ON ORGANIZED STRUCTURES IN GENERAL. 99 



105. Still less is known of the Alfouroiis, or Jllforian race, which are 

 considered by some to be the earliest inhabitants of the greater part of the 

 Malayan Archipelago, and to have been supplanted by the more powerful peo- 

 ple of the two preceding races, who have either extirpated them altogether, 

 or have driven them from the coasts into the mountainous and desert parts of 

 the interior. They are yet to be found in the central parts of the Moluccas 

 and Philippines; and they seem to occupy most of the interior and southern 

 portion of New Guinea, where they are termed Endamenes. They are of 

 very dark complexion ; but their hair, though black and thick, is lank. They 

 have a peculiar repulsive physiognomy ; the nose is flattened, so as to give 

 the nostrils an almost transverse position; the cheek-bones project; the eyes 

 are large, the teeth prominent, the lips thick, and the mouth wide. The limbs 

 are long, slender and misshapen. From the close resemblance in physical 

 characters, between the Endamenes of New Guinea, and the aborigines of 

 New Holland, and from the proximity between the adjacent coasts of these 

 two large islands, it may be surmised that the latter belong to the Alforian 

 race; but too little is known of the language of either, to give this inference 

 a suflicient stability. In the degradation of their condition and manner of life 

 the savages of New Holland fully equal the Bushmen of South Africa ; and 

 it is scarcely possible to imagine human beings, existing in a condition more 

 nearly resembling that of brutes. But there is reason to believe, that the 

 tribes in closest contact with European settlers are more miserable and savage 

 than those of the interior ; and even with respect to these, increasing acquaint- 

 ance with their language, and a consequent improved insight into their modes 

 of thought, tend to raise the very low estimate which had been formed and 

 long maintained, in regard to their extreme mental degradation. The latest 

 and most authentic statements enable us to recognize among them the same 

 principles of a moral and intellectual nature, which, in more cultivated tribes, 

 constitute the highest endowments of humanity, and thus to show that they 

 are not separated, by any impassable barrier, from the most civilized and cul- 

 tivated nations of the globe. 



CHAPTER III. 



OF THE ELEMENTARY PARTS OF THE HUMAN FABRIC. 



1. On Organized Structures in General. 



106. THE Human body, in common with the bodies of all the higher Ani- 

 mals, is composed of an immense number of parts, whose structure and 

 whose actions are alike dissimilar ; but which are yet so arranged, as to make 

 up a fabric distinguished by its perfect adaptation to a great variety of pur- 

 poses, whilst their actions, though in a great degree independent of each other, 

 concur in effecting one common object, the maintenance of the integrity of 

 the entire organism. In the lowest and simplest forms of living being, such 

 as we meet with among the humblest Cellular Plants, we find a single cell 

 making up the whole fabric. This cell grows from its germ, absorbs and as- 

 similates nutriment, converts a part of this into the substance of its own cell- 

 wall, secretes another portion into its cavity, and produces from a third the 

 reproductive germs that are to continue the race ; and having reached its own 



