Chap. XX. SEXUAL SELECTION : MAN. 357 



" intermixtures with the Georgians and Circassians, 

 " two nations which surpass all the world in personal 

 " beauty. Tliere is hardly a man of rank in Persia 

 " who is not born of a Georcfian or Circassian mother." 

 He adds that they inherit their beauty, " not from their 

 " ancestors, for without the above mixture, the men of 

 " rank in Persia, who are descendants of the Tartars, 

 "would be extremely ugly."^ Here is a more curious 

 case : the priestesses who attended the temple of Venus 

 Erycina at San-Giuliano in Sicily, were selected for their 

 beauty out of the wdiole of Greece; they were not 

 vestal virgins, and Quatrefages,^ who makes this state- 

 ment, says that the women of San-Giuliano are famous 

 at the present day as the most beautiful in the island, 

 and are sought by artists as models. But it is obvious 

 that the evidence in the above cases is doubtful. 



The following case, though relating to savages, is well 

 worth giving from its curiosity. Mr. Winwood Reade 

 informs me that the JoUofs, a tribe of negroes on the 

 west coast of Africa, " are remarkable for their uni- 

 " formly fine appearance." A friend of his asked one of 

 these men, " How is it that every one whom I meet is 

 " so fine-looking, not only your men, but your women ? 

 The Jollof answered, " It is very easily explained : it 

 " has always been our custom to pick out our worse- 

 " looking slaves and to sell them." It need hardly 

 be added that with all savages female slaves serve as 

 concubines. That this negro should have attributed, 

 w^hether rightly or wrongly, the fine appearance of his 

 tribe, to the long-continued elimination of the ugly 



* These quotations are taken from Lawrence (' Lectures on Pliysi- 

 ology,' &c. 1822, p. 393), who attributes the beauty of the upper classes 

 in England to the men having long selected the more beautiful women. 



2 " Anthropologic," ' Kevue des Corn's Scientiflques,' Oct. 1868, p. 

 721. 



