SELECTION IN MAN. 387 



more might be adduced, leads me to think that though 

 selective agencies in the warm Mediterranean regions are 

 on the whole adverse to the perpetuation of the blond 

 type, they are not so everywhere or in very high degree. 



Most of what evidence we have from northern countries 

 makes one doubt whether any change has occurred except 

 through immigration from melanochroic areas, and con- 

 sequent admixture of blood. The Icelandic Sagas show 

 that the Norsemen in the tenth century w T ere as diverse in 

 colour of hair as they are now ; in fact the number of 

 persons qualified as "black" would be a little surprising, if 

 one did not allow for the probable inclusion of some whose 

 hair was really only dark brown. The carefulness of the 

 descriptions is vouched for by coincidences ; thus, chiefs 

 with a mixture of Irish blood, such as Skarphedinn and 

 Kjartan, betray it by some Irish feature. The eyes are 

 seldom mentioned ; but Egil Skallagrimson, a pure Nor- 

 wegian, had black eyes. 



Similarly the old Irish poems and legends testify to the 

 occurrence of the same varieties of complexion that now 

 exist, and particularly to that of the very Irish combination 

 of blue eyes and black hair, which is ascribed among others 

 to the famous Diarmaid O'Duibhne, the semi-mythical 

 ancestor of the Campbells. 



Nevertheless I hold to the opinion, though only as an 

 opinion, not as a firm belief, that the modern Norsemen 

 are, if anything, more generally blond than their ancestors, 

 and the modern Irishmen less so. If Scandinavia was, as 

 now-a-days many think, the officina or breeding-ground of 

 the blond long-headed type, may not the same agencies 

 which worked in that direction after the close of the last 

 glacial period be still operating there now, though it may 

 be less powerfully ? As for the Irish, it is certainly curious 

 that no early English writer, so far as I am aware, makes 

 mention of their dark hair. As I have said elsewhere, 

 Giraldus tells us that the Welsh were of swarthy com- 

 plexion, but he says nothing about the colour of the Irish 

 (though he had much to do with them), except that inci- 

 dentally and casually he says something about " long 



