THE RACES OF MANKIND. 297 



circular Mongolian hair () hangs straight ; the more curly European 

 hair {b) has an oval or elliptical section ; the woolly African hair (c) 

 is more flattened ; while the frizzy Papuan hair (^d) is a yet more 

 extreme example of the flattened ribbon-like kind. Not only the color 

 and form of the hair, but its quantity, vary in different races. 



That certain races are constitutionally fit, and others unfit, for cer- 

 tain climates, is a fact which the English have but too good reason to 

 know. It is well known that races are not affected alike by certain 

 diseases. While in equatorial Africa or the West Indies, the coast- 

 fever and yellow fever are so fatal or injurious to the new-eome 

 Europeans, the negroes, and even mulattoes, are almost untouched by 

 this scourge of the white nations. On the other hand, we English 

 look upon measles as a trifling complaint, and hear with astonishment 

 of its being carried into Feejee, and there, aggravated, no doubt, by 

 improper treatment, sweeping away the natives by thousands. It is 

 plain that nations moving into a new climate, if they are to flourish, 

 must become adapted in body to the new state of life. Fitness for a 

 special climate, being matter of life or death to a race, must be reck- 

 oned among the chief of race-characters. 



Travelers notice striking distinctions in the temper of races. There 

 seems no difference of condition betvv^een the native Indian and the 

 African negro in Brazil to make the brown man dull and sullen, while 

 the black is overflowing with eagerness and gayety. So, in Europe, 

 the unlikeness between the melancholy Russian peasant and the viva- 

 cious Italian can hardly depend altogether on climate and food and 

 government. There seem to be in mankind inbred temperament and 

 inbred capacity of mind. History points the great lesson that some 

 races have marched on in civilization while others have stood still or 

 fallen back, and we should partly look for an explanation of this in 



Fig. 8. Race or Population arranged by Stature (Qiietelet's method). 



differences of intellectual and moral powers between such tribes as the 

 native Americans and Africans, and the old-world nations who over- 

 match and subdue them. In measurino; the minds of the lower races, 

 a good test is, how far their children are able to take a civilized edu- 

 cation. The account generally given by European teachers who have 

 had the children of lower races in their schools is that, though these 



