ANTHROPOLOGY. 
109 
Both as a matter of anthropology and of practical politics, the 
suitability of particular races to particular climates is of great interest; 
sometimes this depends on one race being free from a disease from which 
another suffers, as in the well-known immunity of negroes from yellow 
fever. Or it may be evident that tribes have become acclimatised, so as 
to resist influences which are deadly to strangers; for instance, the 
Khonds flourish in the hills of Orissa, where not only Europeans but 
the Hindus of the plains sicken of the malaria in the unhealthy season. 
That such peculiarities of constitution are inherited and pass into the 
nature of the race, is one of the keys to the obscure problem of the 
origins of the various races of man as connected with their spread over 
the globe. As yet this problem has not passed much beyond the stage of 
collecting information, and no pains should be spared to get at facts thus 
bearing on the history and development of the human species. European 
medical men in districts inhabited by uncivilised races have often made 
important observations of this kind, which they are glad to communicate, 
though being occupied with professional work they do not follow them 
up. In all races there occur abnormal varieties, which should be ob¬ 
served with reference to their being hereditary, such as Albinos, whose 
dead-whiteness is due to absence of pigment from the skin. Even such 
tendencies as that to the occurrence of red hair where the ordinary 
hue is black, or to melanism or diseased darkening of the skin, are worth 
remark. It is essential to discover how far these descend from parents 
to children, which is not the case with such alterations as that of the 
Chinese feet, which, in spite of generations of cramping, continue of the 
natural shape in the children. 
Language .—Before coming to actual language, remark may be made on 
the natural communication of all races carried on by pantomimic signs 
without spoken words. This is the “ gesture language ” to which we are 
accustomed among the deaf-and-dumb, and which sometimes also comes 
into practical use between tribes ignorant of one another’s languages, as 
on the American prairies. It is so far the same in principle everywhere, 
that the explorer visiting a new tribe, having to make frequent use of 
signs to supplement his interpreter, or to eke out his own scanty know¬ 
ledge of the native language, soon adapts himself to the particular signs 
in vogue. He will observe that, as to most common signs, such as asking 
for food or drink, or beckoning or warning otf a stranger, he understands 
