346 SEXUAL SELECTION *. MAN. Part II. 



beauty, and she was so immensely developed behind, that 

 when seated on level ground she could not rise, and had 

 to push herself along until she came to a slope. Some of 

 the women in various negro tribes are similarly charac- 

 terised ; and, according to Burton, the Somal men *' are 

 " said to choose their wives by ranging them in a line, 

 " and by picking her out who projects farthest a tergo, 

 " Nothing can be more hateful to a negro than the 

 ** opposite form." ^* 



With respect to colour, the negroes rallied Mungo 

 Park on the whiteness of his skin and the prominence 

 of his nose, both of which they considered as " unsightly 

 " and unnatural conformations." He in return praised 

 the glossy jet of their skins and the lovely depression of 

 their noses ; this they said was *' honey-mouth," never- 

 theless they gave him food. The African Moors, also, 

 " knitted their brows and seemed to shudder " at the 

 whiteness of his skin. On the eastern coast, the negro 

 boys when they saw Burton, cried out "Look at the 

 " white man ; does he not look like a white ape?" On 

 the western coast, as Mr. Winwood Keade informs me, 

 the negroes admire a very black skin more than one of 

 a lighter tint. But their horror of whiteness may be 

 partly attributed, according to this same traveller, to 

 the belief held by most negroes that demons and spirits 

 are white. 



The Banyai of the more southern part of the continent 

 are negroes, but " a great many of them are of a light 

 *' cofifee-and-milk colour, and, indeed, this colour is con- 

 " sidered handsome throughout the whole country ; " so 

 that liere we have a different standard of taste. With the 



5* 'The Anthropological Keview,' November, 1864, p. 237. For 

 additional references, see Waitz, ' Introduct. to Anthropology,' Eng. 

 translat. 1863, vol. i. p. 105. 



