466 



OEIGIN AND DISTRIBUTION OF MAN. 



[Cii. XLIII. 





infinitely liis superiors in jDliysical force. '"^ But this difficulty 

 liad been met^ as before stated^ by assigning, as the original 



i 



8 



man, some island within the tropics, tree from 



Here man niav have remainprl for n r 



beasts of prey. Here 

 peculiar to a limited area, just as some of the large anthro- 

 pomorphous species are now restricted to one tropical island. 

 In such a situation, the new-born race might have lived in 

 security, though far more helpless than the New Holland 

 savages, and might have found abundance of vegetable food. 



Colonies may 



been sent forth from this 



mother country ,^ and then the peopling of the earth may have 

 proceeded according to the hypothesis before alluded to. 



In an early stage of society the necessity of hunting acts 

 as a principle of repulsion, causing men to spread with the 

 greatest rapidity over a country, until the whole is covered 

 with scattered settlements. It has been calculated that 

 800 acres of hunting-ground produce only as much food as 

 half an acre of arable land. When the p-aine has been in 



a great measure exhausted, and a state of pasturage suc- 



ceeds, the several hunter-tribes, being already scattered, may 

 multiply in a short time into the greatest number which the 



pastoral state is capable of sustaining. The necessity, says 

 Brand, thus imposed upon the two savage states, of dispersing 

 themselves far and wide over the country, affords a reason 

 why, at a very early period^ the worst parts of the earth may 

 have become inhabited. 



But this reason, it may be said, is only applicable in as far 

 as regards the peopling of a continuous continent; whereas 

 the smallest islands, however remote from continents, have 

 almost always been found inhabited by man. St. Helena, it 

 is true, afforded an exception ; for when that island was dis- 

 covered in 1501, it was only inhabited by sea-fowl, and occa- 

 sionally visited by seals and turtles. f The islands also of 

 Madeira, Mauritius, Bourbon, Pitcairns, and Juan rernandez, 

 and those of the Galapagos archipelago, one of which is 

 70 miles long, were uninhabited when first discovered, as 

 were also the Falkland Islands, which is still more remark- 



i 





V 



s 



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i 



4 



s \ 



f 



k 



5 



1 





1 



4 



^^ Sir II. Davy, Consolations In Tnivel, p. 74. 



t See p. 453. 



