NATURAL DISTORT. 



'Tis vain to seek in man far more than maa, 

 Though proud in promise big in previous thought, 

 Experience damps our triumphs." YOUNG. 



The influence of organization is shown in many instances : the 

 Moors, who have lived for ages under a burning sun, still have 

 white children, and the offspring of Europeans in the Indies have 

 the original tint of their progenitors. Different complexions are in 

 some cases intermixed by immigrant races, and white and black 

 people dwell together ; and complexions are modified by the off- 

 spring of marriages between members of the different races. But 

 it is further and most conclusively demonstrated by an examination 

 of the skins of the darkly-coloured races, in which a secreted colour- 

 Ing matter is found. The skin is thicker and harder in black people 

 than in white. The external skin of each is transparent and colour- 

 less. The colouring matter of the coloured races lies in the rde 

 mucosum, or inner skin, and this colour is seen through the trans- 

 parent true skin, just as white people see the traces of their dark 

 veins through the same cuticle. The influences of intermarriage are 

 abundantly demonstrated by the fact that the union of black and 

 white parents generally produces children of an intermediate cha- 

 racter, which are called mulattoes ; and of exceptional circumstances 

 in the less frequent occurrence of the birth of pie-bald negroes, 

 having their skin diversified with black and white spots, and part 

 of their woolly hair white ; of short parents producing very tall 

 children, &c. 



9. The ekange of colour in the human skin, from exposure to son and air, is well 

 known to be temporary. The discoloration which we term " tanning," or being 

 *' sun-burnt," as well as the spots called "freckles," are most incidental to fair 

 ekins, and disappear when the parts are covered or no longer exposed to the sua. 

 The children of tke husbandman or of the sailor whose countenance bears the marks 

 of other climes, are just as fair as those of the most delicate and pale inhabitants 

 of a city. 



10. What imparted to various tribes the different habits and 

 modes of life for which they are remarkable ? 



Chiefly the physical features of the countries in which they were 

 born, or into which they wandered. The people who established them- 

 selves in the frozen regions of the north not finding enough of vege- 

 table nourishment, became hunters and fishers. Necessarily separated 

 from each other for the pursuit of sustenance, they multiplied slowly, 



