42 SOUTH AMERICA— THE ANDES EEGIOXS. 



process may even be regarded as completed in all the more pojDulous districts of 

 Venezuela and Colombia, in certain parts of Peru, in north and central Chili, as 

 well as in Uruguay and along the banks of the Plate river. On the other hand, 

 nearly all the tribes of the eastern slopes of the Cordilleras, and in the great 

 Amazonian forests, have preserved their social characters by keeping entirely aloof 

 from the whites. 



Farther east, on the Guiana and Brazilian seaboards, the populations of mixed 

 origin again become dominant. But in these regions the process of miscege- 

 nation has taken place, not so much between the aborigines and the European 

 settlers, as between the latter and the Africans, descendants of formerly imported 

 slaves. In South America the strain of black blood increases in the direction 

 from west to east, and the coloured element even greatly predominates in the 

 Brazilian provinces which project nearest to the African continent. Full-blood 

 families, whether white or black, are scarcely met at all along this eastern 

 seaboard. 



Besides the blending of the white type on the one hand with that of the 

 Indians, on the other with that of the negroes, there occur, here and there, a 

 limited number of half-breeds, the direct issue either of native men and African 

 women, or of African men and native women. But as a rule the ethnical combina- 

 tions are much more complex than such mixtures as these. During the course of 

 the ten or twelve generations that have followed since the period of the conquest, 

 the fusion of the various elements has assumed an endlessly diversified aspect. 

 Although every individual half-breed may possibly be classified and denotated in 

 a general way by his complexion and more salient features, the proportions vary 

 beyond all calculation. 



This ethnological problem is further complicated by the phenomena of atavism, 

 in virtue of which the blends show a tendency to revert to one or other of the 

 original types. The question of miscegenation, everywhere so difficult, should 

 be studied especially in South America, where every town, village and hamlet in 

 the neighbourhood of every tribe presents "specimens" of every conceivable variety. 

 Attempts have been made to determine the comparative value of the results of 

 such and such crossings. Thus, according to D'Orbigny, the issues of unions 

 between different Indian races have always proved superior to either of the 

 original types. So also the progeny of white men and Guarani women is dis- 

 tinguished by noble features and fine figures, nearly always of white colour from 

 the outset, whereas Araucanian and Quichua mestizoes long preserve the cha- 

 racters of the native stock. 



The fusion of negroes with Guarani women appears highly favourable for the 

 physical improvement of the race. Other crossings are, on the contrary, regarded 

 as baneful, resulting, as is asserted, both in bodily and moral degradation. But 

 despite the facilities offered by the southern continent for the study of miscegena- 

 tion, the subject is still involved in much obscurity. The fact, however, remains 

 that, viewed as a whole, the population of South America is the most " human," 

 representing the most complete fusion of the most characteristic primitive 



