ON SECLUDED TRIBES OP UNCIVILIZED MEN. 327 



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lore they have had opportunities of intercourse with civilized men. 

 Some who have bordered on the dwellings of the civilized have evinced 

 a superior aptitude for learning the uses of certain mechanical appli- 

 ances, and, though still continuing savages, have appropriated the 

 inventions of civilization for the better prosecution of their savage 

 practices. Several such tribes, as, for example, the Maoris, have 

 proved themselves formidable antagonists to those who have possessed 

 all the advantages of a high civilization ; and this has been to a great 

 extent brought about by their adopting the implements and practi- 

 ces of warfare as used by civilized men. Other savages are differ- 

 ently affected by the inroads of civilization upon their borders- The 

 native Australian is endowed with a sort of pacific confidence in his 

 intercourse with the civilized races. He frequently visits the set- 

 tlements, but, being of a low type, as regards intellectual power, he 

 does not avail himself of the superior arts of the civilized man for his 

 own aggrandizement, yet can improve, by culture, in mental capa- 

 bilities. But even in the abyss of barbarism itself, there are degrees. 

 Some tribes are apparently of so low a standard of intellect that they 

 evince no disposition to form those social bonds which other men, 

 even in the savage state, generally adopt for their commou welfare, 

 or to profit by the opportunities afforded them of intercourse with 

 superior races. 



It is a very interesting fact that there exist, scattered throughout 

 the world, several detached, though, in general, inconsiderable bodies 

 of men, who have secluded themselves from intercourse with the rest 

 of their species, in a most determined manner. Whatever commu- 

 nication they have had either with other wild tribes or with civilized 

 men, has, for the most part, been forced upon them. Such has been 

 their habit of life from the earliest times of which we have any re- 

 cord of their existence. In the case of some of these tribes a proba- 

 ble cause has been adduced for this secluded condition ; and their 

 early history, interwoven with mythical narrations, has been referred 

 to in proof of their having been a fragment of a more considerable 

 body broken off by persecution or separated by migration from the 

 original mass. Although such tribes are to be found in different 

 regions and climates, yet in their habits, characteristics and persons 

 there is a general resemblance. For example, a majority of them 

 are to be found in regions which are very scantily supplied with the 

 means of supporting animal life. They are consequently, through 



