viii THE HUMAN KACES 327 



observations which would be of the greatest importance from the 

 physiologist's point of view. 



II. We must first of all describe those specially striking charac- 

 teristics which enable us to distinguish and classify the different 

 races. One of the characteristics to which the earliest anthropo- 

 logists attached very great importance is the colour of the skin, 

 iris, hair, and beard. The distinguished histologists, Kolliker and 

 Virchow, discovered this difference of colour to be due to the 

 greater or smaller number of granules of pigment contained in the 

 cutaneous cells, and more particularly in the deeper cells of the 

 Malpighian layer (Vol. II. Chap. IX.). 



Virchow maintains that there is no human race whose hair, 

 iris, and skin are totally devoid of pigment ; true albinism is a 

 pathological condition (leucopathia) ; hence the differences existing 

 between the various races in this particular are merely ones of 

 degree, and not even the most careful and detailed study can draw 

 a line of demarcation between individuals belonging to different 

 races. 



The action of the sun has always been known to exercise a 

 great influence on the colouring of the different races. The nearer 

 man lives to the equator, the darker does the skin tend to become. 

 In the case of individuals leading an out-of-door life in our own 

 climate we notice that those portions of the skin which are 

 exposed to the sun become more or less brown. It would not, 

 however, be accurate to say that the black or brown colour of the 

 skin is due only to the action of the solar rays. Virchow points 

 out that, though in America there are tropical and frigid zones 

 just as in the old world, that continent possesses no races as black 

 as the Kaffirs or as fair as Anglo-Saxons. In Northern Europe we 

 have the Finns who are fair, and still farther north the Laplanders 

 who are light brown. In all probability the colour of the skin 

 depends not only on external conditions, such as climate and 

 environment, but also on internal causes, such as the specific 

 congenital tendencies of the different races. 



Some modern anthropologists Topinard and Deniker amongst 

 them distinguish ten gradations in the colour of the skin. There 

 are gradations amongst the white races : pale and rosy white, found 

 amongst Scandinavians, English, Dutch, etc., and brunette, found 

 amongst Spaniards, Italians, etc. The yellow races likewise present 

 three varieties of colour : light yellow, fallow, and corn coloured, 

 seen in certain Chinese races ; opaque yellow, tending to olive, 

 the colour of a new leather, seen in the natives of South America, 

 Polynesia, and Indonesia ; golden brown, the colour of a dead leaf, 

 seen in the Malays and certain American races. There are at 

 least four gradations of colouring amongst the Hack races : reddish 

 brown or cinnamon coloured, amongst the Beggia, Niam-Niams, 

 etc. ; chocolate, such as the Dravidians, Australians, and certain 



