?Written with sensitivity, learning and wisdom....Mr. Mason has elaborated his conceptions of Bantu life before the coming of the European in the belief that there can be no understanding of the present without an understanding of the past. To an understanding of this past, with all its fearful complexities and voids, he has directed his considerable gifts, not the least of which is his ability....to be charitable and yet wholly dispassionate.?-Times (London) Literary Supplement