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THE THIRD BOOK. 

 CHAP. I. 

 NEGROES. 



IS H A L L divide this people into two clafles, the native, or Cre- 

 ole blacks, and the imported, or Africans ; but, before I come to 

 ipeak of thofe who inhabit Jamaica, I rtiall beg to premife fome re- 

 marks upon the Negroes in genei-al found on that part of the African 

 continent, called Guiney, or Negro-land. The particulars wherein 

 they differ moft effentially from the Whites are, firft, in refpeft to their 

 bodies, viz. the dark membrane which communicates that black colour 

 to their fkins [a],, which does not alter by tranlportation into other 



climates, 



[a] AnatomLfts fay, that this reticular membrane, which is found between the Epidermis and the 

 Ikin, being foaked in water for a long time, does not change its colour. JVIonlieur Barrere, who 

 appears to have examined this circumftance with pecuHar attention, as well as Mr. Winflow, 

 fays, that the Efiilirmis itfelf is black, and that if it has appeared white to fome that have examined 

 it, it is owing to its extreme finenefs and tranfparency ; but that it is really as dark as a piece of 

 black horn, reduced to the farne gracility. That this colour of the Epiiicnnis, and of the ikirr, 

 is caufed by the bile, which in Negroes is not yellow, but always us black as ink. The bile iu 

 white men tinges their (kin yellow ; and if their bile was black, it would doubtlefs communicate the 

 fame black tint. Mr. Barrere affirms, that the Negroe bile naturally fccretes itfelf upon the £//» 

 dermis, in a quantity kifficient to impregnate it with the dark colour tor which it isfo remarkable. 

 Thefe obfervations naturally lead to the further ijueltion, " why the bile in Negroes is black r" 



Mr. Buffun endeavours to refolve the former part of this enquiry, by fuppofing that the heat of 

 climate is the principal caufe ot their black colour. " That excellive cold and excellive heat produce 

 '• fimilar effeds on the human body, and acl on the Qcin by a certain drying quality, which tans it ; 

 " that originally there was but one fpecies ot men ; and that difiercnre of climate, of manner of 

 " living, of food, of endemical diftempers, and the mixtures ot individuals, more or lefs varied, 

 " have produced the diftinCtions that are now vifible ; and that this black colour of Negroes, if they 

 " were tranfplanted into a cold c-hmate, would giadually wear olfand difappear in the courfe of ten 

 "or twelve generations." 



But, to admit the force of this rcafoifing, we mull fuppofe the wcild to be much older than 

 has been generally believed. The jEthiopiau is probably not at at! black-crnow than he was in the 

 days of Solomon. The nations ot Nicaragua andGuatimala, on the American continent, u ho lie 

 under the fame parallel of latitude as the inhabitants ot Guiney, have not acquired this black linAurtv 

 although many more generations have pafTed lince they were firft difcovered by the Europeans than 

 Mr. Buffon thinks futficient for changing a Negroe from black to white. How many centuries mull 

 have revolved before that continent was difcovered, may be imagined from the populous llate of it 

 in the days of Americas \'efpucius, and the prodigious length ot time required for a nation or large 

 fotiety, of men to grow up, become powerful, warlike, and tolerably civilized, as the Mexicans 



were ! 



