312 PSYCHOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION. [PART II. 



very slight one, the degeneracy of the population was nearly 

 the same. The assertion that the European alone is capable of 

 taking the initiative in civilization, and that the impulse 

 thereunto is a peculiarity of the race, must, after the quoted 

 facts, be considerably modified, for they prove at least that 

 the white man is not much less dependent on external cir- 

 cumstances in his progress towards civilization than the 

 black man. This is plainly shown when we consider man in 

 his individual capacity. 



The savage, though he may have lived for some time in 

 civilized society, is generally but superficially changed. Young 

 Australians brought up by Europeans have escaped to the woods 

 when grown up j 1 and similar instances are related of North 

 American Indians. In order not to draw erroneous conclu- 

 sions from such cases, we must consider that these individuals 

 could not fail to observe that they played but a sorry part 

 among the Whites ; perhaps, also, an instinctive impulse drove 

 them again to seek their freedom. Civilization is a state 

 which the uncultivated man, be he European or African, resists 

 with all his power, according to the law of inertia ; but it does 

 not irresistibly lead to the conclusion that savage peoples are 

 irreclaimable. If, on the one hand, the savage does not take 

 freely to civilization, though surrounded by it, we find, on the 

 other hand, that the civilized man, living among savages, re- 

 lapses after a short time into a state of barbarism, which, on 

 that account, we must consider as the primitive state of man. 

 In New Zealand, there are many such degenerate Europeans, 

 whose character and mode of life resemble those of the natives. 2 

 Numbers of such instances are to be met with in Australia and 

 North America; nor was it in many cases necessity, but a pre- 

 dilection for a roaming life ; it was free choice which made 

 these men return to barbarism. Towards the end of the 

 last century it very often happened that some Whites were 



1 Braim, " History of New South Wales," ii, p. 240, 1846. 



2 Mundy, " Our Antipodes," ii, p. 124, 1852 ; Polack, " New Zealand : being 

 a Narrative," i, p. 52, 1838; "Die Neuseeliinder nacli d. Engl.," p. 258, 1833. 

 Kay, in " Caffraria," p. 400, 1833. 



