236 EARLY HISTORY OF MANKIND. 



but they persisted in restricting themselves to the simple signs 

 of ideas, leaving the structure undetermined by any but the 

 natural order of connexion. Such is exactly the condition of 

 the Chinese language. 



Africa, exclusive of the northern parts, which have been 

 referred to as occupied by Syro- Arabian nations, is possessed 

 by races generally of black complexion and at a low stage in 

 civilization, but more various in their colour and in their bar- 

 barism than is usually supposed. Guinea and some of the 

 neighbouring districts are the true seat of the entirely black 

 or Negro tribes, who have become so well known to us in their 

 native simplicity by their representatives, the slave population 

 of the West Indies and North America. The Kaffirs, in the 

 South of Africa, are of superior form and more vigorous 

 character, with only a brown complexion. The Fulahs and 

 Mandingoes are mountaineer races, who have spread from Se- 

 negambia along the coast and far into the interior. They have 

 formed states, practise commerce, and little of the Negro form 

 is seen in them. In civilization and in external appearance, 

 the northern African nations make a gradual transition towards 

 the Syro-Arabian races which are found in that region. The 

 languages, however, are considered as distinct. These, through- 

 out the whole of Africa, excepting the districts occupied by 

 Syro-Arabian races, are, as far as known, believed to be of one 

 character, not so low as the monosyllabic Chinese, and not so 

 highly inflected as the Indo-European, but at a point of de- 

 velopment apparently between the two. 



Crossing the Pacific, we come to the last great family in the 

 languages of the aboriginal Americans, which have all of them 

 features in common, proving them to constitute a group by 

 themselves, without any regard to the very different degrees of 

 civilization which these nations had attained at the time of the 

 discovery. The common resemblance is in the grammatical 

 structure as well as in words, and the grammatical structure 

 of this family is of a very peculiar and complicated kind. The 

 general character in this respect has caused the term Polysyn- 

 thetic to be applied to the American languages. A long many- 

 syllabled word is used by the rude Algonquins and Delawares 

 to express a whole sentence : for example, a woman of the 

 latter nation, playing with a little dog or cat, would perhaps 

 be heard saying, " kuligatschis" meaning, " give me your pretty 

 little paw ;" the word, on examination, is found to be made 

 up in this manner : k, the second personal pronoun ; uli, part 



