ANIMALS. 245 



extremity of that large continent, are not to be ranked among the 

 negro race : however, the difference between them, in point of co- 

 lour and features, is so small, that they may very easily be grouped 

 in this general picture ; and in the one or two that I have seen, I 

 could not per:eive the smallest difference. Each of the negro na- 

 tions, it must be owned, differ from each other ; they have their 

 peculiar countries, for beauty, like us ; and different nations, as \n 

 Europe, pride themselves upon the regularity of their features. 

 Those of Guinea, for instance, are extremely ugly, and have an 

 insupportable scent ; those of Mosambique are reckoned beautiful, 

 and have no ill smell whatsoever. The negroes, in general, are of 

 a black colour, with a smooth soft skin. This smoothness pro- 

 ceeds from the downy softness of the hair which grows upon it ; 

 the strength of which gives a roughness to the feel, in those of a 

 white complexion. Their skins, therefore, have a velvet smooth- 

 ness, and seem less braced upon the muscles than ours. The hair of 

 their heads differs entirely from what we are accustomed to, being 

 soft, woolly, and short. The beard also partakes of the same qua- 

 lities ; but in this it differs, that it soon turns gray, which the hair is 

 seldom found to do ; so that several are seen with white beards, and 

 black hair, at the same time. Their eyes are generally of a deep 

 hazel ; their noses flat and short ; their lips thick and tumid ; and 

 their teeth of an ivory whiteness. This their only beauty, how- 

 ever, is set off by the colour of their skin ; the contrast between the 

 black and white being the more observable. It is false to say that 

 their features are deformed by art ; since, in the negro children born 

 in European countries, the same deformities are seen to prevail ; the 

 same flatness in the nose ; and the same prominence in the lips. They 

 are, in general, said to be well shaped ; but of such as I have seen, 

 I never found one that might be justly called so ; their legs being 

 mostly ill formed, and commonly bending outward on the shin-bone. 

 But it is not only in those parts of their bodies that are obvious, that they 

 are disproportioned ; those parts which among us are usually con- 

 cealed by dress, with them are large and languid.* The women's 

 breasts, after bearing one child, hang down below the navel; and it 

 is customary with them to suckle the child at their backs, by throw- 

 ing the breast over the shoulder. As their persons are thus na- 

 turally deformed, at least to our imaginations, their minds are equally 

 incapable of strong exertions. The climate seems to relax their men- 

 tal powers still more than those of the body ; they are, therefore, in 

 general, found to be stupid, indolent, and mischievous. The Ara- 

 bians themselves, many colonies of whom have migrated southward 

 into the most inland parts of Africa, seem to have degenerated from 

 their ancestors ; forgetting their ancient learning, and losing their 

 beauty, they have become a race scarcely any way distinguishable' 

 from the original natives. Nor does it seem to have fared otherwise 

 with the Portuguese, who, about two centuries ago, settled along this 



Linnaeus, in prima linea sua, faeminas Africanas dej-ingit sicut aliquid deforme in 

 parte genitali gestantes, quod sinum pudoris nuncupat. Attamen nihil differunt a nostra 

 ibus in hac parte nisi quod labia pudendae sint aliquantuluin tumidiora. In hominibuf 

 etiam penis est longioi et in til to laxior. 



