DEB SLOG EA 
12T 
THURSDAY, JUNE 8, 1899. 
MAN, PAST AND PRESENT. 
Man, Past and Present. By A. H. Keane. ‘‘ Cambridge 
Geographical Series.” Pp. xii + 548, illustrated. (Cam- 
bridge University Press, 1899.) 
TRUSTWORTHY and up-to-date work in a small 
compass on “Ethnology” in its wider sense, in 
which the human race should be considered in greater 
detail from a zoological (anthropological) rather than from 
a linguistic and cultural (ethnological) point of view, was 
a decided want in this country. And this want has been 
well supplied by the volume before us, with its precursor 
in the same series published three years ago under the 
title of “ Ethnology.” It is, however, in our opinion, a 
matter for distinct regret that the author and the editor 
did not at first starting definitely make up their minds as 
to the extent to which the subject of ethnology (again 
using the term in its wider sense) was to figure in the 
series. Had this been done, a considerable amount of 
useless and irritating repetition might have been avoided, 
while the present volume would have been much more 
fully illustrated. 
According to the present arrangement, the second part 
of the “Ethnology” treats of the primary divisions of 
mankind, of which the author recognises four ; and in each 
of these divisions the chief groups or sections are described 
in more or less detail. In the present volume, on the 
other hand, attention is directed to the detailed classi- 
fication of the various groups and races of the four main 
divisions. It would have been far preferable had the 
descriptions of the main divisions given in the first 
volume been immediately followed by the detailed history 
of the race-groups which appears in the second, with a 
blending of some of the matter relating to these latter 
from the “Ethnology,” and the omission of the rest. 
The numerous excellent illustrations of racial types in 
the first volume would then have been available for the 
detailed descriptions in the second, where they are now 
so sorely needed. To illustrate what we mean, we may 
refer to the notices of the Andamanese on p. 256 of the 
first, and p. 158 of the second volume. In both 
instances we are informed that these people were mis- 
called “ Mincopies,” in both that their language is unlike 
any other, and in both that their numerals only extend to 
two, but that ten can be counted by means of the fingers. 
Again, if the accounts of the Bushmen and Hottentots on 
pp. 248 and 250 of the first, and p. 121 of the second 
volume be compared, it will be found that while there is a 
certain amount of repetition ; neither is complete without 
the other, so that a judicious blending is clearly required. 
But this is not quite all the fault we have to find with 
the general plan adopted by the author, who, we venture 
to suggest, would be all the better for a little training in 
descriptive zoology. For instance, in neither volume do 
we find a definite description of the characters of the 
Negroid division (“‘ Homo aethiopicus”), as distinct from 
all other divisions ; although in the one under consider- 
ation we have many such division-characters given as 
distinctive of a minor group, to wit, the Sudani negroes. 
Still more pronounced is this confusion in the case of the 
NO. 1545, VOL. 60] 
Mongoloids (“‘ Homo mongolicus”), of which the division- 
characters are correctly given on p. 297 of the first 
volume, only to be repeated as group-distinctions on pp. 
169 and 170 of the second. And here it may be men- 
tioned that, since the author insists very strongly on the 
specific unity of mankind, he has no justification for using 
the names above referred to. The proper terms should, 
of course, be Homo sapiens aethiopicus and H. s 
mongolicus. 
In his treatment of the four main divisions of mankind 
in the present volume, the author commences with the 
Negroid; and his clear account of the essential difference 
between the Sudani and Bantu sections of African Negroes 
affords an important contribution to a very difficult sub- 
ject, in which a considerable amount of new matter 
appears. It is, however, a matter for regret that the 
author has seen fit to discard M. Hamy’s convenient 
term “Negrillos” for the dwarf races of equatorial 
Africa, since if they are called Negritos, it is liable to lead 
to confusion with the Andamanese and other Oceanic 
Negroid races. In treating of the southern Bantu, the 
author draws attention to the fact that the term Kaffir is 
only a corruption of the name Kafir applied indiscrimin- 
ately by Muhammedans to all unbelievers, as exemplified 
by the Siahposh Kafirs of Central Asia. He conse- 
quently suggests the substitution of “ Zulu-Xosas” for 
Zulus and Kaffirs; but unless, which is extremely un- 
likely, this meets with popular acceptation, the proposed 
change does not seem advantageous. Mr. Keane fully 
supports Sir Harry Johnston’s estimate of the non-pro- 
gressive nature of the Negro character (even in its Bantu 
modification) ; and he accordingly agrees with Mr. Bent 
in regarding the Zimbabwe ruins as of Arabic origin. 
In the classification of the oceanic members of the 
Negroid group, the author follows the generally received 
views. He, however, considers that the Papuans, although 
nearly allied to Melanesians, should not be merged in 
the latter, and therefore proposes the term Papuasians 
for the two. On p. 145 he states that 
“the ethnological parting-line between the Malayan and 
Papuasian races, as first laid down by Wallace, nearly 
coincides with his division between the Indo-Malayan 
and Austro-Malayan floras and faunas, the chief dif- 
ferences being the position of Sumbawa and Celebes. 
Both of these islands are excluded from the Papuasian 
realm, but included in the Austro-Malayan zoological 
and botanical regions.” 
In this connection it is unfortunate that Mr. Keane 
does not appear to have seen certain recent works, in 
which the right of Celebes to be included in the Orienta 
region is very strongly urged. Had he done so, he would 
have been able to point out an interesting coincidence 
between ethnographic and zoological boundaries. 
Evidence in favour of another such coincidence is 
noticeable in the author’s contention that Tibet is the 
cradle of the Mongol division of mankind, the mammals 
of that plateau being, as is well known, curiously different 
from those of adjacent districts. As Tibet slowly rose 
from a lower elevation in Pleistocene times, so, if we 
understand the author rightly, the Mongols gradually 
became differentiated from a more generalised human 
stock, subsequently to descend and pour over the low- 
lands to the south. 
G 
