284 FORMS OF THE SKULL. 



recognize the tribes scattered in the meudows of the Rio 

 Apure and the Carony. The same style of feature exists, 

 no doubt, in both Americas ; but those Europeans who have 

 sailed on the great rivers Orinoco and Amazons, and have 

 had occasion to see a great number of tribes assembled 

 under tlie monastical hierarchy in the missions, must have 

 observed, that the American race contains nations whose 

 features differ as essentially from one another, as the nu- 

 merous varieties of the race of Caucacus, the Circassians, 

 Moors, and Persians, differ from one another. The tall form 

 of the Patagonians is again found by us, as it were, among 

 the Caribs, who dwell in the plains from the delta of the 

 Orinoco, to the sources of the Rio Blanco. What a diffe- 

 rence between the figure, physiognomy, and physical consti- 

 tution of these Caribs, who ought to be accounted one of 

 the most robust nations on the face of the earth, and are 

 not to be confounded with the degenerate Zambos, formerly 

 called Caribs, of the island of St. Vincent, and the squat 

 bodies of the Chayma Indians of the province of Cumana ! 

 What a difference of form between the Indians of Tlascala 

 and the Lipans and the Chichlmecs of the northern part of 

 Mexico *. 



An analagous variety of countenance has been noticed in 

 the Friendly Islanders ; " their features are very various, 

 insomuch that it is scarcely possible to fix on any general 

 likeness by which to characterize them, unless it be a fulness 

 at the point of the nose, which is very common. But, on 

 the other hand, we met with hundreds of truly European 

 faces, and many genuine Roman noses amongst them f. 



Individuals in Europe often have the countenance exactly 

 resembling the Negro or Mongol face. 



From our survey of the countenance we proceed, by a 

 natural and easy transition, to a consideration of the bony 

 head. It Is sufliclently obvious that there must be a close 

 connexion between the external soft parts of the face, or 

 the features, and the bony fabric, or mould, on which they 



* Political Essay, v, 4. p. 142. 



+ Cook's Voyage to the Pacific; i. 38. 



