68 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



races are almost entirely confined within the tropics, and both attain 

 their highest development near the equator. It is here that we should 

 expect the primitive man to have appeared, and here we still find what 

 may well be his direct descendants thriving best. We may, perhaps, 

 even look on the diverse types of the other great races as in part 

 due to changes of constitution adapting them to cooler climates and 

 changed conditions ; first, the Australians and the hill tribes of central 

 India, who once perhaps spread far over the northern hemisphere, but 

 have been displaced by the Mongoloid type, which flourishes at this day 

 from the equator to the pole. These, again, have been ousted from 

 some of the fairest regions of the temperate zone by the Indo-Europe- 

 ans, who seem only to have attained their full development and high- 

 est vigor when exposed to the cold winds and variable climate of the 

 temperate regions. 



If this view is correct, and the Papuans really form one branch of 

 the most primitive type of man which still exists on the globe, we 

 shall continue to look upon them with ever-increasing interest, and 

 shall welcome every fact relating to them as important additions to the 

 history of our race. The further exploration of their beautiful and 

 luxuriant island will, it is to be hoped, be vigorously pursued, not only 

 to obtain the mineral, vegetable, and animal treasures that still lie hid 

 in its great mountain ranges, but also to search for the remains of 

 primeval man in caves or alluvial deposits, and thus throw light on the 

 many interesting problems suggested by the physical peculiarities and 

 insular position of the Papuan race. Contemporary Review. 



-**- 



DANGERS OF DARWINISM* 



MR. DARWIN has certainly achieved the distinction of being 

 recognized as the " bogey " of his generation. What Bona- 

 parte was to the English tradesman and his family at the beginning of 

 this century, the great evolutionist is at present to pious Clapham and 

 chapel-going Holloway. Vast numbers of virtuous vestrymen frighten 

 the old women of their parishes with the mere mention of his name. 

 Sentiments and sayings are put into his mouth which would come 

 equally well from that of the enemy of mankind. His conspiracy 

 against the peace of the British matron is so diabolical that even bish- 

 ops sometimes thunder at him, and good people of an old-fashioned 

 way of thinking have a conviction that he ought, in this world or an- 

 other, to be burned. It is no use for tender-hearted clergymen, in the 

 great reviews and elsewhere, to recommend him to mercy, and to sug- 

 gest that his theories after all may not be altogether so infamous as 



* " The Darwinian Theory Examined." London : Bickers & Sons. 



