" finds his
way to Corisco, Cape Lopez, Batanga, and even Fernando Po. The
two great families on the northern river bank are the Quabens and
the Glass, who style themselves kings and princes; the southern
side lodges King William (Roi Denis) near the mouth, and the
powerful King George, about twenty-five miles higher up stream.
There are also settlements scattered at various distances from
the great highway of commerce to which they naturally cling, and
upon the Coniquet and Parrot Islands.

Barbot (iv. 9) describes the "Gaboon blacks" as "commonly tall,
robust, and well-shaped;" they appeared to me rather below the
average of West Coast size and weight. Both sexes, even when
running to polysarcia, have delicate limbs and extremities, and
the features, though negroid, are not the negro of the
tobacconist's shop: I noticed several pyramidal and
brachycephalic heads, contrary to the rule for African man and
simiad. In the remarkable paper read (1861) by Professor Busk
before the Ethnological Society, that eminent physiologist proved
that the Asiatic apes, typified by the ourang-outang, are
brachycephalic, like the Mongolians amongst whom they live, or
who live amongst them; whilst the gorillas and the African
anthropoids are dolichocephalic as the negroes. The Gaboon men