ANIMALS. 



■Ill 



The form of the face seems rather to be the result of custom. 

 Nations who have long considered some artificial deformity as 

 beautiful, who have industriously lessened the feet or flattened 

 the nose, by degrees begin to receive the impression they ai'e 

 taught to assume ; and Nature, in a course of ages, shapes itself 

 to the constraint, and assumes hereditary deformity. We find 

 nothing more common in births, than for children to inherit 

 sometimes even the accidental deformities of their parents. We 

 have many instances of squinting in the father, which he received 

 from fright or habit, communicated to the ofl^'spring ; and 1 my- 

 self have seen a child distinctly marked with a scar, similar to 

 one the father had received in battle. In this manner, acci- 

 dental deformities may become natural ones ; and by assiduity 

 may be continued, and even increased, through successive gene- 

 rations. From this, therefore, may have arisen the small eyes 

 and long ears of the Tartar and Chinese nations. From hence 

 originally may have come the flat noses of the blacks, and the 

 flat heads of the American Indians.* 



counts of travellers respecting the Patagonians have been various and cod- 

 tradictory ; from a careful comparison of statements, we conclude the aver- 

 age height of this nation to be from ftve feet ten inches to six feet and a half. 

 Similar differences occur in the Ethiopian variety. The Negroes generally 

 correspond in stature «itli Europeans ; the Hottentots are usually smaller 

 than other Africans, and the Bushmen are remarkably short The Katfers 

 are distinguished for their stature, and the muscularity and symmetry of 

 their figures. The Mongolians are generally shorter in stature than our. 

 selves ; but considerable varieties are found among them. The Chinese and 

 Japanese are about our own size. The Calmucks, Burats, &c. are shorter; 

 the people of Loo Choo are a diminutive race, five feet two being the limit 

 of their average height. The Laplanders, Samoiedes, Greenlanders, and 

 Esquimaux are all short ; Captain Parry found no individual among the last 

 above five feet ten ; the average was five feet four, five, and six inches. H 

 has been reported that a naticm of white long-armed dwarfs existed in the 

 island of Madagascar, but there appears t)o foundation in truth for suclij 

 story. 



* No two persons are ever met with possesping precisely the same sort of 

 features ; yet there are certain generally characteristic countenances belong- 

 ing to the different races of mankind, and even to particular nations. To 

 enter into all the minute variations would be endless, but they have been 

 reduced by Blumenbach to the five following, which include all the leading 

 traits : 



1. An oval countenance, with the features moderately intrr-distinguished • 

 high and broad forehead ; nose aquihne, or slightly convex or prominent • 

 check. bones not prominent ; small mouth and Lips slightly curved ; chin full 



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