460 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1818. 



noko, is only two or three inches 

 broad, and is tied on both sides 

 to a string, that encircles the 

 middle of the body. The girls 

 are often married at the age of 

 twelve years; until nine the mis- 

 sionaries allow them to go to 

 church naked, that is to say 

 without a tunic. I need not 

 repeat here, that among the 

 Chaymas, as well as in all the 

 Spanish Missions and the Indian 

 villages, which I have visited, a 

 pair of drawers, or shoes, or a 

 hat, are objects of luxury unknown 

 to the natives. A servant, who 

 had been with us during our 

 journey to Caripe and the Oroo- 

 noko, and whom I brought to 

 France, was so much struck on 

 landing, when he saw the ground 

 tilled by a peasant with a hat on, 

 that he thought himself in a 

 miserable country, where even 

 nobles (los mismos caballeros) 

 followed the plough. The Chayma 

 women are not handsome, ac- 

 cording to the ideas that we annex 

 to beauty ; yet the girls have 

 something soft and melancholy 

 in their looks, which forms an 

 agreeable contrast with the ex- 

 pression of the mouth, which is 

 somewhat austere and savage. 

 They wear the hair plaited in two 

 long tresses; they do not paint 

 their skin, and from their extreme 

 poverty are acquainted with no 

 other ornaments than necklaces 

 and bracelets made of shells, 

 birds' bones, and seeds. Both 

 men and women are very mus- 

 cular, but fleshy and plump. It 

 is superfluous to add, that I saw 

 no person, who had any natural 

 deformity; I might say the same 

 of thousands of Caribs, Muyscas, 

 *nd Mexican and Peruvian In- 



dians, whom we observed during 

 the course of five years. Bodily 

 deformities, deviations from na- 

 ture, are infinitely rare among 

 certain races of men, especially 

 those nations, who have the 

 dermoid system highly coloured. 

 I cannot believe, that they depend 

 solely on the progress of civiliza- 

 tion, a luxurious life, or the 

 corruption of morals. In Europe 

 a deformed or very ugly girl 

 marries if she have a fortune, and 

 tlie children often inherit the 

 deformity of the mother. In the 

 savage state, which is a state of 

 equality, nothing can induce a 

 man to unitehimself to a deformed 

 woman, or one who is very un- 

 healthy. If therefore such a 

 woman have had tiie misfortune 

 of attaining an adult age, and 

 have resisted the chances of a 

 restless and disturbed life, she 

 dies without children. We might 

 be tempted to think, that savages 

 all appear well made and vigorous, 

 because feeble children die young 

 for want of care ; and that the 

 strongest alone survive ; but these 

 causes can,not act on the Indians 

 of the Missions, who have the 

 manners of our peasants, and the 

 Mexicans of Cholula and Tlas- 

 cala, who enjoy wealth, that has 

 been transmitted to them by 

 ancestors more civilized than 

 themselves. If in every state of 

 cultivation, the copper-coloured 

 race manifests the same inflexibi- 

 lity, the same resistance to devia- 

 tion from a primitive type, are we 

 not forced to admit, that this 

 property belongs in great measure 

 to hereditary organization, to that 

 which constitutes the race ? I use 

 intentionally the expression in 

 great measure, not entirely to 



exclude 



