~ observation and experiment. 
Sept. 9, 1886 } 
NATGRE 
To begin at the beginning, I think that, while so much effort 
and so much science have been expended, perhaps not very 
fructuously, in inquiries into the origin of man, too little syste- 
matic attention has been given to the radical differences between 
the modern man and modern animals. For instance, in the 
matter of speech no one can doubt that dogs and elephants and 
seals understand a great deal of language. One cannot see the 
individuals of a pack of hounds answer to their names without 
being satisfied that they not only attach a meaning to a few rude 
sounds, but can distinguish niceties and refinements of language. 
Again, we know that parrots and other creatures can speak our 
language ; but I have never seen the question whether any one 
creature can both speak and understand thoroughly worked out. 
Has it been carefully and thoroughly ascertained whether any 
animals really cry or laugh? Sir John Lubbock and others have 
given attention to the question whether, in habitation-building, 
and the like, bees and ants exercise an intelligent discretion or 
follow one unvarying hereditary instinct ; but I do not think any 
distinct conclusion has been arrived at. Can any monkey or 
other creature be educated up to the point of putting sticks on a 
fire and cooking chestnuts? I am afraid that on all these 
subjects there has been nothing but very desultory individual 
effort. 
Then as regards man-breeding. Probably we have enough 
physiological knowledge to effect a vast improvement in the 
pairing of individuals of the same or allied races if we could 
only apply that knowledge to mike fitting marriages, instead of 
giving way to foolish ideas about love and the tastes of young 
people, whom we can hardly trust to choose their own bonnets, 
much less to choose in a grayer matter in which they are most 
likely to be influenced by frivolous prejudices. As I am not 
preaching I need say no more on that—all that I could say is 
self-evident. But when we come to the very important question 
of the crossing of races there is very great need of scientific 
Both the general knowledge that 
we have of humans and the analogy of animals tends to show the 
great benefit of the crossing of breeds. Anglo-Saxon is an 
awkward term. Ido not stop to inquire whether it represents 
two races ; whether the peasant of the Lothians is an English- 
man and the peasant of the south of England a Saxon, or why 
one is superior to the other ; but using the word English for the 
Teutonic inhabitants of these islands I think one can hardly 
doubt that the English breed crossed with a dash of Celtic blood 
produces a better animal than either of the parent races. Witness 
the people of many parts of Scotland, of Ulster, and, I believe 
I may also say, of Cornwall. It is the use of the Celtic blood 
as an alloy that makes me specially unwilling to see High- 
landers, and even wild Irishmen, exterminated from these islands. 
It may be worse for all of us if that comes to pass. 
There is a popular belief that the cross between an 
Englishman and a Hindu produces a race inferior to either. 
I very much doubt the fact. Owing to the caste system (and 
it prevails with us almost as much as with the Hindus) half- 
castes are placed at a very great disadvantage, but I doubt 
if they are naturally inferior; at any rate, the question requires 
to be worked out. I think we have the means of doing 
so if we systematically went about it. So again as regards the 
cross-breeds between whites and Negroes. There is so much 
prejudice on the subject in the United States that it is very 
difficult to arrive at the truth. Some people think that the 
stimulating climate tends to make the white race in America 
wear itselfout, and that (apart from the present great immigra- 
tion from Europe) it would bea real improvement to the American 
race if the whites were crossed with the more phlegmatic blacks, 
say, in the porportion of six or eight of white to one of black, 
which now exists in the States. However, that is their affair, 
but a very important question for them, 
And this brings me to the effect of climate. Is it the fact 
that in course of generations settled in America the climate alters 
the British race—or perhaps I should say European races ? What 
is the tendency of the very peculiar Australian climate? It has 
passed into a popular proverb that the European race cannot 
survive in India beyond the second or third generation ; and the 
result of that belief has been of enormous practical importance, 
for no sort of colonisation has been attempted. Yet I wholly 
doubt if the belief can be supported by any facts whatever ; it 
is one of those things that are universally believed because they 
have neyer been tried, and therefore cannot be contradicted. 
Till little more than fifty years ago Europeans were not allowed 
to settle in India. To this day opportunities for education and 
457 
good up-bringing are very much wanting—the surroundings are 
most unfavourable to European children; yet a good many 
instances could now be quoted of Europeans brought up in India 
who are physically just as good as their parents. The mortality 
in the European orphan asylums is extraordinarily low. It is not 
at all certain that the race might not be adapted to the climate, 
especially as the cool hill regions are those least occupied by the 
natives, and most fit for many lucrative industries introduced by 
Europeans. 
Coming to physical and mental education, I have already 
alluded to some of the subjects which urgently require attention, 
the most important of which is, I think, the effect of what we 
call civilised life, and especially urban life. It is impossible to 
see the crowded and inferior dwellings in which so vast a popu- 
lation live in towns, without room for the gardens which their 
fathers had, and without the space and recreations natural to 
man, and not to fear for the result on the race. I might also say 
more on the question of physical education and on that of a 
mental education so general as to leave no mere primitive jungle 
plants as a stock on which to graft improved varieties ; a subject 
which is already engaging anxious attention. On many other 
questions to which I have briefly alluded I might enlarge, but I 
have detained you so long that I think you would prefer to get 
to business ; and so I will conclude by recommending practical 
anthropology to your earnest attention. 
NOTES 
WE have received the programme of the Finsbury Technical 
College for the session 1886-87. There is no change in the 
curriculum calling for remark. 
On September 3 a banquet took place in Bologna to celebrate 
the 190th anniversary of the discovery of animal electricity in 
that city by Galvani. 
Tue Bund announces that Prof. Forel, of Morges, in the 
Canton of Vaud, has discovered a natural gallery which goes 
right across the lower portion of the glacier of Arolla, in the 
Eringerthal, in the Valais. It constitutes a natural grotto in 
the heart of the glacier, and was explored to a distance of 250 
metres (273 yards) by the Professor and some fellow-members of 
the Swiss Alpine Club from Geneva, Neuchatel, and the Canton 
of Vaud. The average width was from 6 to 10 metres, broaden- 
ing out here and there to fully 25 metres; the height varied 
from 2 to 3 metres, At the spot where the party stopped, the 
cayern divided into two galleries, the exploration of which they 
reserved for another time. The glacier was found to rest direct 
on the ground. 
AccorbiING to a Kimberley journal, Dr. Holub’s exploration 
party is making but little progress. The whole of the party had 
been down with the fever, which has been severe this year in 
the Zambezi region. 
THE captain of the steamer Avdangorm officially reports at 
Malta that at 1 p.m. on August 30, in clear, calm weather, when 
about 14 miles north of Galita, a small island between Sardinia 
and Tunis, he noticed that the eastern and highest peak of the 
island appeared to be in eruption, while smoke resembling that 
ascending from Mount Etna was ejected at intervals from the 
crater. 
THE Pioneer of Allahabad states that news dated last April 
has been received from Mr. Carey, who is travelling from Leh 
towards China. He was then at Lob Nor. His course from 
Leh was south-eastward into Western Tibet, and then due 
north to Khotan, whence he made the Tarim River. After an 
excursion northwards towards the Baba Kul Lake he returned 
to the Tarim River, and followed it to Lob Nor. He is said to 
have probably entered Northern China before now. 
One of the projects formed by M. Paul Bert before leaving 
France as Resident-General in Tonquin and Annam, was the 
