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HYBRIDITY AND ABSORPTION IN RELATION 

 TO THE RED INDIAN RACE. 



BY DANIEL WILSON, LL.D., P.R.S.B. 



The progress of maritime enterprise in modern centuries lias 

 brought about a collision between civilized and savage races, in 

 which the inevitable extinction of the latter appears to be involved. 

 The Esquimaux may still survive in his arctic retreat, and the 

 wretched Fuegian remain unmolested in the desolate region which 

 he inhabits ; but wherever there is an adequate temptation to settle- 

 ment, the progress of colonization involves the disappearance of the 

 inferior races. Yet the disparity is, with some at least, rather that 

 of childhood as compared with maturity, than any essential inferiority. 

 Some of the savage races, thus recognized as doomed to speedy extir- 

 pation, are indeed so deficient alike in physical and intellectual attri- 

 butes, that the most sensitive jDhilanthropy must recognize their fate 

 as inevitable. But there are others, such as the Maories of New 

 Zealand, who manifest traits of intellectual aptitude, and so great a 

 capacity for progress, that their extinction seems to involve the loss 

 of a hopeful element in the progress of humanity. 



Yet it is the more vigorous and impulsive among the undeveloped 

 races that appear to be doomed to speedy extinction; while docile, 

 passive ones, like the Malay and the Negro, continiie to multiply 

 in numbers, and seem destined to survive as servile races, well 

 adapted to be the tillers of the soil under the rule of European 

 masters. 



The American Indian is inferior m apparent aptitude for civiliza- 

 tion, to the Maori, and lacks all the passive endurance or docility of 

 the Negro or Malay. Yet he, too, manifests physical and intellec- ■ 

 tual traits far above those of the lowest savage races ; and the abun- 

 dant evidences of an ancient native civilization in difi"erent centres 

 both of North and South America, justify regret at the inevitable 

 extinction of races that seemed to await a historical future of their 

 own, when the intrusive civilization of Europe arrested their progress. 



