428 AN ACCOUNT OF, &c. 



more depressed parts. Their reddish colour 

 was, no doubt, occasioned by the external air, as 

 the skin of the other hand was red from that 

 cause. All the other parts of the black skin 

 are fully as dark, as I found on making the 

 comparison, as the corresponding parts of a 

 dark negro, and are much darker than those of 

 many negroes. One part, indeed, of her skin 

 is considerably darker than the corresponding 

 part in any negro whom I have seen ; for the 

 palm of her hand and inside of her fingers are 

 black, whereas these parts in a negro are only 

 of a tawny hue. 



A considerable part of the black skin is as 

 smooth to the touch, as the skin of the white 

 arm ; but the cuticular lines in the black arm, 

 appeared everywhere stronger to the sight, than 

 similar lines in the arm of a black man, whose 

 skin I examined at the same time. In the 

 greater part, however, of West's black skin, 

 those lines sink deeper beneath its general sur- 

 face, than the lines of any other human skin 

 that I have seen, which was not evidently dis- 

 eased. These depressions are extremely narrow, 

 and proceed chiefly in one direction, obliquely 

 upwards and inwards from the outer part of the 

 arm. On removing a small portion of the cuti- 

 cle, they were found to be occasioned by the 

 sinking down of that membrane between very 



