90 MUTUAL RELATIONS OF THE HUMAN FAMILY. 



the characters which distinguish the majority of the other race. Any such 

 peculiarities, therefore, are totally useless as the foundation of specific charac- 

 ters ; being simply variations from the ordinary type, resulting from causes 

 which might affect the entire race, as well as individuals. 



90. The connection between the general form of the body, on the one hand, 

 and the degree of civilization (involving the regular supply of nutriment) on 

 the other, is made apparent, not merely by the improvement which we per- 

 ceive in the form, development, and vigour of the frame, as we advance from 

 the lowest to the most cultivated of the Human races ; but also by the degra- 

 dation which is occasionally to be met with in particular groups of the higher 

 tribes, Avhich have been subjected for several generations to the influence of 

 depressing causes. Of this class of facts, the following is a very interesting 

 example : " On the plantation of Ulster, and afterwards on the successes of 

 the British against the rebels of 1641 and 1689, great multitudes of the na- 

 tive Irish were driven from Armagh and the south of Down, into the moun- 

 tainous tract extending from the barony of Flews eastward to the sea: on 

 the other side of the kingdom, the same race were expelled into Leitrim, Sligo 

 and Mayo. Here they have been almost ever since, exposed to the worst 

 effects of hunger and ignorance, the two great brutalizers of the human race. 

 The descendants of these exiles are still readily distinguishable from their 

 kindred in Meath, and in other districts where they are not in a state of phy- 

 sical degradation ; being remarkable for open projecting mouths, with prominent 

 teeth and exposed gums ; their advancing cheek-bones and depressed noses 

 bearing barbarism on their very front. In Sligo and northern Mayo, the con- 

 sequences of two centuries of degradation and hardship exhibit themselves in 

 the whole physical condition of the people ; affecting not only the features, 

 but the frame, and giving such an example of human deterioration from known 

 causes, as almost compensates, by its value to future ages, for the suffering 

 and debasement which past generations have endured in perfecting its appall- 

 ing lesson. Five feet two inches upon an average, pot-bellied, bow-legged, 

 abortively-featured, their clothing a wisp of rags, these spectres of a people, 

 that were once well-grown, able-bodied, and comely, stalk abroad into the day- 

 light of civilization, the annual apparitions of Irish ugliness and Irish want. 

 In other parts of the island, where the population has never undergone the 

 influence of the same causes of physical degradation, it is well known that 

 the same race furnishes the most perfect specimens of human beauty and 

 vigour, both mental and bodily."* 



91. From the foregoing survey of the phenomena, bearing upon the ques- 

 tion of the specific unity or diversity of the Human races, the following 

 conclusions may be drawn : 



I. That the physical constitution of Man is peculiarly disposed, like that 

 of the domesticated animals, to undergo variations; some of which can be 

 traced to the influence of external causes; whilst others are not so explicable, 

 and must be termed spontaneous. 



II. That the extreme variations which present themselves, between the 

 races apparently the most removed from one another, are not greater in degree 

 than those which exist between the different breeds of domesticated animals, 

 which are known to have descended from a common stock ; and that they 

 are of the same kind with the variations which present themselves in any 

 one race of Mankind, the difference of degree being clearly attributable, in 

 the majority of cases, to the respective conditions under which each race 

 exists. 



III. That none of the variations, which have been pointed out as existing 



* Sec Dublin University Magazine, No. XLVIII. 



