182 IDLE DAYS IN PATAGONIA 



Man has been very little improved in this direc- 

 tion, the dark eye, except in the north of Europe, 

 having been, until recent times, almost or quite 

 universal. The blue eye does not seem to have 

 any advantage for man in a state of nature, being 

 mild where fierceness of expression is required; 

 it is almost unknown amongst the inferior crea- 

 tures; and only on the supposition that the ap- 

 pearance of the eye is less important to man's 

 welfare than it is to that of other species, can 

 we account for its survival in a branch of the hu- 

 man race. 



Cerulean eyes; locks comparable in hue to the 

 ''yellow hair that floats on the eastern clouds," 

 and a white body, like snow with a blush on it 

 what could Nature have been dreaming of when 

 she gave such things to her rudest most savage 

 humans ! That they should have overcome dark- 

 eyed races, and trod on their necks and ruined 

 their works, strikes one as unnatural, and reads 

 like a fable. 



Little, however, as the human eye has changed, 

 assuming it to have been dark originally, there 

 is a great deal of spontaneous variation in indi- 

 viduals, light hazel and blue-gray being appar- 

 ently the most variable. I have found curiously 

 marked and spotted eyes not uncommon; in some 

 instances the spots being so black, round, and 

 large as to produce the appearance of eyes with 

 clusters of pupils on them. I have known one per- 

 son with large brown spots on light blue-gray 



