the eastern side of the continent, as the Caffres, have heads finely developed, and strongly European. Instances of this kind are frequently seen, and after I became so familiar with the dark color as to forget it in viewing the countenance, I was struck by the strong resemblance some nations bore to certain of our own notabilities. The Bushmen and Hottentots are exceptions to these remarks, for both the shape of their heads and growth of wool are peculiar · the latter, for instance, springs from the scalp in tufts, with bare spaces between, and, when the crop is short, resembles a number of black pepper-corns stuck on the skin, and very unlike the thick, frizzly masses which cover the heads of the Balonda and Maravi. With every disposition to pay due deference to the opinions of those who have made ethnology their special study, I have felt myself unable to believe that the exaggerated features usually put forth as those of the typical negro characterize the majority of any nation of South Central Africa. The monuments of the ancient Egyptians seem to me to embody the ideal of the inhabitants of Londa better than the figures of any work of Ethnology I have met with."Livingstone's Researches in South Africa. London ed., 1857, ch. xix. p. 378. The following facts and opinions respecting the negro race are from the work of another recent African traveler." Having given a physical description of the negro which would satisfy any negro-hater, the writer proceeds as follows: "Thus it has been proved by measurements, by microscopes, by analysis, that the typical negro is something between a child, By *"SAVAGE AFRICA: Being the Narrative of a Tour in Equatorial, South-western, and North-western Africa. Winwood Reade, Fellow of the Geographical and Anthropological Societies of London, and Corresponding Member of the Geographical Society of Paris. Second edition, London. a dotard, and a beast. I can not struggle against these sacred facts of science; I can not venture to dispute the degradation of the negro. But I contend that it is only degradation; that it is the result of disease; that it is not characteristic of the African continent; and that it is confined to a small geographical area. But first I will remove the great stumbling-block of African ethnology. By defining the geography of the negro, I shall pave the way for the elucidation of that mystery which has perplexed the philosophers of all ages the negro's place in nature. -- "Those who deny that the negro type has been produced by natural causes, have alleged that there are two distinct races in Africa, the red and the black, and that they inhabit the same localities. The reader will bear in mind that a series of mountain terraces runs along the whole length of Western Africa, and that between them and the sea are low and malarious swamps. These mountains are inhabited by the true African — a red-skinned race. Nations of these, descending into the swamps, have become degraded in body and mind, and their type completely changed. "The negro forms an exceptional race in Africa. He inhabits that immense tract of marshy land which lies between the mountains and the sea, from Senegal to Benguela, and the lowlands of the eastern side in the same manner. He is found in the parts about Lake Tchad, in Sennaar, along the marshy banks of rivers, and in several isolated spots besides. But he is not found in the vast tracts which are occupied by the Berbers on the north, and the Bitshuanas of the south. He is not found in the highlands of Ethiopia, nor in those of Soudan. "In Africa there are three grand races, as there may be said to be three grand geological divisions. "The Libyan stock inhabit the primitive and volcanic tracts. They have a tawny complexion, Caucasian features, and long black hair. "On the sand-stones will be found an intermediate type. They are darker than their parents; they have short and very curly hair; their lips are thick, and their nostrils wide at the base. “And, finally, in the alluvia, one will find the negroes with a black skin, woolly hair, and prognathous development. “I do not mean to assert that light-colored tribes are never found in the alluvia, and that true negroes can never be met with in the dry plateaus. There is in Africa a continual movement towards the west. It is, therefore, common enough to see Fulas and Mandingos inhabiting the lowlands of Senegambia; and the light-colored Fans are beginning to occupy the banks of the Gaboon. In the same manner, a tribe of negroes migrating across the continent from the east coast might be met with in a sandy desert of Central Africa. "My assertion that the negro is as exceptional a race in Africa as the livid inhabitants of the Fens in England, or of the Pontine marshes in Italy, and that he inhabits, comparatively speaking, a small geographical area, will excite great surprise. There is a general delusion respecting the negro which is not difficult to explain. The whole western coast, and a great portion of the eastern coast, are inhabited by negroes. It is natural that travelers and coast residents should accept them as types of the races of the continent. The slaves that have been imported into the New World were almost exclusively brought from these regions; and I have always observed that slaves, even among negroes, present a lower type than that of the surrounding population. These also have been examined, and written upon by naturalists as true samples of the African.”—pp. 509, 513. In regard to the cause of color in man, a distinguished French savant* writes as follows: "When we seek for the cause of coloration in the human skin, an anatomical analysis presents particulars to which sufficient * De l'Unité des Races Humaines. Par M. Ladevi Roche, Professeur Honoraire de Philosophie à la Faculté de Lettres de Bordeaux. attention has not been given. In proceeding from the outside, we at first meet with that thin, light pellicle, transparent and colorless tissue, called the epidermis; and immediately below, the microscope reveals the colored matter called the pigmentary body (from the Latin pigmentum, painting), formed of a multitude of granules, and always presenting a yellow, red, or black tint, which is reflected by the transparency of the epidermis. They (the polygenists) have gone further: they have wished to descend even to the true skin of man, to the dermis, in which are the roots of the hair, . . . in the hope of finding there the efficient cause of coloration in the pigmentary matter. But, oh, surprise! The dermis, the true skin of man, which they thought to find black, yellow, red, or copper-colored, and, by these different shades, to justify the distinction and plurality of races, — the dermis, I say, turned and returned in every way, examined by the lens and the microscope, in the white, in the black, in the red, and in the yellow, constantly offers itself to the astonished eye with a uniform color of faded white, as soon as it is disengaged from the blood that covers it; and we have been forced to recognize - so evident was the fact that the true skin of man -the two tissues which cover it being removed was of the same complexion (d'une teinte unicolorée) in all men, and that, in this relation, no doubt can be entertained respecting the unity of the human races. Thus the variety of coloration depends solely on the presence of the pigmentary body. This body is a cellular network, of which each cell contains, under the form of granules, the coloring matter. It is very apparent in individuals who are black, red, olive, or tawny; it is less, and sometimes not at all, in those that are white; so that the first observers declared that in the white man there was no trace of it - that which creates a difference between the white race and the other three. And already, taking advantage of this peculiarity, the polygenists cry with an air of triumph (G. Pouchet, p. 74), ‘Behold an appendage (appareil) which is wanting in the white man, which the negro possesses, and which he alone possesses! Be hold a fundamental difference in the name of which we are able to proclaim the non-community of origin in the races!' "Not so fast (ne vous pressez pas tant), Messieurs; you have nothing to proclaim. New researches, made with more care, by M. Flourens in France, and by M. Simon at Berlin, have discovered the pigmentary appendage even in the white. It is its presence which gives to the areole mamelon its brown color, and it is its appearance which, under the influence of the sun's rays, causes to appear blotches of red so frequent in men of a blond color. It has been found again by M. Flourens throughout the entire skin of a French soldier, who died in Algeria; which would lead one to think that men carry in them the germ of this appendage, and that different outward influences, among which it is necessary to reckon climate, provoke its development (Godron, vol. ii. p. 144.) . . . In the face of these facts, will the polygenists attempt to affirm that between the white and the black there is an impassable gulf? "The pigmentum, or the coloring matter, which covers the surface of the dermis, and transmits its color to the epidermis, does not exist in the new-born infant, and commences to exist only some time after birth; it is asked, What is the cause of this? To this question several answers have been given. Some have said the formative cause is climate; others, that it is alimentary regime; others, that it is the hygrometric state of the air; others, that it is the excess of carbon, which the blood contains in very warm countries. This diversity of opinions in regard to the true formative agent of the pigmentary substance, proves that science is not yet settled on this point. But let us mark well that the indecision of science on this point does not weaken the certainty, (1.) of the existence of the pigmentary body; (2.) of the uniformity of color in the dermis; (3.) of the infinite variety of colors in each race; (4.) of the generation of the white by the black and the black by the white; and as all these facts concur to demonstrate the unity of the human races, we see that this unity is altogether independent of the different explications |