146 SYSTEM. 



species ; and from this connection, which nobody can con- 

 tradict as a means of investigation, there arises a farther proof 

 of the rank which we must give to man in the organic 

 series. " We must observe the living animal/' said M. Flou- 

 rens ; " we must observe him for a long time, and also both 

 sexes and all ages. We must study his nature, his instincts, 

 and his intellect. Each of these things has its own charac- 

 teristic in each animal, and it is by the whole of these character- 

 istics put together that species is denned." It is impossible 

 to trace in a better manner the anthropologists' task. 



When we have well studied a homogeneous centre of popu- 

 lation under all its aspects, when we have rendered an account 

 of its physiological, psychological, and philological character- 

 istics, we may stop; and without prejudging anything con- 

 cerning the area of this race, may then pass on to another 

 centre, which we shall notice in the same way, without 

 troubling ourselves with intermediary varieties, which will al- 

 ways be in a greater or lesser number wherever we do not 

 happen to meet with a physical barrier, like the sea or a chain 

 of mountains, which may separate the two centres which are to 

 be observed. Then we shall, doubtless, have numberless shades 

 and transitions ; but these are merely the phenomena of hy- 

 bridity, entirely secondary, and which ought not at all to in- 

 fluence our essays on anthropological classification. At a later 

 period, when we know more, we shall be able to review all 

 these intermediary varieties, when we understand their con- 

 ditions of existence better. In this manner we must take care 

 at the beginning to study certain countries, places of travel, 

 and meeting, to which all the neighbouring races have given 

 some portion of their blood. Such are most European coun- 

 tries, and such always was the Valley of the Nile and the Blue 

 Nile. The streets of Cairo are not only a picturesque spec- 

 tacle ; from thence did fitienne Geoffrey borrow his grand 

 views about the position of the genus homo in nature ; the man 

 of science profits here as much in his search after truth as the 

 artist in his search after the beautiful. 



Who can forget, even if he has only once seen it, this phan- 

 tasmagoria of customs and physiognomies which developes itself 



