MAN'S PRIMITIVE CONDITION 1663 



for life would be always harder. And so it always 

 happens in the natural and necessary course of things, 

 that the races which were driven furthest would be 

 the rudest the most engrossed in the pursuits of 

 mere animal existence. 



Is it not true that the lowest and rudest tribes in 

 the population of the globe have been found at the 

 furthest extremities of its great continents, and in 

 the distant islands which would be the last refuge of 

 the victims of violence and misfortune? "The New 

 World" is the continent which presents the most un- 

 interrupted stretch of habitable land from the highest 

 northern to the lowest southern latitude. On the ex- 

 treme north we have the Eskimo, or Inuit race, main- 

 taining human life under conditions of extremest 

 hardship, even amid the perpetual ice of the polar 

 seas. And what a life it is! Watching at the blow- 

 hole of a seal for many hours, in a temperature of 75 

 below freezing-point, is the constant work of the Inuit 

 hunter. And when at last his prey is struck, it is his 

 luxury to feast upon the raw blood and blubber. To 

 civilized man it is hardly possible to conceive a life 

 so wretched, and in many respects so brutal, as the life 

 led by this race during the long lasting night of the 

 Arctic winter. Not even the most extravagant the- 

 orist, as regards the plurality of human origins, can 

 suppose that there was an Eskimo Adam that any 

 man was originally created or developed in the icy 

 regions round the pole. Here then we have a case, 

 beyond all question, of races driven by wars and mi- 

 grations from the more temperate regions of the 

 globe. So long as they were still in those regions, 



& Q + VOL. TV. 



