Black 



Brown 



Hriiwii liriiilur.s; II. L. Shapiro; American Museum of Natural History 

 Yellow Red 



SORTING PEOPLE BY COLOR 



Differences in skin color are obvious enough — except where shades or colors blend. 

 We cannot find any color group in which the members are so much alike in most of 

 the other characters as to be considered "of the same kind". Nor do those who 

 differ in color differ consistently in most of the other characters, so as to be con- 

 sidered "a different kind" 



The medical students of the Caucasian University at Tiflis (shown in the 

 illustration on page 67) are probably all of "Caucasian" stock. To what 

 extent are they essentially alike as to stature, or pigmentation, or the char- 

 acter of the hair, or the shape of the head^ — or any other trait? For that 

 matter, what physical characteristics have these students in common that 

 are not found also among yellow, black, red, or brown people ? 



As with other species, inbreeding for many generations is likely to estab- 

 lish a fairly uniform type of human beings in any given locality. There are 

 indeed many villages or tribes in which nearly the entire population has some 

 distinguishing physical characteristics, just as a particular region may show a 

 distinct dialect or idiom. In the course of centuries not only have the main 

 "races" been formed, but also subraces and specialized stocks. The North 

 American Indians, for example, are unquestionably descendants of ancient 

 Mongolians who came either across the land bridge from Siberia to Alaska, or 

 perhaps by boat. After many centuries they had spread southward into South 

 America and had also moved eastward toward the Atlantic coast and the is- 

 lands off Florida. When the Europeans first came to America, they found 

 relics of very old civilizations in Peru and Mexico. They also found scattered 

 over the continent other "Indians" who differed from the Mexican and South 

 American Indians both in physical features and in their modes of life. And to 

 this day another branch made up of the Eskimos is obviously different phys- 

 ically and in its mode of life. 



Among the North American Indians there are several distinct branches 

 which apparently became separated from the main stem many generations 

 ago. While we have no pure race, there are many such isolated stocks that 



517 



