THE HUMAN SPECIES. 449 



adays extremely complex. Looking from above downward, it is con- 

 sequently difficult to define the lines of ethnic division with any 

 accuracy. The analytical method furnishes sufficient distinctions, how- 

 ever, to establish a general classification of humanity. Taking the 

 shape of the skull, the texture of the hair, the pigment of the skin and 

 general structural characters into account, etlinographers have con- 

 cluded that there are four elementary divisions of mankind, Icnown 

 particularly as the Negro or Black race, the Mongolic or Yellow race, 

 the Caucasic or White race and the American or Ked race. 



Looking from below upward, it is out of the question, of course, 

 to follow the lines of racial ramification chronologically. But though 

 the time factor fails for the most part, the place element can usually 

 be determined with considerable accuracy. Ethnic consequents can, 

 accordingly, be connected in each instance with their geographic an- 

 tecedents, and the outcome of the interaction between variability and 

 environment set forth in some detail. Thus though it is out of the 

 question to establish the chronological sequence exactly, by supple- 

 menting the analytical with the geographical method of enquiry, it 

 should at least be possible to indicate the general order of racial rami- 

 fication and determine under what environmental conditions the ethnic 

 differentiation of mankind took place. 



Corresponding to the fourfold ethnic division of the human race, 

 there are four more or less distinctly defined geographic sections of 

 the globe. Three of these racial regions radiate from Indo-Malaysia, 

 the cradle-land of manlvind; the fourth is situated on the opposite 

 side of the earth, though connected in the far north with the 

 continental area of the eastern hemisphere. Considering the situa- 

 tion somewhat more in detail, the four habitats may be defined as 

 follows: Toward the south, the Indo-Malaysian abode borders upon 

 what we may call the 'eastern-equatorial section,' which stretches out 

 between the tropics from the west coast of Africa, across the partially 

 submerged Indo- African continent, to Melanesia and Australia. This 

 intertropical belt has from time immemorial been the abode of the 

 Negro or Black race. North of the Indo-Malaysian cradle-land lies 

 the vast 'Asiatic section' of the eastern hemisphere, which is sepa- 

 rated from the southern peninsulas by the Himalayan line, except along 

 the Pacific coast where passage to the north is possible between the 

 longitudinal ranges of Cochin- China. This continental area is the 

 traditional abode of the Mongols or Yellow people. Between the equa- 

 torial belt and the Asiatic area, the 'Indo-Mediterranean-European 

 section' spreads out towards the west from Indo-Malaysia to the At- 

 lantic coast of the continent. This peninsular portion of the eastern 

 hemisphere is the historical home of the White man, the field for the 

 development of what we are in the habit of calling Caucasian civiliza- 



VOL. LX. — 29. 



