222 Distinctive Characteristics , S/*c. 



and the Patagonian, he assigns certain vague geographical 

 hmitSj without estabUshing any distinctive characteristics of 

 the people themselves. The system is so devoid of founda- 

 tion in nature, so fanciful in all its details, as hardly to merit 

 a serious analysis ; and we have introduced it on the present 

 occasion to illustrate the extravagance and the poverty of 

 some of the hypotheses which have been resorted to in expla- 

 nation of the problem before us. 



Once for all I repeat my conviction, that the study of 

 physical conformation alone, excludes every branch of the 

 Caucasian race from any obvious participation in the peopling 

 of this continent. If the Egyptians,* Hindoos, Phenicians or 

 Gauls have ever, by accident or design, planted colonies in 

 America, these must have been, sooner or later, dispersed and 

 lost in the waves of a vast indigenous population. Such we 

 know to have been the fact with the Northmen, whose repeat- 

 ed, though very partial settlements in the present New Eng- 

 land States, from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries, are now 

 matter of history ; yet, in the country itself, they have not 

 left a single indisputable trace of their sojourn. 



In fine, our own conclusion, long ago deduced from a 

 patient examination of the facts thus briefly and inadequately 

 stated, is, that the American race is essentially separate and 

 peculiar, whether we regard it in its physical, its moral, or its 

 intellectual relations. To us there are no direct or obvious 

 links between the people of the old world and the new ; for 



* With respect to the Egyptians and Hindoos as involved in this question, I 

 can speak without reservation. Through the kindness of an accomplished 

 gentleman and scholar, George R. Gliddon, Esq., late United States Consul at 

 Cairo, I have received ninety heads of Egyptian mummies from the tornb.s of 

 AbyduS) Thebes and Memphis; and I unhesitatingly declare, that, with a 

 very few exceptions, which have a mixed character, and resemble the Coptic 

 form, tiie conformation throughout is that of the Caucasian race. In every 

 instance in which the hair has been preserved, it is long, soft and curling, and 

 indeed as silky as that of the most polished Europeans of the present time. I 

 am now preparing, with the title of Crania JEgyptiaca^ a brief exposition of the 

 facts connected with these interesting relics of antiquity. 



I possess also about thirty crania of the Hindoos, among which there is not 

 one that could be mistaken for an Indian skull. In fact there is an obvious 

 contrast between them in all respects excepting the internal capacity, which is 

 nearly the same in the Hindoo and Peruvian. 



