MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL INFERIORITY. 571 



boy up in his arms, dashed him with the utmost violence 

 against the stones. The poor little creature lay motionless 

 and bleeding, and in that condition was taken up by the 

 mother, but died soon after."* 



In fact, we may fairly sum up this part of the question in 

 a few words by saying, as the most general conclusion which 

 can be arrived at, that savages have the character of children 

 with the passions and strength of men. No doubt different 

 races of savages differ very much in character. An Esquimaux 

 and a Fijian, for instance, have little in common. But after 

 making every possible allowance for savages, it must I think 

 be admitted that they are inferior, morally as well as in other 

 respects, to the more civilized races. There is indeed no 

 atrocious crime, no vice recorded by any traveller, whicli 

 might not be paralleled in Europe. But that which is with 

 us the exception, is with them the rule ; that which with us 

 is condemned by the general verdict of society, and is confined 

 to the uneducated and vicious, is among savages passed over 

 almost without condemnation, and treated as a mere matter 

 of course. In Tahiti, for instance, the missionaries considered 

 that " not less than two-thirds of the children were murdered 

 by their parents." 



If we now turn to the mental differences between civilized 

 and uncivilized races, we shall find them very strongly marked. 

 Speaking of a Bushman tribe, Burchell observes that " whether 

 capable of reflection or not, these individuals never exerted 

 it."-)- The Eev. T. Dove describes the Tasmanians as distin- 

 guished " by the absence of all moral views and impressions. 

 Every idea bearing on our origin and destination as rational 

 beings seems to have been erased from their breasts." J It 

 would be easy to fill a volume with the evidence of excessive 



* Byron's Loss of the Wager ; t 1. c. vol. i. p. 461. 

 Kerr's Voyages, vol. xvii. p. 374. J Tasmanian Journal of Natural 



Science, vol. i. p. 249. 



