The Human Race

225. – A CROW CHIEF.

“They also slit the cartilages and lobes of their ears, lengthen them, and insert little billets as ornaments. Those in the lip are principally worn by the women, though some of the men have adopted this fashion, which becomes more and more in vogue among both sexes as the coast is ascended northwards. The same may be said of the masks, which are to be found as far as among the Aloutis. All the women have not the lip pierced, and those who have do not carry the wooden ornament except on certain occasions, at settled periods, when they don full dress. They remove it when eating and sleeping or if they have to talk much, for there are plenty of words which cannot be pronounced with this inconvenient trinket.

“The lip is perforated at the earliest age, and the aperture thus formed, though almost imperceptible at first when the ‘barbote’ is taken out, is kept open and grows larger daily.”

The same traveller had the pleasure of again meeting the Crows, but as we have already spoken of the Indians of this tribe, we shall content ourselves with reproducing here his very picturesque costume of one of their chiefs (fig. 225).

Mr. Catlin twice visited the Mandan Indians in the course of the summer of 1832. The solitary village in which they were collected, to the number of two or three thousand, was on the left bank of the Missouri, at a distance of about 1400 miles from the city of St. Louis. Of medium stature, and comfortably clad in skins, all wore leathern leggings and mocassins elegantly embroidered with porcupine silk dyed in various colours.

Each man had his tunic and his mantle which he assumed or laid aside according to the temperature, and every woman her robe of deer or antelope skin. Many among them had a very fair skin, and their hair, which was silvery gray from childhood to old age, their light blue eyes and oval faces, doubtless testified to an infusion of white blood. Almost all the men adopted a curious fashion, peculiar to this tribe; their hair, long enough to reach the calf of their legs, was divided into matted locks, flattened and separated by hardened birdlime or by red or yellow clay.

North-Western Family

The Indian tribes composing the North-Western family of the North American Branch, are less warlike and cruel than those of the east. They take no scalps. Their stature is not so tall, their face broader, their eyes more sunken, and their complexion browner. M. d’Omalius d’Halloy cites in this group the Koliouges (from 60° to 50° N. lat.), the Wakisches or Nootkans (Island of Nootka and neighbouring coasts), the Chinooks (mouth of the Oregon), and the Tularenos, or Indians of California.

A detailed description of these different American tribes would be devoid of interest; in fact, we should be only able to repeat with but little alteration what has been said in previous pages concerning the manners, habits, customs, &c., of the last remaining savages who still people the interior of the North American forests.

In connection with the aboriginal inhabitants of California, we must direct the reader’s attention to the fact, that the Californians have a skin of such a deep reddish-brown that it seems black. This colour is certainly exceptional among the primitive inhabitants of America, but the characteristic is so pronounced in the present instance, that we felt that we could not avoid pointing it out, although it may be opposed to the classification which we have adopted, placing in the Red Race all members of the human family proper to America. This exception is one of the inconveniences of classification to which we must submit, without however endeavouring to conceal it.

THE BLACK RACE

The Black Race, as considered in the various peoples constituting its type, is distinguished by its short and woolly hair, compressed skull, flattened nose, prominent jaws, thick lips, bowed legs, and black or dark brown skin. Its members are confined to the central and southern regions of Africa and the southern parts of Asia and Oceania. The blacks found in America are the descendants of African slaves transported into the New World by Europeans.

The peoples belonging to the Black Race present great variations. Some have the type altogether peculiar to the Race we have just characterized, while others show a tendency to approach the Yellow and the White Races. The inhabitants of Guinea and Congo are quite black, but the Caffres are only excessively brown and resemble Abyssinians. The Hottentots and Bushmen are yellowish, like the Chinese, though at the same time possessing the features and physiognomy of the Negro.

As striking varieties are, therefore, observable in the Black Race as in the White, and a rigorous classification of it is consequently very difficult to establish; but as we coincide in that which has been suggested by M. d’Omalius d’Halloy, we shall separate the Black Race into two divisions, the Western and the Eastern Branches.

CHAPTER I.
WESTERN BRANCH

We shall notice three families in the Western Branch of the Black Race, those of the Caffres, Hottentots, and Negroes. These general groups comprise an immense number of tribes, many of them still unknown, constituting a population of about fifty-two millions.

Caffre Family

The Caffres who inhabit the south-east of Africa form, so to speak, the stepping-stone or intermedium between the brown and the black nations. Their hair is woolly, but their complexion is not so dark nor their nose so flat as those of a Negro. Possessing more aptitude for civilization than the other black races, they are associated together in large communities, each of which obeys a chief, and though half wandering in their habits, occupy some very populous towns, of considerable extent, and resembling vast camps. Their clothing is very scanty, being reduced in the men’s case almost to a cloak, whilst the women are better covered in leathern garments.

The Caffres have great herds of cattle and devote themselves to agriculture. They cultivate maize, millet, beans and watermelons; make bread and beer, and manufacture earthenware, are able to utilize metals, employ iron and copper, and know how to turn both into tools and ornaments. They believe in a Supreme Being as well as in the immortality of the soul, but pervert their religious sentiments by divers superstitions.

The various tribes of this great family possess physical characteristics in common which are not to be found in other African nations. Caffres are far taller and stronger; they have well-proportioned limbs, a brown skin, black and woolly hair; the elevated forehead and the projecting nose of the European with the thick lips of the Negro, and the high prominent cheekbones of the Hottentot. Their language is sonorous, sweet, and harmonious, with a rumbling in its pronunciation.

226. – A CAFFRE.

We class with this family:

1. The Southern Caffres, who include the Amakisas, Amathymbas, or Tamboukis, Amapendas, and other tribes;

2. The Amazulas, Vatwas, and some other warlike wandering hordes who have lately advanced southward into the interior;

3. The inhabitants of Delagoa Bay, who bear a closer resemblance to the Negroes;

4. The Bechuanas and all the numerous tribes situated towards the north and in the interior, speaking a language of their own, called Sichuana.

227. – NATIVE OF THE MOZAMBIQUE COAST.

The Bechuana nations are the most advanced of these four groups. The traveller Livingstone, who made a long stay in their country, has given excellent descriptions of them in his “Expedition to the Zambesi.” They have made progress in arts and civilization, inhabit large towns, have well-built houses, till the soil, and know how to preserve one year’s crop until the next. Their features tend towards an approach to those of Europeans.

In the region of the Tammahas, not far from Marhow, a town of ten thousand inhabitants, fields of corn several hundred acres in extent, testify to a rather forward state of agriculture and industry.

The Maratsi cultivate sugar and tobacco, make knives and razors, construct their houses in masonry, and ornament them with pilasters and mouldings.

We must also affiliate to the Caffres, the inhabitants of the Mozambique coast, that is to say, that portion of the east coast of Africa between the mouth of the Zambesi and Cape Delgado. Fig. 227 represents a typical native of this district.

Hottentot Family

The Hottentots, whom the Dutch colonists call Bosjesmans or Bushmen, inhabit the southern extremity of the continent. Their skin is of a dark yellowish hue, and it is only in consequence of their features and conformation, which are those of Negroes, that the Hottentots are placed in the Black Race, for if their colour is considered, they should be ranked in the Yellow one.

Prior to the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope by European navigators, the Hottentots formed a numerous people, whose little tribes lived happily and tranquilly under the patriarchal rule of their chiefs or elders. Composed of from three to four hundred individuals only, these hordes roved about with their flocks and assembled in villages, the houses of which being constructed of branches of trees and reed mats, were taken asunder on the signal of departure, and removed by oxen to the site of the new encampment selected by the chief. The wildest of them had for covering a cloak of sheepskins sewn together, and their weapons were a bow and poisoned arrows. This people were active and intrepid hunters, and they found an opportunity of proving to the Europeans that they were brave in war. Their cruel invaders, the Dutch, exterminated the majority of these tribes, others were violently divested of their possessions and hurled back into the forests or the deserts, where their wretched descendants still live.

The Hottentots or Bushmen seem to be the lowest of mankind, as much by their physical characteristics as by the inferiority of their intelligence. They are of small stature, yellowish complexion, and repulsive countenance. Prominent foreheads, small sunken eyes, extremely flat noses, and thick projecting lips, form the distinctive features of their face. In consequence of their miserable state of existence, they become worn out and decrepit early in life. They delight in personal adornment, and deck ears, arms, and legs with beads, and with iron, copper, or brass rings. The women colour the whole or part of their faces; for all covering, they throw over their shoulders a kind of sheepskin mantle.

228. – THE HOTTENTOT VENUS.

We give here (fig. 228), as an accurate specimen of the Hottentot race, the portrait (from a cast in the French Museum of Natural History) of a woman of that country, who died at Paris in 1828, and who was known by the name of “The Hottentot Venus.” The physical specialty which rendered her remarkable, and which consisted in a considerable development of the posterior muscles, was merely an individual anomaly, and does not permit of any general conclusion being drawn from it as a characteristic of the Hottentot race. The skeleton of this female is preserved entire in the Museum, where a cast of the whole body, coloured as in life, may also be seen.

The Bushman’s dwelling is a low hut or a circular cavity. They formerly lived in a species of natural caves among the rocks, and a few individuals, even to the present day, occupy these same dens, which convey to us a perfect idea of man’s habitations at the time of his first appearance on the globe.

These wild beings have never been seen engaged in any other occupation than that of making or repairing their weapons and their barbed or poisoned arrows. In times of scarcity, they eat herb-roots, ants’ eggs, locusts, and snakes. Their language is a mixture of chattering, hissing, and nasal grunts.

As regards physical type, the Hottentots are small, but well-proportioned, and erect without being muscular. They are generally extremely ugly. Their nose is usually flat, their eyes long and narrow, very wide apart from each other and with the inner angle rounded as among the Chinese, whom the Hottentots resemble besides in some other respects. Their cheekbones are high set and very prominent, and form almost an equilateral triangle with their sharp-pointed chin. Their teeth are very white. The women sometimes possess pleasing figures in early youth, but later on their breasts lengthen immoderately, their stomach becomes protuberant, and sometimes the hind part of their body is covered with an enormous mass of fat. This inclination was visible to an exaggerated excess in the case of the “Hottentot Venus;” but as we have said, she merely constituted an individual exception, and it would be erroneous to set it down as a general characteristic of the whole Hottentot family.

Negro Family

The Negroes occupy a large part of Central and Southern Africa. Senegambia, Guinea, a portion of the western Soudan, the coast of Congo, along with the immense extent of country, as yet almost entirely unknown, which is comprised between Congo on the west and the coasts of Mozambique and Zanzibar on the east, are the dwelling-places of the Negroes, properly so called.

Guinea and Congo are the classic homes of the Negro. There live the representatives of this race, with the most characteristic and repulsive features. The belief is, that, as the incursions of Asiatic and European populations into Africa were always effected by the Isthmus of Suez and the Red Sea, the aboriginal blacks were thrust back more and more towards the west of the continent. The inhabitants of Guinea and Congo would consequently be the descendants and contemporary representatives of the primitive black stock.

Negroes are also to be found in the numerous islands of the Southern Ocean; New Guinea, New Britain, New Caledonia, Australia, Madagascar, &c., &c. In the last named large island, a vast Negro kingdom is in existence, governed by a queen, who sent ambassadors to England and France at the commencement of the present century. Finally, there are Negroes in the United States, and in the West Indies. From 1848, when slavery was declared abolished in the French possessions, the blacks have been free in those colonies, and the gradual emancipation of the Negroes which has taken place since, both in the American and Spanish territories, has completely relieved them from bondage.

We proceed to study the Negroes, firstly as regards organization, and then from the intellectual and moral stand-point.

The physiognomy of the Negro is so strongly distinctive that it is impossible not to recognize it at the first glance, even if the individual should have a fair skin. His protruding lips, low forehead, projecting teeth, woolly and half-frizzled hair, thin beard, broad, flat nose, retreating chin, and round eyes, give him a peculiar look amongst all other human races. Several are bow-legged, almost all have but little calf, half-bent knees, the body stooped forward, and a tired gait.

The masticatory muscles are more powerful in the Negro than in the White, on account of the greater length of the jaw. Their occiput is flatter than that of the White, and the great occipital hole placed further back. Dr. Madden has noticed skeletons of Negroes in Upper Egypt, showing six lumbar vertebræ instead of five, a fact which explains the length of their loins and shambling gait. The hips are less prominent than in a white man. We may add that in this race the trunk is not so broad as in the other human families, the arms are slightly longer in proportion, and the legs rather perceptibly bent, with flat and high placed calves.

The bones of the skull and those of the body are thicker and harder than in the other races.

The bony cavity of the pelvis is much narrower in the Negro than in the European, but it is broader towards the os sacrum, which renders delivery easy to a Negress. Accurate measurements show the upper portion of the pelvis to be a fourth wider in the European than in the Negro.

The thighs also differ in the Negro and the White, being very perceptibly flattened in the former.

The foot participates in this general ugliness of the limbs. Flat feet, which are sufficient to exempt from military service among the French, are not only no deformity in the Negro, but a normal characteristic. Instead of forming that curve which imparts elasticity to the whole frame, the under part of the Negro’s foot is flat, thus rendering it less fitted to support the body on marches. So apparent is this malformation in the black, that they say of him in America, “The sole of his foot makes a hole in the sand;” and it is easy, in consequence, to distinguish by a mere look the footprint of an European from that of a Negro. The first only shows the marks of the toes and heel, while the other is the impress of the entire sole, from one end to the other. Besides, the foot of the Negro is large and narrow, with wide divisions between the toes, while the nails are so sharp and pointed, that they resemble claws.

The complexion of the skin is one of the most apparent, though not most characteristic, attributes of the Negro race. The belief was long entertained that the colour of the blacks resulted from the prolonged action of the sun on their bodies, but observation has shown that such is not the case, and that their extremely dark hue by no means depends either on the intensity or brilliancy of the solar rays. White men are to be found in the central parts of Africa, in the Soudan and the Sahara, for instance, as well as among the Touaricks, whilst black tribes exist in countries subject to the most rigorous cold, such as Van Diemen’s Land, and New Zealand. In another direction, too, quite close to the white Icelanders and Norwegians, people with very dark skins may be seen, like the Laplanders; and in California, a country of cold latitude, the aborigines are, as we have stated, almost black.

The black colour resides in an oily, greasy principle, termed pigmentum nigrum (black pigment), which is deposited in a layer in the mucous tissue on the cuticle. This penetrates into the hair, dyeing it black, and diffuses itself throughout the entire system even to the membranes surrounding the brain. This black mucous net-work appears to protect the skin from the violent action of an African sun, and preserves it from those inflammations which are called sun-strokes in our climate.

229. – A ZANZIBAR NEGRO.

Crossing with the White gradually diminishes the Negro’s colour, and in proportion to the preponderance of black or white in its progenitors, the offspring presents various gradations of complexion. The following are the names which according to Valmont de Bomaire are given in the colonies to the issue of the union of the two races: 1. The child of a white man and a Negress, or of a Negro and a white woman, is called a mulatto, who is neither black nor white, but of a blackish yellow hue, and who has short and frizzly black hair. 2. The offspring of a white man and a mulatto woman, or of a Negro and a mulatto woman, is termed a quadroon, who, as regards colour, is a mixture of three-quarters white with one-quarter black, or three-quarters black with one-quarter white. In the first case the complexion is fairer; in the second, darker than that of a mulatto. 3. A white man and a fair quadroon, or a Negro and a dark quadroon produce an octoroon, seven-eighths white and one-eighth black, or seven-eighths black and one-eighth white. 4. The child of a White and an octoroon, or of a Negro and a dark octoroon, is in the one case almost entirely white, in the other, nearly quite black.

Valmont de Bomaire adds, that in succeeding mixed generations (the union with the white man taking place in Europe, and that with the black man, in Senegal) the complexion would grow lighter or darker, until at last a white or a black being was brought into the world. Such is the course of physical influences and the causes of deterioration or relapse in the colour of the human species. Only four or five generations of mixed blood are required in order to render the Negro stock white, and no more are wanted to make the white black. The union of a mulatto with a quadroon or octoroon woman will produce, as may be understood, other hues approaching to white or black in proportion to the progression described above. The progeny of a black and a quadroon is termed “saltatras” in the colonies; the word signifies “a leap-backwards” or a return towards the black race.

Crossings of the Negro with individuals of the Yellow or Red Races, with Asiatic Indians or American red-skins, beget offspring of varied shades of colour, bearing different designations according to the countries. These men of colour are seen in many islands of Polynesia. Possessing neither the intelligence of whites nor the submissiveness of blacks, despised by the former and hated by the latter, they constitute an equivocal caste, with no settled position, and less disposed to labour than revolt.

The colour of his skin takes away all charm from the Negro’s countenance. What renders the European’s face pleasing is that each of its features exhibits a particular shade. The cheeks, forehead, nose, and chin of the White have each a different tinge. On the contrary all is black on an African visage, even the eyebrows, as inky as the rest, are merged in the general colour; scarcely another shade is perceptible, except at the line where the lips join each other.

The skin of Negroes is very porous, so much so that the pores show visibly; but it is far from hard in all cases, being in some instances quite the reverse, smooth, satiny, and extremely soft to the touch.

The most unpleasant thing about a Negro’s skin is the nauseous odour it emits when the individual is heated by perspiration or exercise; these emanations are as hard to endure as those which some animals exhale.

A Negro’s hair is quite peculiar. Whilst that of a White is cylindrical, the Black man’s is flat. It is also short and crisp, like the wool of a sheep, and in contradistinction to the abundant supply of Europeans, the women among whom can even trail their locks on the ground, it only attains the length of a few inches. The beard, also, is very scanty and scarcely covers the upper lip.

The eye of the Negro differs also from that of the white; the iris is so dark as almost to be confounded with the black of the pupil. In the European, the colour of the iris is so strongly marked as to render at once perceptible whether the person has black, blue, or grey eyes. Nothing similar in the case of the Negro, where all parts of the eye are blended in the same hue. Add to this that the white of the eye is always suffused with yellow in the Negro, and you will understand how this organ, which contributes so powerfully to give life to the countenance of the White, is invariably dull and expressionless in the Black Race.

Nature adapts the Negro to the torrid countries he inhabits. His constitution is in general lymphatic and lethargic. His slow, sluggish gait and invincible laziness provoke Europeans, who cannot understand so much indolence. The relaxation of the limbs of the Negro betrays itself by his inertia and drowsiness, as well as by the flabby flesh of the women (Fig. 230).

Negroes are much less subject than Europeans to the influence of stimulants. The strongest spirit, rum, pepper, the most irritant spices, only feebly rouse their inert palate. Their soft, thick, oily skin, smooth and hairless, is encrusted beneath the epidermis, as we have said, with a black mucous deposit which gives it its colour. This viscid film envelopes the nervous ramifications beneath the cuticle, thus blunting the sensibility. The fine and delicate skin of the European experiences horrible torture under the lash; but even when he is torn by leathern thongs, the bleeding weals of which are sometimes, in an excess of barbarity, rubbed with pepper and vinegar, the Negro supports this cruel usage with indifference. Some blacks are seen joining the dance after this punishment, as if nothing had happened.

Before speaking of the brain and understanding of the Negro, we should make some remarks on the facial angle observed in this race. We have said that a relatively exact judgment may be formed from the size of this angle as to the value of a race of mankind, from the intellectual point of view.¹⁰ The more obtuse the angle, the greater indication does it afford of noble and lofty sentiments; the smaller it is, the nearer the head approaches to that of animals. A prominent forehead is the sign of a developed intellect, whilst protruding jaws reveal brute instincts. Consequently, the facial angle increases or diminishes according as the forehead or the jaws project forward. The facial angle of Europeans is about 76¹⁄₂ degrees, sometimes reaching 81. An angle of 90 degrees, that is to say a right angle, is found in the ancient statues of Greece. But by reason of his retreating forehead and prominent jaws the Negro only exhibits a facial angle of from 61¹⁄₄ to 63 degrees, approaching that of the monkey, which in those of the species to which the orang-outang and gorilla belong, is of 45 degrees.

This proportionate weakness of intelligence, revealed to us by the smallness of the facial angle in the Negro, is confirmed by an examination of his brain. The labours of anatomists of our own day have established that not only is it the bulk of the brain which corresponds relatively with intellectual activity, but that the genuine indication revealing the superiority of mind in man consists in the number and depth of the furrows or circumvolutions of the brain. Now the outlines and windings of the cerebral mass in the European are so numerous and deep that they can scarcely be measured, whilst the complications in the head of the black are, as regards the same qualities, less by one half. The brain of a Negro is also perceptibly smaller than that of a White. It is the front part especially, that is to say the cerebral lobes, which is so much larger in the European, and hence the fine arch of the forehead peculiar to the White or Caucasian race.

230. – ZANZIBAR NEGRESSES.

The intellectual inferiority of the Negro is readable in his countenance, devoid of expression and mobility. The black man is a child, and like a child he is impressionable, fickle, easily affected by good treatment, and capable of self-devotion, but capable also of hatred in some cases, as well as of working out his revenge. The people of the Black Race living in a free condition in the interior of Africa, demonstrate by their habits and the state of their mind that they can hardly get beyond the level of tribe life; and on the other hand such difficulty is experienced in many colonies, in endeavouring to induce the Negroes (so indispensable has the guardianship of Europeans become to them) to maintain among themselves the benefits of civilization, that the inferiority of their intelligence, compared with that of the rest of mankind, is a fact not to be disputed.

Several instances might doubtless be adduced of Negroes who have surpassed Europeans by their capacity of mind. Generals Toussaint Louverture, Christofle, and Dessalines were no ordinary men, and Blumenbach has preserved to us the names of many illustrious blacks, among whom he mentions Jacob Captain, whose sermons, and theological writings, in Latin and Dutch, are truly remarkable. It is not from individual cases, however, but from the whole, that a judgment must be arrived at, and experience has proved that the Negroes are inferior in intelligence to all known races, not even excepting the savage people of America and the Oceanian islands.

The Negro tribes would be excessively numerous if their children lived, but negligence and laziness cause a notable proportion of their offspring to perish. The continual wars, too, in which they indulge against each other, equally impede the spread of their species, and notwithstanding the fertility of the soil in a great part of Africa, the improvidence and carelessness of the natives bring on real famines which decimate their numbers.

Another cause of depopulation that happily becomes less important every day is the trade which the blacks themselves are most eager to keep up. They sell their children for a packet of beads or for a few flasks of “fire-water.”

Thought grows sad as it carries itself back to the time, not yet very remote, when Negro traffic and slavery, which to-day form the exception, were the universal rule along the whole coast of Western Africa. Negroes then were torn ruthlessly from their country and transported to other climes to be reduced to bondage, or in other words to sacrifice life and strength for their master, and in serving him, to exhaust themselves by toil without gaining as much pity as is extended to beasts of burden. With our animals, in fact, repose succeeds fatigue and food restores vigour; whilst, in colonies subject to Europeans, dread of punishment, the lash, and the most shocking usage, subdued the Negro to forced labour.

This horrible traffic having excited universal indignation for half a century, most States decreed its abolition. France by laws passed between the years 1814 and 1848, definitively emancipated the slaves in all her possessions, and since 1860 or so, almost the whole of America has followed this example. Cruisers are now kept permanently on the coasts of Africa both by England and France, which renders the slave trade, if not impossible, at least difficult and dangerous for the grasping, barbarous men who are not afraid to devote themselves to it still.

This commerce, against which European nations have effected so much, nevertheless, reckons as its partizans the Negroes themselves. The tribes are, in fact, incessantly waging war on each other in order to take prisoners and sell them to the traders who pay prohibited visits to their shores. Even now, convoys of captives, chained together by means of forked sticks, are too often to be seen traversing the forests on their way to a slave-ship moored in some unfrequented creek.