750 PRIMATES 



Asiatic Mongols, who in their wanderings northwards and east- 

 wards across the American continent, where they have been isolated 

 almost as perfectly as an island population would be, hemmed 

 in on one side by the eternal Polar ice, and on the other by hostile 

 tribes of American Indians, with which they rarely, if ever, mingled, 

 have gradually developed characters, most of which are strongly- 

 expressed modifications of those seen in their allies who still remain 

 on the western side of Behring Strait. It has also been shown 

 that these special characteristics gradually increase from west to 

 east, and are seen in their greatest perfection in the inhabitants 

 of Greenland, at all events in those where no crossing with the 

 Danes has taken place. A typical Eskimo skull presents a com- 

 bination of characters by which it can be at once distinguished 

 from that of any other of the groups of mankind. Such scanty 

 remains as have yet been discovered of the earliest inhabitants of 

 Europe do not present any structural affinities to this type, and 

 there is therefore no justification for the supposition that they 

 belonged to the same race, although it is not unlikely that similar 

 external conditions may have led them to adopt similar modes of life. 



B. The typical Mongolian races constitute the present popula- 

 tion of Northern and Central Asia. They are not very distinctly, 

 but still conveniently for descriptive purposes, divided into a 

 Northern and a Southern group. 



a. The members of the former, Mongolo- Altaic or Sibiric group, 

 are united by the affinities of their language. These people, from 

 the cradle of their race in the great plateau of Central Asia, have 

 at various times poured out their hordes upon the lands lying to the 

 west, and thence penetrated almost to the heart of Europe. The 

 Lapps, Finns, the Magyars, and the Turks are each the descendants 

 of one of these waves of incursion, but they have for so many genera- 

 tions intermingled with the peoples through whom they have passed 

 in their migrations, or whom they have found in the countries in 

 which they have ultimately settled, that their original physical 

 characters have been completely modified. Even the Lapps, that 

 diminutive tribe of nomads inhabiting the most northern parts of 

 Europe, supposed to be of Mongolian descent, show so little of the 

 special attributes of that branch that it is difficult to assign them 

 a place in it in a classification based upon physical characters. 

 The Japanese are said by their language to be allied rather to the 

 Northern than to the following branch of the Mongolian stock. 



b. The southern Mongolian or Sinitic group, divided from the 

 former chiefly by language and habits of life, includes the greater 

 part of the population of China, Tibet, Burma, and Siam. 



C. The next great division of Mongoloid people is the Malay, 

 forming the bulk of the population of the Indo-Malayan Archipelago 

 and (mixed with the Negro) of Madagascar, subtypical it is true, 



