Ibaras

Ibaras, a people of Madagascar, south and south-west districts of the province of Betsileo. Like the allied Betsileos of the central districts, they live in the so-called valas, that is, groups of three or four huts, each surrounded by a mud wall and a quickset cactus hedge. The Ibaras are still for the most part nature worshippers, and, according to J. Mullens, who visited them in 1875, number about 200,000 souls. In their territory is the remarkable Mount Ivahibe, an isolated table with a lacustrine depression on the summit whence, during the rainy season, the lake sends its overflow through a wild gorge and magnificent cascade down to the surrounding plains.