58 PHYSICAL INVESTIGATION. [PAET I. 



tlieir bodily condition, as compared with that of their allied 

 tribes, and their approximation to the brute creation, which 

 Lichtenstein has so vividly described, justifies us the more in 

 attributing it to their miserable mode of existence, since the 

 Bosjesmen on the Zuga river, and in the north-east of the 

 Ngami lake, who do not suffer from want, are strong and well 

 made, looking much better than those of the south in the 

 desert who speak the same language. 1 



In the same manner it can be shown that all peoples which 

 we find physically and morally in the lowest scale of humanity, 

 live in the deepest material misery. To this class belong the 

 aborigines of Tierra del Fuego and Australia. The former 

 inhabit a wild and rocky mountain-coast, which even obstructs 

 free motion, so that they are obliged to pass the greater por- 

 tion of their lives in their huts or in their boats ; hence their 

 crooked thin legs. 2 They suffer much from hunger and cold. 

 Notwithstanding their miserable appearance, it is highly proba- 

 ble that they belong to the powerful tribe of the Araucanians, 

 with whom, in respect of their bodily formation, D'Orbigny 

 classes them, whilst in their manners they resemble the Pata- 

 gonians, so unlike them in body. Attention has been directed 

 to the external resemblance of the people of Tierra del Fuego 

 to the Esquimaux, so that it may be imagined that climate and 

 mode of life induce a certain resemblance of physical forma- 

 tion. Australia is deficient in water and large wild animals. 

 Among the tribes of the natives those who are badly nourished 

 stand physically and mentally lowest. On proceeding from 

 Port Jackson northwards to Port Macquarie, Clarence, Moreton, 

 and Rockingham Bay, Port Essington, the natives are found 

 to be physically and mentally superior. 3 Those who live in the 

 eastern part of the interior are frequently exposed to hunger, 

 and feed but sparingly on kangaroos, whilst those who dwell 

 on the banks of the Lynd and Mitchell rivers, and near the 



1 Livingstone, Journal of the Royal Geog. Soc., xxi, p. 23, and xxii, p. 164. 



2 Wilkes's " Narrative of U. S. Expedition," i, p. 124, PMlad., 1845. 



3 Hodgson, " Reminiscences of Aust.," p. 254, 1846 ; King, " Narrative of 

 a Survey of the Intertropical and W. Coasts of Aust.," i, p. 1827, 203 ; Leich- 

 ardt, "Tageb. einer Landreise in Aust.," p. 415, 1851. 



