May 1, 1900.] 



KNOWLEDGE. 



97 



y^ ILLUSTRATED MAGAZINE <if 



^lENCE^llTERATURE ^ART. 



Founded by RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 



LONDON: ^[AY 1, 1900. 



CONTENTS. 



Oceanic Negroes. Bv R. Lydkkkke. (Illustrated) 

 Where the Day Changes. B_v Dr. A. M. W. Downi.no. 



(I!h,slr<i/fd) " 



Plants and their Food.— III. By U. H. W. Pearson, m.a. 



(Illustrated) 



A Temple of Science. By W. Alfiikd Parb. (Illustrated) 

 Astronomy without a Telescope. — IV. A Total Solar 



Eclipse. ]!_v K. Walter IIaundbb. v.r.a.s. ... 

 A Photographic Search for an Interniercurial Planet. 



By Edward C. Pickering... 

 The Photography of Clouds. By Eugene Anioniadi, 



f.r.a.?. (Illustrated) 

 Cloud Photographs taken at Juvisy. (Plate) 

 Letters: 



Is THE .Steliae Universe Finite? By (!eo. Piirlps 

 Is THE Stbliab Unitbbsk Finite ? By W. H. S. Monck. 



Note by E. Walter Maunder, f.r.a.s. 

 WlBELESS Telegraph Rbceivee. By Norman Kobinson. 



Note by Howard B. Little 



A Cloud of Dried Beech Leaves. By T. H. Astbuet 

 London Suitmees. By Alex. B. MacDowall. (Illus- 

 trated) ... 

 Obituary: 



Prof. St. George Mivart, f.b.s 



Prof. John Hbnet Pepper 



Notices of Books 



BooE3 Eecbitbd 



Wireless Telegraphy. — II, By G. W. db Tunzelmann, b.sc. 



Drops and their Splashes. (Illustrated) 



Microscopy. By John H. Cooke, p.l.s., j.g.b 



Notes on Comets and Meteors. By W. F. Denning, 



P,B.A,S. ... 



The Face of the Sky for May. By A. Fowieb, p.e.a.s, 



(Illustrated) 



Chess Column. By C. D. Locock, b.a. 



PAOK 



97 



1(10 



Jill 

 ]ii:h 



KM 

 |(iC> 

 107 



ins 



II IS 



109 

 liiO 



110 



110 

 110 

 110 

 113 

 113 

 11.5 

 117 



118 



118 

 119 



OCEANIC NEGROES. 



By R. Lydekker, 



Like many other terms, the word Negro, and more es- 

 pecially its vulgar corruption " nigger," has a popular, 

 and indeed an etymological, significance very different 

 from the sense in which it is employed in anthropo- 

 logical science, Etymologically, of course, it means 

 simply a black man, and is therefore legitimately 

 applicable to all dark-skinned races, of whatever 

 origin ; although there is the difficulty of determining 

 where to draw the line between dark and lights 

 skinned races, since there is a complete transition from 

 the one t-o the other. In this sense, therefore, the dark- 

 skinned races of Somaliland and Nubia may bo termed 

 Negi-oes, although they have a large proportion of Arab 

 blood in their veins. The wild tribes of India and 

 Ceylon, forming the subject of another article iu 

 Knowledge, may likewise be so termed ; and, however 

 much they may dislike such an appellation, it i.s diffi- 



cult to see how many of the higher races of India can 

 claim an exemption from this use of the name. 



But in a scientific soiiso tho term has a much moro 

 limited application, although even hero difficulties are 

 met with in defining it when wo have to deal with 

 cross-bred rates like those of North-eastern Africa. If 

 tho aborigines of Australia be excepted (and it has been 

 shown in an c.u'licr article that there arc some reasons 

 for regarding thcni as belonging to a different stock), 

 a Negro may befit be defined in popular science as a 

 person with frizzly, or, incorrectly, woolly, black hair, 

 and genei-ally a very dark, or even black complexion. 

 Tho hair is, however, a much better character than 

 tho colour of the skin, which iu tho South African 

 Bushmen is of a leathery yellow. Accompanying this 

 frizzly hair, we may generally notice in Negroes an 

 elongated skull, a broad and flat nose, thick and pro- 

 jecting lips, relatively large teeth, and moderate or 

 scanty development of the beard. Closer examination 

 will reveal the fact that the fore-arm of a Negro is 

 longer in proportion to the leg than is tho case in an 

 average Euro|)ean ; and there is also less dsvclopmeni; 

 of the calf of the leg, as well as a marked difference 

 in tho form of tho heel. But to record all such 

 niinutire would be practically to write a treatise on an- 

 thropology ; and I must accordingly ask my readers to 

 be content with the frizzly hair as the essential 

 characteristic of a purc-bi-ed Negro. 



Now we all know that such frizzly-haired black 

 (occasionally yellow) skinned people populate the 

 greater part of Africa, whence numbers of them have 

 been transported in the old slaving days to various 

 parts of America. And it is among these black African 

 races that we have tho typical Negro of anthropological 

 science, and, probably, also of popular speech. But 

 Negroes, even in the scientific sense, are by no means 

 restricted to what, from an anthropological point of 

 view, may still be aptly designated the " Dark Con- 

 tinent." Frizzly-haired islack races are met with in the 

 Andamans and Philippines, as well as in some of 

 the neighbouring islands; but since all these people 

 differ from Afncan Negroes by their broader and 

 shorter heads, they have been separated under the name 

 of Negritoes ; and it is not of these that I desire to treat 

 on the present occasion. Further eastwards, in that 

 part of Oceania now commonly designated (from the 

 colour of its inhabitants) Melanesia, we find " mop- 

 headed," frizzly-haired races, agreeing so essentially in 

 physical characters with African Negroes, that there 

 can be no reasonable doubt of their comparatively near 

 relationship to tho latter. As some of my readers may 

 perhaps be a little hazy as to the precise signification 

 of the term Melanesia,* it may be stated for their 

 benefit that it includes the great island of New Guinea, 

 or Papua, together with the Louisiades, the Bisniark 

 (New Ireland and New Britain) and Solomon groups, 

 the New Hebrides, the Loyalty group, and New Cale- 

 donia. The mountains of the interior of Fiji are like- 

 wise inhabited by members of the same negro-like race. 

 In regard to a general name for these Oceanic Ne- 

 groes, as they are perhaps best called authorities are 

 somewhat divided. By the Malays the aborigines o 

 New Guinea are designated Orang Papua (pronounced 

 Papooa), and some writers extend the term Papuans to 

 embrace the inhabitants of tho whole area. On the 

 other hand, the term Mela nesians, orig inally pr oposed 



• In the "Timo. Atlas" the name Melanesia, although omiitecl 

 from the index occurs in the map of the world, but not ,n that of 

 the Papuan Archipelago. 



