516 THE SAVAGE RACES. 



the place of his habitation on the earth." We cannot pretend to 

 undervalue the importance of race. We cannot deny that one is the 

 ruler, the other the ruled. As Emerson says,* "It is race, is it not ? 

 that puts the hundred millions of India under the dominion of a 

 remote island in the north of Europe. Race is a controlling influence 

 in the Jew, who, for two millenniums, under every climate, has pre- 

 served the same character and employments." It is race that has 

 planted the Anglo-Saxon on every shore, and that for ages has sub- 

 jected the negro to the yoke of bondage. At all events, it is certain 

 that, even in the present day, savagery is the exclusive portion of 

 certain races, perfectly distinct in a physiological point of view from 

 the white and yellow races (the Caucasian and Mongolian), which, 

 either in antiquity or the modern age, have arrived at more or less 

 advanced degrees of civilization. 



The savage races may be divided into four great groups : 



The Negro, in Africa and North America ; 



The Malayo-Polynesian, in Polynesia and the Indian islands. 



The American, or Red Indians ; and 



The Hyperborean, chiefly represented by the Eskimos. 



The Negro or Black races are distributed over the whole of Africa, 

 from the Cape of Good Hope to the frontiers of the Saharan region. 

 The name of Negro is also given to the natives of Australia and 

 Papouasia. But most anthropologists agree in considering the Aus- 

 tralian branch wholly distinct from, and independent of, the African 

 branch ; which, nevertheless, it resembles in several organic pecu- 

 liarities, and especially in the deep colour of the skin. 



This characteristic, which is the most conspicuous at the first 

 glance, is, however of secondary importance : it is extremely marked 

 on the east African coast, among the Nubians and the Abyssinians ; 

 on the banks of the Cuzamance, not far from the Sierra Leone coast, 

 among the Feloupas, and on the Guinea coast, among the Aminas. 

 All these peoples are black as ebony ; but their oval countenances, 

 * R. W. Emerson. " Essays " (Collected Works, Bell & Daldy, 2 vols.) 



