perament of slaves. Their nose is aquiline, their forehead narrow, their hair black, strong, smooth, and plentiful; their complexion an olive red, the apple of the eye black, and the white not very clear. They never have any beard, for we cannot bestow that name on some short straggling hairs which sprout in old age; nor have either men or women the downy hair which generally appears after the age of puberty. In this they are distinguished from all people on earth, even from the Tartars and Chinese. As in eunuchs, it is the character of their degeneracy.

Not

Judging by the rage which the Americans have to mutilate and disfigure themselves, we should suppose they were all discontented with the proportions of their limbs and bodies. a single nation has been discovered in this fourth quarter of the globe, which has not adopted the custom of artificially changing, either the form of the lips, the hollow of the ear, or the shape of the head, by forcing it to assume an extraordinary and ridiculous figure.

There are savages whose heads are pyramidal, or conical, with the top terminating in a point. Others have flat heads, with large foreheads, and the back part flattened. This caprice seems to have been the most fashionable, at least it was the most common. Some Canadians had their heads perfectly spherical. Though the natural form of the head really approaches the circular, these savages, who, by being thus

distorted, acquired the appellation of bowl or bullet-head, do not appear less disgusting, for having made the head too round, and perverted the original purpose of nature, to which nothing can be added, from which nothing can be taken away, without some essential error being the result, which is destructive to the animal.

In short, we have seen, on the banks of the Maragnon, Americans with square or cubical heads; that is to say, flattened on the face, the top, the temples, and the occiput, which appears to be the last stage of human extravagance.

It is not easy to conceive how it was possible to compress and mould the bones of the scull into so many various forms, without most essentially injuring the seat of sense, and the organs of reason, or occasioning either madness or idiotism, since we so often have examples, that violent contusions in the region of the temples have occasioned lunacy, and deprived the sufferers of intellectual capacity. For it is not true, as ancient narratives have affirmed, that all Indians with flat or sugar-loaf heads were really idiots. Had this been the case, there must have been whole nations in America either foolish or frantic, which is impossible even in supposition.

Observation by Lintz.

To me it appears very remarkable, that the Jews should have taken with them the marks of

their country and race to all parts of the world; I mean their short, black, curly hair, and brown complexion. Their quickness of speech, haste and abruptness in all their actions, appear to proceed from the same causes. I imagine the Jews have more gall than other men.

Extract from a Letter written by M. Fuessli, dated at Presburg.

My observations have been directed (says this great designer and physiognomist) not to the countenance of nations only; being convinced, from numberless experiments, that the general form of the human body, its attitude and manner, the sunken or raised position of the head between or above the shoulders, the firm, the tottering, the hasty, or slow walk, may frequently be less deceitful signs of this or that character, than the countenance separately considered. I believe it possible so accurately to characterize man, from the calmest state of rest, to the highest gradation of rage, terror, and pain, that, from the carriage of the body, the turn of the head, and gestures in general, we shall be able to distinguish the Hungarian, the Sclavonian, the Illyrian, the Wallachian; and to obtain a full and clear conception of the actual, and, in general, the prominent characteristics of this or that nation.

Extract of a Letter from Professor Camper.
It would be very difficult, if not impossible,

to give you my particular rules for delineating various nations and ages with mathematical certainty, especially if I would add all that I have had occasion to remark concerning the beauty of the antiques. These rules I have obtained by constant observations on the sculls of different nations, of which I have a large collection, and by a long study of the antiques.

To draw any head accurately in profile, takes me much time. I have dissected the sculls of people lately dead, that I might be able to define the lines of the countenance, and the angle of these lines with the horizon. I was thus led to the discovery of the maximum and minimum of this angle. I began with the monkey, proceeded to the Negro and the European, till I ascended to the countenances of antiquity, and examined a Medusa, an Apollo, or a Venus de Medicis. This concerns only the profile. There is another difference, in the breadth of the cheeks, which I have found to be the largest among the Calmucs, and much smaller among the Asiatic Negroes. The Chinese, and inhabitants of the Molucca and other Asiatic islands, appear to me to have broad cheeks, with projecting jaw-bones; the under jaw-bone, in particular, very high, and almost forming a right angle, which, among Europeans, is very obtuse, and still more so among the African Negroes.

I have not hitherto been able to procure a real

scull of an American, and therefore cannot say any thing on that subject.

I am almost ashamed to confess, that I have not yet been able accurately to draw the countenance of a Jew, although they are so very remarkable in their features; nor have I yet obtained precision in delineating the Italian face. It is generally true, that the upper and under jaw of the European is less broad than the breadth of the scull; and that among the Asiatics they are much broader; but I have not been. able to determine the specific differences between European nations.

By physiognomonical sensations, I have very frequently been able to distinguish the soldiers of different nations-the Scotchman, the Irishman, and the native of England; yet I have never been able to delineate the distinguishing traits. The people of our provinces are a mixture of all nations; but, in the remote and separated cantons, I find the countenance to be more flat, and extraordinarily high from the eyes upward.

CHAP. XXI.

Extracts from the Manuscript of a Man of Literature at Darmstadt, on National Physiognomy.

ALL tribes of people, who live in uncultivated countries, and consequently are pastoral, not assimilated in towns, would never be capable of an

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