246 



VARIETIES OF COLOUR 



the daughter of two Mulattoes, born in Nova Scotia^ who 

 had all the Negro features, with woolly hair of a dirty 

 white colour, and a skin equalling in whiteness that of an 

 European, without any thing disagreeable in its appearance 

 or texture. Her eyes were between a red and light hazel 

 colour, and not much affected by light. There are no signs 

 here of cachexia or lej^rosy ; nor are there any in the two 

 Swiss youths described by Blumenbach, and before him by 

 Saussure *. They seem indeed to be short for their age : 

 the elder was twenty-two years old, with the stature of 

 fifteen ; the younger seventeen, with that of twelve. Two 

 writers of very different characters, who had both seen Afri- 

 can Albinos, seem to have equally felt that the notion of 

 disease was quite unfounded; and have used the very same 

 words in conveying their strong o])inion to this effect : 

 " Prctendre que ce sont des Negres nains, dont une espece 

 de lepre a blanchi la peau, c'est comme si Ton disoit que les 

 noirs eux-memes sont des blancs que la ISpre a noircis t«" 

 " Casterum, " says Pallas, " hascc varietates iEthiopum 

 albas non raagis morbosam naturam (quod Blumenbachio 

 placuit) appellari posse i)uto, quam ipsa iEthiopum nigredo 

 morbus est J:." 



This variety was first observed in the African, as the 

 great difference of colour renders the variation more strik- 

 ing : hence the individuals were termed Leucaethiopes §, or 

 white Negroes, their i)eculiar constitution — for the devia- 

 tion is by no means confined to the surface of the body — 

 may be conveniently termed, after some modern authors, 

 leucaethiopia. From their avoiding the light, tlie Dutch 

 gave them (in the island of Java) the contemptuous appel- 

 lation of Kakkerlakken, cockroaches, insects that run about 

 in the dark ; and hence the French name Chacrelas. The 

 Spaniards called them Albinos, and the French Blafards. 



* Voyages dans les ylfpes, iv. 303. 

 + Voltaire Essai sur les Mceurs^ introduction. 

 :J: Nova; Species Qua(lrupe(lu7ny p. 1 1, note. 



^ Pliny mentions Leucaethiopes in liis Natural History, lib. v. sec. 8. ; 

 and Ptolemy, lib. iv. cit. 6. But whether they mean Albinos, is donbtful. 



