278 TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



negro races of the South Sea, and the Indian 

 Archipelago, who, for the most part, are derived 

 from a mixture of various races, who, at so great 

 a distance from their native country, must expe- 

 rience considerable modification of the Ethiopic 

 character, yet still indicate, in every respect, 

 their African descent, rather than a nearer af- 

 finity with the other races. On the other hand, 

 the physiognomical characteristics of the Mon- 

 gol, Caucasian, Malay, and American races, blend 

 with each other through so many shades, that 

 we are involuntarily led to presume a common 

 fundamental type for all these, in opposition to the 

 Ethiopic, which perhaps is most strikingly marked 

 in the Mongol, and to which the abovementioned 

 various conformations must perhaps be referred as 

 so many forms of development occasioned by cli- 

 mate, as has been already asserted by a very dis- 

 tinguished writer on Universal History. Whether 

 such a change, proceeding from the aboriginal in- 

 habitants of Upper Asia, has really produced the 

 actually existing four chief varieties of the Mongol 

 as the oldest, then the American, the Malay, and 

 Caucasian, would be one of the most important 

 and interesting investigations for the study of an- 

 thropology, as well as the history of the revolutions 

 of the earth in general. 



Lieutenant-colonel Feldner had been already 

 several months at Santa Cruz, to direct the manufac- 

 tory of charcoal, which had been established there 

 for his majesty's account, and particularly for the 



