50 MAMMALIA. 



liead ; and it is this one which has given rise to the most civihzed nations,— to those which have gene- 

 rally held the rest in suhjection : it varies in complexion and in the colour of the hair. 



The Mongolian is known hy his projecting cheek-bones, flat visage, narrow and ohlique eyebrows, 

 scanty beard, and olive complexion. Great empires have been established by this race in China and 

 Japan, and its conquests have sometimes extended to this side of the Great Desert ; but its civilization 

 has always remained stationary. 



The Negro race is confined to the southward of the Atlas chain of mountains : its colour is Ijlack, 

 its hair crisped, the cranium compressed, and nose flattened. The projecting muzzle and thick lips 

 evidently approximate it to the Apes : the hordes of which it is composed have always continued 

 barbarous. 



The name Caucasian has been affixed to the race from which we descend, because tradition and the 

 fihation of nations seem to refer its origin to that group of mountains situate between the Caspian and 

 IJlack Seas, whence it has apparently extended by radiating all around. The nations of the Caucasus, 

 or the Circassians and Georgians, are even now considered as the handsomest on earth. The principal 

 ramifications of this race may be distinguished by the analogies of language. The Armenian or 

 Syi-ian branch, spreading southward, produced the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, the hitherto untameable 

 Arabs, who, after Mahomet, expected to become masters of the world ; the Phcenicians, the Jews, the 

 Abyssinians, which were Arabian colonies, and most probably the Egyptians. It is from this branch, 

 always inclined to mysticism, that have sprung the most widely extended forms of religion. Science 

 and literature have sometimes flourished among its nations, but always in a strange disguise and 

 figurative style. 



The Indian, German, and Pelasgic branch is much more extended, and was much earlier divided : 

 notwithstanding which, the most numerous affinities have been recognized between its four principal 

 languages — the Sanscrit, the present sacred language of the Hindoos, and the parent of the greater 

 number of the dialects of Hindostan ; the ancient language of the Pelasgi, common parent of the 

 Greek, Latin, many tongues that are extinct, and of all those of the south of Europe ; the Gothic or 

 Teutonic, from wliich are derived the languages of the north and north-west of Europe, such as the 

 German, Dutch, English, Danish, Swedish, and their dialects ; and finally, the Sclavonian, from which 

 are descended those of the north-east, the Russian, Polish, Bohemian, and that of the Vandals. 



It is by this great and venerable branch of the Caucasian stock, that philosophy, the arts and 

 sciences, have been carried to their present state of advancement ; and it has continued to be the 

 depository of them for thirty centuries. 



It was preceded in Em"ope by the Celts, whose tribes, once very numerous, came by the north, and 

 are now confined to its most western extremities ; and by the Cantabrians, who passed from Africa 

 into Spain, and have become confounded with the many nations whose posterity have intermingled in 

 that peninsula. 



The ancient Persians originate from the same source as the Indians, and their descendants still 

 present a very close resemblance to the nations of Europe. 



The Scythian and Tartar branch, extending first towards the north and north-east, and always 

 wandering over the immense plains of those countries, returned but to devastate the happier abodes of 

 their more civilized brethren. The Scythians, who, at so remote a period, made irruptions into Upper 

 Asia ; the Parthians, who there destroyed the Greek and Roman domination ; the Turks, who there 

 subverted that of the Arabs, and subjugated in Europe the unfortunate remnant of the Grecian people, 

 were all oflFsets from this branch. The Finlanders and Hungarians are tribes of the same division, 

 which have strayed among the Sclavonic and Teutonic nations. Their original country, to the north 

 and eastward of the Caspian Sea, still contains inhabitants who have the same origin, and speak 

 similar languages ; but these are mingled with many other petty nations, variously descended, and of 

 lUfferent languages. The Tartars remained unmixed longer than the others throughout that extent of 

 country included between the mouth of the Danube to beyond the Irtisch, from which they so long 

 menaced Russia, and where they have finally been subjugated by her. The Mongoles, however, have 

 mingled their blood with that of the nations they conquered, many traces of which may still be found 

 among the iidiabitants of Lesser Tartary. 



It is to the east of this Tartar branch of the Caucasian race that the Mongolian race begins, whence 

 it extends to the eastern ocean. Its branches, the Calmucks and Kalkas, still wandering shepherds, 



