230 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



epithet of outcast ; the marked unceasing 1 proof of a t urse, as 

 old as the origin of society, not even deserving human forbear- 

 ance ! and true it is, that the worst slavery is his lot, even at 

 home, for he is there exposed to the constant peril of becoming 

 also a victim, slaughtered with the most revolting torments.* 

 Tyrant of his blood, he traffics in slavery as it were mer- 

 chandise ; makes war purposely to capture neighbors, and sells 

 even his own wives and children. 



A second stem of the typical group is the eastern tropical 

 or Samang, which we shall continue to denominate Papua, 

 notwithstanding recent investigations have endeavored to con- 

 fine this name to a more hybrid population of the Australian 

 islands. It is in general greatly intermixed with Hindoo, 

 Mongolic, and Malay blood ; and in comparatively few locali- 

 ties sufficiently pure to retain the close crisp woolly scalp 

 which is the most decisive criterion of the fact ; for, so soon 

 as, in any warm climate, there is foreign alliance, the wool 

 becomes bushy, and rises into a huge round mop; and, if there 

 be still greater connection, it droops, and gradually turns into 

 incipient curls. By this token the amount of adulteration 

 may be traced, independent of the color of the skin, with per- 

 haps no exceptions, although it is true that there is in some 

 cases a tendency to variation, in the offspring taking, in one 

 birth, a more decisive maternal character, and perhaps in the 

 next a paternal, even to the extent of modifying the hair, par- 

 ticularly between true Negroes and hard lank-haired South 

 Americans of the Austral-Malay cast of structure. These 

 remarks show that the earlier Egyptians had only a casual 

 knowledge of the true Negro populations ; for, when these 

 were first noticed, they occupied, it seems, the high lands 

 behind the east coast of Africa ; and the ages they may have 

 nestled in the central regions, without further progress west- 



* See Bowdich's Mission to Ashantee. 



