AND COLOUR OF THE IRIS. 2?! 



The Chinese resemble tlie Mongolian tribes, to which 

 they owe their origin, in this deticiency of beard ; although 

 they preserve it, and encourage the growth as much as 

 they can *. 



The practice of extermination is mentioned by K^mpfer 

 as prevalent in Japan and among the Malays ; by Forrest, 

 among the Mindanao islanders; Wilson, in the Pelew 

 Islands 5 Langsdorff, in the Marquesas f; Carteret, 

 among the Papuas; Bougainville, in the Navigators' 

 Islands ; Mr. Marsden, in Sumatra I; &c. &c. 



There has been a great dispute about the Americans ; 

 some asserting their entire and natural want of beard, and 

 assigning this as a proof of tlieir physical inferiority, of that 

 degeneracy, which is supposed to have affected all animal 

 nature in the New World ; while others are inclined to 

 ascribe the apparent difference entirely to the practice of 

 eradication. 



We have abundant evidence that the American race is 

 characterized generally by a small and imperfect beard ; 

 yet there are tribes, particularly in North America, with a 

 more copious growth. The tall and robust stature of some 



* The Booteas, or inhabitants of Bootan, have all the characters of the 

 Mongolian variety, and the deficiency of beard with the rest. " Their skins 

 are remarkably smooth; and most of them arrive at a very advanced as;.' 

 before they can boast even the earliest rudiments of a beard. TJieir 

 eyelashes are so thin, as to be scarcely perceptible." Turner, Embassy to 

 the Court of the Teshoo Lama, p. 84-5. 



+ " The Natives of Nukahiwah consider an entirely smooth skin a o-reat 

 beauty, and therefore eradicate the hair under the arms and from the breast.'* 

 Voyages and Travels, &c. p. 114. 



J " The men are beardless ; and have chins so remarkably smooth, that 

 were it not for the priests displaying a little tuft, we should be apt to con- 

 clude that nature had refused them this token of manhood. It is the same 

 with respect to other parts of the body in both sexes ; and this particular 

 attention to their persons they esteem a point of delicacy, and the contrary 

 an unpardonable neglect. The boys, as they approach the age of puberty, 

 rub their chins, upper lips, and those parts of the body that are subject to 

 superfluous hair, with chunam (quick-lime, especially of shell), which de- 

 stroys the roots of the incipient beard. The few pihc that afterwards appear 

 are plucked out with tweezers, which they always carry about with them for 

 that purpose." Hist, of Sumatra ; Ed. 3. p. 45. 



