On the peopling of America. 207 



near the coa<i;t. There are not any people, on the old conthient, 

 perfectly fair, except tho'-e who live in high latitudes, where the 

 westerly winds come from the sea, at no great distance, so tem- 

 pered as not to be very sharp nor very dry. This rule applies 

 to Great Britain and Ireland, to the Germans, Danes, Sv/edes, 

 and Circassians*; hut going to the eastward in the same lati- 

 tude, as we depart from the ocean or the Black Sea, having more 

 drv land to the windward, by which the air is charged with sun- 

 dry exhalations, the skin changes its colour; it ceases to be 

 perfectly fair. There is not, in the eastern part of Asia, be- 

 tween the extremes of heat and cold, a nation perfectly fair. 

 The best complexions are found near the head of the Ganges, 

 among the mountains of Thibet. We may discover a concur- 

 rence of circumstances, in the British isles, and near the German 

 Ocean, not found in many other places, which are necessary to 

 a fair skin. They are little exposed to the warm sun ; they 

 have little intense cold, and their winds usuallv come from a 

 watery surface. Their westerly winds arc from the ocean, and 

 their atmosphere is loaded with moisture. They have not much 

 rain, but their showers are of long continuance; they have much 

 dark cloudy weather, and the rays of the sun are feeble when he 

 visits the inhabitants. They ne^'er experience that warm clear 

 s».in, which freckles or tans the skin ; nor those long intense 

 colds, which injure the cutaneous nerves, and produce a reddish 

 brown. While America remained a great forest, inhabited by 

 savages, tmder the constant dominion of westerly winds, there 

 was not any clinuite on the eastern coast in which we could 

 expect a fair skin. By the progress of cultivation, the general 

 course of the winds is materially affected in the middle and 

 northern stat-?s ; and ii; the process of time we may expect such 

 a prevalence of easterly winds, near the coast, in those states, as 

 shall prevejit that tendency of complexion to the clear brunet, 

 tvliich prevails in temperate climates, in other parts of the 

 world. 



Although i;o part of America is fitted to the production of a 

 black skin, nor would nsany parts of this continent be expected 

 to produce a skin perfectly fair, among the original inhabitants ; 

 we are not to believe, as some writers have alleged, that the 

 Arneiican Indians are all of one colour. Their skin is tiu'^ed 

 with a variety of shades between white and black; but there are 

 Indians, as we are told, above the latitude of -15 degrees north, 

 who are nearly white ; and there are Indians in Guiana and 

 Brazil, at a distatice from the coast, whose skins are very dark. 



• London in Intiiude 51°, Prague 50^, Copcnliageii CS", Circassia 4.')^, 

 Laving the Ijlack Sea iMid the Sea of Asopli lo liic soutli-nest and noiili- 



1 wa5 



