110 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



[May 1, 186?. 



character of Torula rather than any other. There'are 

 many most interesting questions that cannot be 

 discussed here. The only one I need refer to is 

 the influence which this species of parasite has in 

 the production of disease. In the immediate 

 condition in which we find it on the hair it need 

 cause but little anxiety ; but the minute form as 

 seen in fig. 80 transplanted to a suitable soil — 

 and the scalp of delicate children best furnishes it- 

 would produce disease of the scalp : of that I have 

 no doubt. Luckily, the tissues of adults, viz., those 

 who wear chignons, are not prone to the more 

 severe forms of diseases produced by vegetable 

 parasites; and as the mass of false hair used in 

 England is free from the fungus described above, 

 the total danger on the whole is slight. 



Tilbury Eox, M.D.Lond. 



THE UNITY OE MANKIND. 



TN a thousand different ways we are continually 

 -*- reminded of the common origin of the whole 

 human race, irrespective of colour, language, or 

 habitat. The coincidences observable betwixt the 

 usages and traditions of nations, often very far 

 removed from each other, are endless ; and plainly 

 point to a time when the minor differences which 

 at present divide mankind were unknown. The 

 writers of works upon Geography and Ethnology 

 often perplex the student, instead of aiding him, by 

 presenting him with some highly complex and 

 utterly unworkable list of the divisions of man- 

 kind'; whereas if they kept to the broad and simple 

 lines of demarcation, which nature has herself laid 

 down, they would be doing a great service to the 

 cause of science. 



The simplest mode of classifying the human race 

 appears to me to be by colour ; and, taking this as 

 the basis of operations, there are three varieties of 

 men — the white, brown, and black ; but of these the 

 brown is merely the first variety in a transition 

 state. 



The white nations are the Circassians, only one 

 branch of whom differs in colour from the parent 

 stem; the Mongols, including the Chinese, Tartars, 

 (to whom belong all the tribes of Chinese, Indepen- 

 dent Tartary, and of Siberia,) Turks, Japanese, and 

 Coreans ; the Arabs (and Moors), the Persians and 

 Esquimaux (akin to whom are the Eins, Laps, 

 Samoycdes, Biscayans, and Magyars). 



The brown nations comprise the American Abori- 

 gines, the Asiatic- African races (Abyssinians, Egyp- 

 tians, Kaffirs, and Gallas) ; the Hottentots ; the 

 Malays (also Malay Polynesians and Hovahs of 

 Madagascar) ; Affghans ; and Indo-Chinese races. 



The black are few in number, i.e., the Negroes of 

 Africa and Polynesia; the Papuans (of whom the 

 Negrittos are probably a variety) ; the Hindoos (who 



are Circassians), and other races which under ex- 

 ceptional circumstances have changed hue. 



It is very important to prove that the brown 

 nations are merely white nations becoming black ; 

 because, if we can do so, it will be a complete 

 answer to the assertions of those individuals who 

 dispute the identity of the white and black races, 

 on the ground that we nowhere see the change 

 between the two extremes of colour going on. If 

 we can succeed in convincing them that this change 

 goes on through the medium of the brown races, 

 we shall have removed an important obstacle to the 

 general acknowledgment of the unity of mankind. 

 That white nations have become black, we know 

 from history, and the testimony of our senses ; for, 

 at the present day, there are the black Jews of 

 Bombay, the Hindoos, and the Shegya Arabs of 

 Nubia, all perfectly black, whilst the great m.ass of 

 their respective nations remain white ; and that this 

 change was produced solely by climatic influences, 

 we are sure from the fact that in every one of these 

 cases intermarriages with other tribes have been 

 strictly forbidden. Of the Shegya Arabs, who live 

 down the Nile above Dongola, Mr. Waddington 

 says : " They are distinguished in every respect from 

 the negroes, by the brightness of their colour, by 

 their hair and the regularity of their features, by the 

 mild and dewy lustre of their eyes, and by the soft- 

 ness of their touch, in which last respect they yield 

 not to Europeans." 



The first thing that we have to prove, then, is that 

 a white skin under certain influences becomes 

 ' brown, and secondly, that the brown under like 

 circumstances deepens into black. About the truth 

 of the first clause I suppose there cannot exist 

 much difference of opinion; an inspection of the 

 face and hands of a countryman, or of the com- 

 plexion of f an old Indian resident, will sufficiently 

 prove the reddening and tanning influence of the 

 sun. To my mind the fact that amongst the brown 

 nations the children and high castes who are pro- 

 tected from the sun, are nearly as white as Euro- 

 peans, conclusively proves this. The Parsees, the 

 ancient Guebres or fire-worshippers of Persia, who 

 fled before the Mahometan invasion under the 

 Caliph Omar, in A.D. 651, to Bombay and Western 

 India, must originally have been of the same fair, 

 yellowish complexion as the modern Persians, but 

 are now so altered by the Indian climate as to be of 

 a dark blackish brown, although they have not 

 intermarried with the natives. No nation exhibits 

 this facility for changing hue, consequent upon 

 geographical position, more clearly than the Arabs. 

 Bruce observes that "some of the women are ex- 

 ceedingly fair," and on the mountains of Ruddua, 

 near Yambo, on the coast of Yemen, he was told 

 that the water freezes there in winter, and that 

 some of the inhabitants have red hair and blue eyes, 

 a thing scarcely ever to be seen but in the coldest 



