AFRICANS. 



577 



corresponds to the latitude ; but from this point, passing to the east, the 

 -Brazilio-Guarani are darker as we approach the Atlantic Ocean. It may 

 with truth be said that the intervention of the Gulf of Mexico and Ca- 

 ribbean Sea has lightened the complexion of the aboriginal tribes of 

 North and South America. 



In the last place, we may consider, in like manner, the African races. 

 These are, as we should expect from the high temperature y . . 

 of that continent, all dark, yet not equally so, for the Berbers pressed on the 

 toward the Mediterranean shore, and the Hottentots and Kaf- African races * 

 firs adjacent to the Cape of Good Hope, are of a lighter hue. In this 

 class we ought also to enumerate, as an example of no common interest, 

 the native Egyptians, who are, perhaps, the lightest of all. It does not 

 appear that there has been any marked change in the complexion of the 

 aboriginal Egyptian for the last three thousand years, so far as can be 

 judged from a comparison of the descriptions and paintings which have 

 descended to our times, with the existing Copts. Leaving the Mediter- 

 ranean shore, and advancing to the south, we pass through bands of pop- 

 ulation sensibly becoming darker, save where a disturbance arises by rea- 

 son of the elevation of the mountain ranges. On the north of the equa- 

 tor the negro land is not reached until we are within 10 lati- The negro 

 tude. The true negro occupies a zone crossing through the con- zone - 

 tinent west and east. If our examination be made meridionally, in the 

 manner just supposed, but along the Eed Sea coast, the complexion of 

 the inhabitants is observed to darken through Upper Egypt and in Abys- 

 synia. Of this country it is interesting to remark that it still retains the 

 Christian faith as delivered to it in the remotest times of the Church. 



The portrait of an Abyssinian, 

 Fig. 276, from M. d'Abbadie, shows 



Fig. 276. 



Abyssinian. Native of Madagascar. 



an admixture of the Arab lineaments, though there is no reason to suppose 



Go 



