168 INTRODUCTION. 



degree of fairness. But the children of Negroes, born in North America, 

 or Northern Europe, their children, and their children's children, are 

 still genuine Negroes. If the colour and form of the Negro were condi- 

 tions thus acquired, such conditions would not be fixed and perpetuated ; 

 for, though like produces like though the Race-horse, breeding with the 

 Race-horse, produces a Race-horse, or the Bull-dog, with its like, produces 

 a Bull-dog still, the mere influence of climate, effecting, as it would 

 seem, only superficial and transitory impressions, does not establish them 

 upon the organization. No people, within the records of history, have 

 been changed into a race of Negroes.* 



While, however, the Negro retains his fixed and distinguishing cha- 

 racters, he is not only surrounded by the descendants of European colonists, 

 retaining theirs, but by African tribes, not Negroes, differing in tint of 

 skin, physiognomy, hair, and general contour. The Abyssinians, within 

 ten degrees of the equator, and surrounded by Negroes, have a dark olive 

 colour ; have large, expressive eyes, and long hair. The Gallas, of the 

 same latitudes, a nation of considerable extent, have, also, a brown skin> 

 and long hair. The natives of Timbuctoo are not Negroes. In Mada- 

 gascar, two or three distinct races exist : a true Negro* race ; and an olive- 

 coloured, or yellowish-brown race, with crisp hair, termed, by Lesson, 

 Madecasses, apparently of the Papuan stock ; and, besides these, what 

 appears to be an aboriginal race, inhabiting the interior, with dark skins 

 and lank hair, called Virzimbers, a branch of the great Alfourou nation, 

 which is spread over the Moluccas, New Guinea, and, also, inhabits the 

 interior of the Islands of the Indian Archipelago. That the Negroes, then, 

 do not owe their peculiarities to the mere effects of the heat of the torrid 



* Dr. Prichard observes : " Nothing seems to hold true, more generally, than that all acquired 

 conditions of body, whether produced by art or accident, end with the life of the individual in whom 

 they are produced. Many nations mould their bodies into unnatural forms : the Indians flatten 

 their foreheads ; the Chinese women reduce their feet to one-third of their natural dimensions ; 

 savages elongate the ears ; many races observe the rite of circumcision. We frequently mutilate 

 our domestic animals, by removing the tail or ears ; and our own species are often obliged, by disease, 

 to submit to the loss of limbs. That no deformity, or mutilation of this kind, is hereditary, is so 

 plainly proved by everything around us, that we must feel some surprise at the contrary opinion 

 having gained any advocates. After the operation of circumcision has prevailed 3000 or 4000 years, 

 the Jews are still obliged to submit to a painful rite. Docked Horses, and cropped Dogs, bring forth 

 young with entire ears and tails. But for this salutary law, what a frightful spectacle would every 

 race of animals exhibit ! The mischances of all preceding times, would overwhelm us with their 

 united weight, and the catalogue would be continually inc easing, until the universe, instead of dis- 

 playing a spectacle of beauty and pleasure, would be filled with maimed, imperfect, and monstrous 

 shapes." Disput. Inau. Though accidental, or induced, deformities, are not always transmitted to 

 succeeding races, still this law only holds good to a certain extent ; for there is a remarkable ten- 

 dency, both in plants and animals, to transmit to their offspring the individual peculiarities which 

 they may possess ; not, indeed, those produced by the accidental loss of parts, but such " new 

 characters of organization as spring up with the breeds, and which, owing to our ignorance of the 

 circumstances of their rise, are termed accidental varieties." Thus, the short and bow-limbed Sheep 

 of New England, which have appeared within a few years, and of which the origin, in a male Lamb, 

 the product of an ordinary Ewe, is well authenticated, has become an established breed. Supernu- 

 merary toes, or fingers, are continued, as abundant examples on record prove, through many gene- 

 rations. Peculiarities in the physiognomy run through families, from generation to generation ; no 

 less than hereditary predispositions to various diseases. 



