maximum and minimum temperatures stand at 80° and 55° F. respectively, with an extreme range of 100° to 35° and a mean annual temperature of 68° to 70°. The rainfall varies according to district from 22 to 32 in. a year and has shown extraordinary stability. Since 1884, the first year in which a record was taken by François Coillard, Barotseland has known no droughts, though South Africa has suffered periodically in this respect.
The Zambezi, as would be expected, forms a definite boundary line in the distribution of many species of fauna and flora. In these respects, as well as from an ethnological standpoint, Barotseland essentially belongs not to South but to Central Africa. The great river has also served to prevent the spread from South Africa into Barotseland of such disastrous cattle diseases as tick fever and lung sickness.
3. The Establishment of British Suzerainty.—By the charter granted to the British South Africa Company in October 1889, the company was allowed to establish its rule in the regions north of the Middle Zambezi not included in the Portuguese dominions, and by a treaty of the 11th of June 1891 between Great Britain and Portugal it was declared that the Barotse kingdom was within the British sphere of influence. The dispute between the contracting powers as to what were the western limits of Barotseland was eventually referred to the arbitration of the king of Italy, who by his award of the 30th of May 1905, fixed the frontier at the Kwando river as far north as 22° E., then that meridian up to the 13° S., which parallel it follows as far east as 24° E., and then that meridian to the Belgian Congo frontier. In the meantime the British South Africa Company had entered into friendly relations with Lewanika (q.v.), the paramount chief of the Barotse, and an administrator was appointed on behalf of the company to reside in the country. A native police force under the command of a British officer was raised and magistrates and district commissioners appointed. In the internal affairs of the Barotse the company did not interfere, and the relations between the British and Barotse have been uniformly friendly. The pioneers of Western civilization were not, however, the agents of the Chartered Company, but missionaries. F. S. Arnot, an Englishman, spent two years in the country (1882–1884) and in 1884 a mission, fruitful of good results, was established by the Société des Missions Evangéliques de Paris. Its first agent was François Coillard (1834–1904), who had previously been engaged in mission work in Basutoland and who devoted the rest of his life to the Barotse. Though always an admirer of British institutions and anxious that the country should ultimately fall under British jurisdiction, Coillard in the interests of his mission was in the first instance anxious to delay the advent of white men into the country. It was contrary to his advice that Lewanika petitioned the “Great White Queen” to assume a protectorate over his dominions, but from the moment Great Britain assumed responsibility and the advance of European civilization became inevitable, all the influence acquired by Coillard’s exceptional personal magnetism and singleness of purpose was used to prepare the way for the extension of British rule. Only those few pioneers who knew the Barotse under the old conditions can fully realise what civilization and England owe to the co-operation of this high-minded Frenchman.
Under the Chartered Company’s rule considerable progress has been made in the development of the resources of the country, especially in opening up the mining districts in the north. The seat of the administration, Kalomo, is on the “Cape to Cairo” railway, about midway between the Zambezi and Kafue rivers. The railway reached the Broken Hill copper mines, 110 m. N. of the Kafue in 1906, and the Belgian Congo frontier in 1910. From Lobito Bay in Portuguese West Africa a railway was being built in 1909 which would connect with the main line near the Congo frontier. This would not only supply Barotseland with a route to the sea alternative to the Beira and Cape Town lines, but while reducing the land route by many hundred miles would also supply a seaport outlet 1700 m. nearer England than Cape Town and thus create a new and more rapid mail route to southern Rhodesia and the Transvaal. The Zambezi also, with Kebrabasa as its one bar to navigation between Barotseland and the sea, will supply a cheap line of communication. (See Rhodesia.)
See David Livingstone, Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa (London, 1857); Major Serpa Pinto, How I crossed Africa (London, 1881); F. Coillard, On the Threshold of Central Africa (London, 1897); Major A. St H. Gibbons, Exploration and Hunting in Central Africa (London, 1898), Africa South to North through Marotseland (London, 1904); “Journeys in Marotseland,” Geographical Journal, 1897; “Travels in the Upper Zambezi Basin,” Geographical Journal, 1901; A. Bertrand, Aux pays des Barotse, haut Zambèze (Paris, 1898); Col. Colin Harding, In Remotest Barotseland, (London, 1905); C. W. Mackintosh, Coillard of the Zambesi (London, 1907), with a bibliography; L. Decle, Three Years in Savage Africa (London, 1898). Consult also the annual reports of the British South Africa Company, published in London. (A. St H. G.)
BAROUCHE (Ger. barutsche, Span. barrocho, Ital. baroccio; from Lat. bi-rotus, double-wheeled), the name of a sort of carriage, with four wheels and a hood, arranged for two couples to sit inside facing one another.
BARQUISIMETO, a city of western Venezuela, capital of the state of Lara, on the Barquisimeto river, 101 m. by rail S.W. of Tucacas, its port on the Caribbean coast. Pop. (est. 1899) 40,000. It is built in a small, fertile valley of the Merida Cordilleras, 1985 ft. above sea-level, has a temperate, healthy climate with a mean annual temperature of 78° F., and is surrounded by a highly productive country from which are exported coffee, sugar, cacao and rum. It is also an important distributing centre for neighbouring districts. The city is the seat of a bishopric, is regularly laid out and well built, and is well provided with educational and charitable institutions. Barquisimeto was founded in 1522 by Juan de Villegas, who was exploring the neighbourhood for gold, and it was first called Nueva Segovia after his native city. In 1807 its population had risen to 15,000, principally through its commercial importance, but on the 26th of March 1812 it was totally destroyed by an earthquake, and with it 1500 lives, including a part of the revolutionary forces occupying the town. It was soon rebuilt and is one of the few cities of Venezuela which have recovered from the ravages of the war of independence and subsequent disorders.
BARR, a town of Germany, in the imperial province of Alsace-Lorraine, on the Kirneck, 13 m. N. from Schlettstadt by rail. It has an Evangelical and a Roman Catholic church and considerable tanneries. There is an active trade in wine and timber. Pop. (1900) 5243.
BARRA, or Barray (Scand. Baraey, isle of the ocean), an island of the outer Hebrides, Inverness-shire, Scotland. Pop. (1901) 2362. It lies about 5 m. S.W. of South Uist, is 8 m. in length and from 2 to 4 m. in breadth, save at the sandy isthmus 2 m. below Scurrival Point, where it is only a few hundred yards broad. The rock formation is gneiss. The highest hill is Heaval (1260 ft.) and there are several small lochs. The chief village is Castlebay, at which the Glasgow steamer calls once a week. This place derives its name from the castle of Kishmul standing on a rock in the bay, which was once the stronghold of the McNeills of Barra, one of the oldest of Highland clans. There are remains of ancient chapels, Danish duns and Druidical circles on the island. There is communication by ferry with South Uist. The parish comprises a number of smaller islands and islets—among them Frida, Gighay, Hellisay, Flodda to the N.E., and Vatersay, Pabbay, Mingalay (pop. 135) and Berneray to the S.E.—and contains 4000 acres of arable land and 18,000 acres of meadow and hill pasture. The cod, ling and herring fisheries are important, and the coasts abound with shell-fish, especially cockles, for which it has always been famous. On Barra Head, the highest point of Berneray, and also the most southerly point of the outer Hebrides chain, is a lighthouse 680 ft. above high water.
BARRACKPUR, a town and magisterial subdivision of British India, in the district of Twenty-four Parganas, Bengal. The town is the largest cantonment in Lower Bengal, having accommodation for two batteries of artillery, the wing of a European regiment and two native battalions. Its name is said to be derived from the fact of troops having been stationed here since 1772. It is a station on the Eastern Bengal railway. Job
