180 



A HISTORY OF 



to believe that the whiteness of the negro's skin 

 was a disease, a kind of milky whiteness, that 

 might be called rather a leprous crust than a 

 natural complexion. I was taught to suppose, 

 that the numberless white negroes found in 

 various parts of Africa, the white men that go 

 by the name of Chacrelas, hi the East Indies, 

 and the white Americans, near the Isthmus of 

 Darien, in the West Indies, were all as so many 

 diseased persons, and even more deformed than 

 the blackest of the natives. But, upon exa- 

 mining that negro which was last shown in 

 London, 1 found the colour to be exactly like 

 that of an European; the visage white and 

 ruddy, and the lips of the proper redness. How- 

 ever, there were sufficient marks to convince 

 me of its descent. The hair was white and 



woolly, and very unlike any thing I had seen 

 before. The iris of the eye was yellow, inclin- 

 ing to red ; the nose was flat, exactly resem- 

 bling that of a negro ; and the lips thick and 

 prominent. No doubt, therefore, remained of 

 the child's having been born of negro parents : 

 and the person who showed it had attestations 

 to convince the most incredulous. From this, 

 then, we see that the variations of the negro 

 colour is into whiteness, whereas the white are 

 never found to have a race of negro children. 

 Upon the whole, therefore, all those changes 

 which the African, the Asiatic,orthe American, 

 undergo, are but accidental deformities, which 

 a kinder climate, better nourishment, or more 

 civilized manners, would, in a course of cen- 

 turies, very probably remove. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 



OF MONSTERS. 



HITHERTO I have only spoken of those 

 \ r arieties in the human species, that are com- 

 mon to whole nations ; but there are varieties 

 of another kind, which are only found in the 

 individual ; and being more rarely seen, are 

 therefore called monstrous. If we examine 

 into the varieties of distorted nature, there is 

 scarcely a limb of the body, or a feature in the 

 face, that has not suffered some reprobation, 

 either from art or nature ; being enlarged or 

 diminished, lengthened or wrested, from its 

 due proportion. Linnaeus, after having given 

 a catalogue of monsters, particularly adds, the 

 flat heads of Canada, the long heads of the 

 Chinese, and the slender waists of the women 

 of Europe, who, by strait lacing, take such 

 pains to destroy their health, through a mis- 

 taken desire to improve their beauty. 3 It be- 



a Linnaei Syst. vol. i. p. 29. Monorchides ut minus 

 fertiles. 



b Vide Phil. Trans, passim. Miscellan. Curioss. Johan. 

 Baptist. Wenck. Dissertatio Physica an ex virilis human! 

 seminis cum brutali per nefarium coitum commixtione, 

 aut vicissim ex bruti maris cum muliebri humano seminis 

 commixtione possit verus homo generari. Vide etiam, 

 Johnstoni Thaumatographia Naturalis. Vide Adalbert! 

 Disquisitio Physica ostenti duoruiu puerorum unus quo- 



longs more to the physician than the naturalist 

 to attend to these minute deformities ; and in- 

 deed it is a melancholy contemplation to specu- 

 late upon a catalogue of calamities, inflicted 

 by unpitying Nature, or brought upon us by 

 our own caprice. Some, however, are fond 

 of such accounts ; and there have been books 

 filled with nothing else. To these, therefore, I 

 refer the reader ; who may be better pleased 

 with accounts of men with two heads, or with- 

 out any head, of children joined in the middle, 

 of bones turned into flesh, or flesh converted 

 into bones, than I am. b It is sufficient here to 

 observe, that every day's experience must 

 have shown us miserable instances of this 

 kind produced by nature or affectation; cala- 

 milities that no pity can soften, or assiduity 

 relieve. 



rum dente aureo, alter cum capite giganteo Bilupe specta- 

 bantur. A man without lungs and stomach, Journal de 

 Scavans, 1682, p. 301 ; another without any brain, An- 

 dreas Carol! Memorabilia, p. 167, an. 167^; another 

 without any head, Giornale di Roma, anno 1(>75, p. 26; 

 another without any arms, New Memoirs of Literature, 

 vol. iv. p. 446. In short, the variety of these accounts is 

 almost infinite ; and, perhaps, their use is as much cir- 

 cumscribed as their variety is extensive 



