496 STUDIES, SCIENTIFIC AND SOCIAL chap, xxi 



From the existence of a different and very low type 

 in Tasmania, apparently allied to the Negrito more than 

 to the Papuan, it seems probable that they may have been 

 the primitive inhabitants of Australia or some portion of 

 it, and that they were partly absorbed partly exterminated 

 by the Australians, who themselves must have entered the 

 country at a ver}^ remote epoch. Such an intermixture 

 might explain the coarseness of features which removes 

 the Australians so far from all other remnants of the Cau- 

 casian type, with which they yet, in their best examples, 

 unmistakably accord. Our general conclusion is, there- 

 fore, that both Polynesians and Australians belong to the 

 same fundamental division of the human race as ourselves 

 — the Caucasian. The Polynesians are considerably ad- 

 vanced intellectually and of a higher type physically, and, 

 although somewhat coarser in features, are in both respects 

 the equals of average Europeans. The Australians are 

 far coarser physically and lower mentally and morally. 

 They are distinctly nearer to the animal progenitors of 

 man, and must be of immense antiquity in their present 

 0-bode. Yet, as they possess the main features of the 

 Caucasian type very well marked, they carry us back but 

 a very few steps towards the primitive man before he was 

 differentiated into the three great races — the Mongoloid, 

 Negroid, and Caucasian. 



