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THE
NATURAL HISTORY

OF

MAN.

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INQUIRIES INTO THE MODIFYIN I FLUENCE OF
PHYSICAL AND MORAL AGENCIES

ON THE DIFFERENT TRIBES OF THE HUMAN FAMILY.

BY

JAMES COWLES BRIGHARD, M.D. F.R.S. M.R.I.A.

PRESIDENT OF THE ETHNOLOGICAL SOCIETY,
CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE,
AND OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF MEDICINE, AND OF THE STATISTICAL SOCIETY, OF FRANCE,
MEMBER OF THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY; ETC.

I drama) iﬁhitiun, 313nm anti Enlarger: by
EDWIN NORRIS,

OF THE ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

ILLUSTRATED WITH SIXTY TWO COLOURED PLATES ENGRAVED ON STEEL,

AND ONE HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS 0N WOOD.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

I 15.3
A. ’%
Library.

01: OauW'

    
     

VOL. II.

L()III)()II:

H. BAILLIERE, PUBLISHER, 219, REGENT STREET,
and 290, BROADWAY, NEW YORK, U.S.
PARIS: J. B. BAILLIERE, LIBRAIRE, RUE HAUTEFEUILLE.
MADRID: BAILLY BAILLIERE, CALLE DEL PRINCIPE.

1855.

 

18 5:2
’7
V no
G O N T E N T S.
BOOK II.
DIVISION INTO GROUPS.
CHAPTER XVI. (continued.)
PAGE
SouthAfricannations.......... .. 343

CHAPTER XVII.

Of the relationship between the different branches of the great South
African race .......................................... 408

CHAPTER XVIII.

0f the Pelagian races. 1. Malayo-Polynesian race. 2. Pelagian
Negroes. 3. Alforas .................................. 427

CHAPTER XIX.
Malaya-Polynesian race .................................... 432

CHAPTERXX.
ThePelagianNegroes...................................... 459

CHAPTER XXI.
0f the Alforian race

CHAPTER XXII.

Of the native races of America—Collective survey .............. 494

Vi ' CONTENTS or VOL. II.

CHAPTER XXIII.

PAGE
Inhabitants of Central America. 1. Race of Toltecas, Chichimecas,

Aztecas 506
CHAPTER XXIV.

0f the Esquimaux, or Karalit .............................. 516
CHAPTER XXV.

Athapascas, or Chepewyans ....... ‘. ........................ 518
CHAPTER XXVI.

The great Algonquin-Lenape and Iroquois races . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 520

CHAPTER XXVII.

Of the Alleghanian races, or nations living to the southward of the
Lenape and Iroquois .................................. 532

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Of the native American races to the westward of the Mississippi. . 538

CHAPTER XXIX.

Of the native American races on the coast of the Paciﬁc Ocean. 1.
Black tribes of California. 2. Tribes on the Columbia River.
3. Whiteraceofthenortherncoast .. 551

CHAPTER XXX.

Of the South American races.~—General Remarks—Classiﬁcation. . 586

CHAPTER XXXI.
Of the Alpine nations of South America, or the Andian family . . . . 594

CHAPTER XXXII.

Mediterranean group of South American nations ................ 618

CHAPTER XXXIII.

The Brasilio-Guarani, or eastern nations of South America ........ 632

 

CONTENTS or VOL. II. vii

BOOK III.

CONCLUSIONS.

CHAPTER I.
FAG E
General observations deduced from the preceding survey of human
races .. 644
CHAPTER II.
Physiological comparison of human races . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 648

CHAPTER III. A

Comparison of human races with respect to mental endowments . . . . 657

CHAPTER IV.

Psychological View of the native races of America .............. 663
CHAPTER V.

Psychological history of the African nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 683
CHAPTER VI.

Psychological traits of the Negro nations in Western Africa . . . . . . 694

Conclusion .............................................. 712

an
H
~> 1

Index .

 

NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. ‘

BOOK ll.

CHAPTER XVI.

OF THE SAABIAN OR LESSER SOUTH AFRICAN RACE, INCLUDING
THE HOTTENTOTS AND THE BUSHMEN.

THE people called by Europeans Hottentots and Bushmen
are said to have among themselves the national appellation
of Saabs or Saaps. Quaiquae is another name which be-
longs to them generally, and one syllable of this doubtless
plural word seems to enter into the epithets of particular
tribes of Hottentots, as Namaaqua, Gonaaqua. The
origin of the word Hottentot is uncertain; it is probably
a corruption of Houteniqua, the name of a particular tribe
now extinct, or, at least, unknown. Dampier wrote the
name of these people Hodmadods, instead of Hottentots.
There was a tribe formerly termed Sonquas, and the Bush-
men were termed in some old accounts Sonqua Hottentots.

The Hottentots are a most singular race of peeple ;
they are the primeval inhabitants of a country which, in
its aspect and in all its productions, is equally singular,
and displays phenomena, both in the animal and vegetable
kingdoms, not elsewhere seen. The region of the world
which it most nearly resembles, in all organised produc-
tions as well as in the dryness of its soil, is the great
island of Australia. The high plain of Central Africa

VOL. II. A A*

344 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

terminates to the southward in the plateau of the Gariep
or Orange River, and hence the surface of the land de-
clines towards the southern coast, not subsiding by a '
gentle and unbroken slope, or sinking precipitately by
a sudden fall, but, like almost all the other table-lands
which extend through the interior of great continents,
by successive steps, or by a series of terrasses, each lower
than the other, and all separated from each other by long
elevated ridges, becoming in some parts high mountain-
chains, which run like transverse walls almost across the
south of Africa, from east to west.* The longest and
the most elevated of them may be considered as the southern
boundary of the plateau or domain of the Gariep. It
bears in different parts the names of Nieuwbergen, Sneuw-
bergen, and Winterberg, and under the last name attains
the height of 6000 feet. To the southward of this chain ,
the dry and barren plains of the Great Karroo extend,
though seventy or eighty miles in breadth, and are
bounded farther south by the Zwarteberg, another trans-
verse chain, which becomes the northern wall of a second
terrass of lower level, and narrower than the Karroo.
This longitudinal valley is the Lange-Kloof. The last
range towards the south is formed by the Zwellendam,
Outeniqua, and Zitzikamma Mountains, which cut off a
littoral terrass, still of considerable elevation, stretching
east and west from Algoa Bay to the Stormy Cape, and
facing, like a great bulwark, the ocean of the Southern
Pole. The interior of these regions consists, in many
parts, of arid plains; there are also fertile valleys and ﬁne
pasture-grounds, and, in other parts, forests of consider-

 

* I have abstracted this short survey of the geographical direction of
South Africa from Ritter’s admirable outline in the “ Erdkunde,” adding
many particulars from the excellent description of Mr. Bunbury, given
in his “ Journey to the Country of the Damaras.” This traveller has
evidently described from his own observation, and he appears not to have
read the description given in the Erdkunde; yet he conﬁrms the luminous
views of the great geographer Bitter in almost every particular, and ﬁlls
up his outline by additional observations.

CH. xv1.] HOTTENTOTS AND BUSHMEN. 345

able extent. In the deeper valleys are the channels of
numerous streams, many of which are dry during apart of
the year. The great river-system of the plateau is the
Gariep, which in its length and direction has been com-
pared to the Senegal. Unlike the other rivers of Africa,
it scarcely fertilises its banks, which consist of bare and
barren hills, surrounded by plains of yellow sand. South
Africa is the region of a most peculiar vegetation, abound-
ing in beautiful heaths and proteaceae, aloés, euphorbias,
and innumerable ﬂowering shrubs, which, in their general
forms, though not by identity of species, bear, as De Can-
dolle and others have observed, a striking resemblance to
the botany of Tasmania. In the same region are produced
the multitudinous tribes of hoofed quadrupeds, of spring-
bocks, nilghaus, and antelopes of various kinds, of giraﬂ‘es
and buffaloes, zebras and quaggas,——created, as it would
appear, since elsewhere they exist not, to wander over the
same vast level wildernesses with the ostrich, the winged
camel of the desert. Such is the native country of the
Saabian race ; it resembles in somer of its physical conditions
the high plains of Central Asia, and its inhabitants, in many
points of their bodily organisation, bear a corresponding
analogy to the Mongoles of Great Tartary. The original
Hottentots were herdsmen : they followed their ﬂocks,
clothed in sheepskins, roaming from place to place, and
beguiling their movements with a monotonous but plaint-
ive song. Their wealth consisted in their herds and in
the simple utensils which they carried on their pack-oxen,
and their temporary dwellings were huts composed of the
boughs of trees and mats. Other tribes, less fortunate
from the ﬁrst, lived wholly in the woods, upon the scanty
sustenance which chance brought within their grasp.
Without cattle, their only art was that of shooting with
poisoned arrows animals which they could not surprise by
their natural craft and their almost supernatural quickness
in the chase. The Bushmen were the outcasts of the more
quiet and inactive herdsmen. They were robbers—their

346 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

hand was against every man, and they suffered recipro-
cally the injuries which they inﬂicted.

There are few skulls belonging to this race in European
collections. The cranium of a Bushman female has been
described by Blumenbach, and another by Cuvier. Dr.
Knox, who has seen the people in their native country,
assures us that the face of the Hottentot resembles that of
the Kalmuc, excepting in the greater thickness of the
lips; and he sets them down as a branch of the Mongolian

F1 G_ 76. race. The width of the orbits,
their distance from each other,
the large size of the occipital
foramen, are points in which
. the Hottentots resemble the
northern Asiatics, and even
the Esquimaux. The annexed
outline represents the cranium

Skull of a Bushman of a Bushman, in which, how-
ever, the jaw projects more than in any other skulls of the
same race.

Mr. Barrow ﬁrst described this people with accuracy.
He says, “ The Hottentots are well proportioned, erect, of
delicate and effeminate make, not muscular; their joints
and extremities small ; their face generally ugly, but dif-
ferent in different families, some having the nose remark-
ably ﬂat, others considerably raised. Their eyes are of a
deep chesnut colour, long and narrow, distinct from each
other, the inner angle being rounded, as in the Chinese,
to whom the Hottentot bears a striking resemblance. The
cheek-bones are high and prominent, and, with the narrow-
pointed chin, form nearly a triangle. Their teeth are
very white.”

The Bushmen are thus described by the missionary
Adulph Bonatz :—«“ These people,” he says, “ are of small
stature and dirty yellow colour ; their countenance is re-
pulsive,-—a prominent- forehead, small, deeply-seated and
roguish eyes, a much depressed nose, and thick projecting

 

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CH. XVI.] HOTTENTOTS AND BUSHMEN. 347

lips, are their characteristic features. Their constitution

‘is so much injured by their dissolute habits and the constant

smoking of durha, that both old and young look wrinkled

and decrepid; nevertheless, they are fond of ornament,

and decorate their ears, arms, and legs with beads, iron,

copper, or brass rings; the women also stain their faces
FIG. '7 7 .

 

Hottentot Female.
red, or‘paint them wholly or in part. Their only clothing,
by day or night, is a mantle of sheep-skin thrown over
their bodies, which they term a kaross. The dwelling of
the Bushman is a low hut, or a circular cavity, on the open
plain, in which he creeps at night with his wife and chil-
dren, and which, though, it shelters him from the wind,
leaves him exposed to the rain. They had formerly their
habitation among the rocks, in which are still seen rude
ﬁgures of horses, oxen, or serpents. Many of them still
.live, like wild beasts, in their rocky retreats, to which they
return with joy after escaping from the service of the
colonists. I have never seen these fugitives otherwise
occupied than with their bows and arrows ; the bows are

348 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

small, the arrows are barbed, and steeped in a potent poi-
son, of a resinous appearance, distilled from the leaves of
an indigenous tree. These they prefer to ﬁre-arms, as
weapons that make no report. On their return from the
chase they feast till they become drowsy, and hunger only
rouses them to renewed exertion. In seasons of scarcity
they devour wild roots, ants’ eggs, locusts, and snakes. As
enemies, the Bushmen are not to be despised. Their lan-
guage seems to consist of snapping, hissing, grunting
sounds, all of them nasal.”

Erroncous notions have long ago been entertained re-
specting the origin of the Bushmen, and their relation to
the pastoral Hottentots. It is now possible to correct
these mistakes, and I shall, for that purpose, enter into
some details on the subject, and bring some facts to bear
upon it which tend to elucidate the ethnology of Southern
Africa, and, perhaps, to suggest useful inquiries respecting
the-origin of some nations in other parts of the world.

It has been supposed that the Bushmen are a race of .
people distinct from the Hottentots. This opinion was
founded on the difference of their manners, on the sup-
posed untameable character of the Bushmen, and, most of '
all, on the fact that the Hottentots do not understand the
language of the Bushmen.

Others, who suppose the two nations to be of one stock,
imagine that the hordes of Bushmen owe their existence
to the hardships which were inﬂicted by the European colo-
nists of South Africa on the Hottentots. The herdsmen of
that race are supposed to have been plundered by the
Dutch settlers near the Cape, and, after losing their cattle i
and all their property, to have been driven into the wilder- '
ness to subsist on such food as they could acquire by the ‘
chase and the rude arts of the most abject savages.

Neither of these opinions is well founded, as it has
been fully proved by the researches of an able and well-
informed traveller, who has made a long abode in South ‘
Africa, and was engaged by the Colonial Government to ‘

CH. xv1.] HOTTENTOTS AND BUSHMEN. 349

undertake a long journey of investigation in the interior
of Hottentot- and Kaﬁrland. From Dr. Andrew Smith’s
accurate information we are convinced that the Bushmen
are of the same race as the Hottentots, and originally
spoke the same language. They have been separated,
however, from the pastoral Hottentots from a very distant
period, and do not owe their destitute condition to the
robberies inﬂicted on" their forefathers by European
colonists, though their numbers have been augmented
from time to time by the resort of outcasts from various
conquered and reduced tribes to the wandering hordes in
their vicinity. It appears extremely probable from Dr.
Andrew Smith’s researches, that the Bushmen existed in
separate hordes in Southern Africa from a period even
long antecedent to the arrival of the ﬁrst colonists of the
Cape.
The earliest notice of the Bushmen that is known occurs
in the narrative of an expedition to the country of the
Amaquas, undertaken in the year 1685 by the Dutch
governor of the colony, Simon van der Stell.* In this nar-
rative an account was given of a pe0ple whose description
exactly coincides with that of the present Bushmen. They
were termed Sonquas, and lived in the immediate vicinity of
the Amaqua Hottentots: they are said to have been robbers.
“They carried,” says the writer of this relation, “ bows
and arrows, and assagays, possessed no cattle, and sub-
'sisted on wild honey and the game which they shot.
Their abodes, or rather places of wandering, were along a
stream which ﬂowed from the Gricqua mountains, falling
into the Olifant river. On inquiry,” continues the narra-
tor, “ we learned that Sangria signiﬁes the same as pauper
does in Eur0pe, and that each tribe of Hottentots had
their own Sonquas, whom they employed to give notice of

 

* “Diary of a Journey made by the Governor Simon van der Stell to
the Country of the Amaquas in the year 1685,” translated from the Dutch
by W. L. von Buschenroder, Esq. (South African Quarterly Journal,
Cape Town, 182-0.)

i

4
350 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II. ,

approaching strangers. Those Sonquas never plunder
from the kraals of the people in whose service they are,
but they rob others, and that as well in time of peace as in 7'

time of war. They possess nothing besides what they
obtain by depredation.”

I have been assured by Dr. Andrew Smith, who has
not yet given to the world a full account of the results of ‘

his extensive observations on South Africa, that almost

every tribe of people who have submitted themselves t0,1

social laws, who recognise the rights of property and reci-
procal social duties, and have thereby acquired some wealth,

z‘v

and have formed themselves into a respectable caste, are ,
surrounded by hordes of vagabonds and outcasts from their "

own community, or have them in their Vicinity ; that these

hordes are ever gathering accessions from the predatory
parties of neighbouring tribes, or even of more distant )

bodies of people. Their haunts are in the wilderness, and

in the fastnesses of mountains and forests, and become the L
resort of all who from crimes and destitution are obliged to :
retire and hide themselves from the abodes of the more
industrious, and honest, and thriving of the community.
Such are the Bushmen of the Hottentot race.ale But a

similar condition in society produces similar results in
regard to other races; and the Kaﬁrs have their Bushmen

as well as the Hottentots. But the people known to the i
Cape colonists are merely the outcast Hottentots. There,

g ,7; . ”ﬂats”.

are likewise vagabonds belonging to the Bechuana nation, is:
who are called by the latter people Balalas. The wild

outcasts who are scattered over the Kalahaie desert are

known by the title of Bakalahaie. These, like the Balala,
consist of the paupers and outcasts from different nations.

 

* One of the most recent travellers in South Africa, F. Galton, Esq., e

says—“ Two African tribes never live close up to a common frontier: they ‘
are always ﬁghting and robbing, and therefore a broad border-land is I

essential; and in these border-lands, so far as I have seen, the Bushmen

and other outcasts live.” (Journal of the Royal Geographical Society,

1852, p. 148).———E1>.

CH. XVIJ ' FINGOES. 351

and the neighbourhood. “ They all stand,” as Dr. A.
Smith assures me, “ in the same relation to the Kaﬁrs as
the Bushmen to the Hottentots.”

We may here mention that the Amakosah or Kosa
Kaﬁrs had formerly under their dominion a servile tribe of
the same description,well known under the name of Fingoes.
A detailed account of this race was sent to the Royal, Geo-
graphical Society by Captain Alexander, from which the
following particulars are taken :—

When Major-General Sir B. D’Urban crossed the Kei
in the Kaﬁr war of 1835, and entered Hintza’s country,
he found a numerous population of Fingoes living in a
state of abject slavery under the Amakosah Kaﬁrs. They
amounted to 17,000 souls. The whole body of this servile
race were emancipated by the English from their cruel
bondage, and settled in a state of freedom on lands which
were given them between the Lower Keiskamma and the
Great Fish River.

The name Fingoes implies wanderers, beggars, or out-
casts. They belong to various scattered tribes of the Kaﬁr
race, and have the language of the Amakosah. The fol-
lowing are the names of the tribes of Fingoes and of
their chiefs z—l. Umslambisa, chieftain of the Amaslubi.
2. Matomela, of the Amakelidwani. 3. Iokwene, of the
Amazisi. 4. Umkwenkwezi, of the Amabili. 5. Ucwana,
of the Amagobizembi. 6. Uhh‘so, of the Amasekuneni.
7. Umkwali, of the Abaswawo. 8. Unomtshatsho, of the
Amantozake. 9. Umkuzangwe, of the Abayimani.

The Fingoes are darker and shorter than the Ama-
kosah, but are said to be as active and even braver than
“the sons of Kahabig” siX Fingoes being able to ﬁght
and overcome twelve Kosahs similarly armed. The men
of the Fingoes have woolly hair, round noses, thickish lips,
straight and muscular limbs, and average ﬁve feet eight
inches in height. Their dress consists of a dressed ox-hide,
worn with the hair inwards, rude sandals on their feet, a
skin-sheath, like the other tribes ; their ornaments are bead

352 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

car-rings, tufts of jackals’ tails on their heads, bead-neck-
laces, generally blue and white, brass rings on their arms,
and a belt of small rings, strung on leather, round their
waists. The women wear small turbans of skin or cloth,
not to defend the head from the sun, but to enable them
better to carry burdens ; a petticoat of hide, a skin breast-
cover ornamented with beads ; and some of them wear the
Kaﬁr female-kaross or mantle of hide, from which depends
behind a ﬂap covered with brass buttons. Beneath the
petticoat is worn a small triangular apron, ornamented 7
with beads ; they also wear bead-necklaces and brass
bracelets. The children are carried behind wrapped in
the kaross. '

The Fingoes are in general good-natured people. The
men labour in the ﬁelds as well as the women, and in this
respect are unlike the Kaﬁrs, among whom the principal
attention of the men is devoted to the cattle. The huts of
the Fingoes are hemispheres of boughs covered with grass;
their food, curdled milk and millet. In war they carry
bundles of assagays, or javelins, and a large oval shield of
ox-hide, over which they can just look- At night in the
ﬁeld they get close together; and they cover themselves
with their shields when they sleep. At present they dread
ﬁre-arms.* ‘

The fact of a tribe of people in a better condition, and
looking upon themselves as of higher caste and dignity,
having in its vicinity hordes of a lower state, a sort of
mlcchchlms, or a “ mixed multitude,” descended probably
from refugees and outcasts, and more or less mingled with
foreigners and vagabonds from various quarters, is a thing
likely to have occurred in other parts of the world besides
South Africa, and the supposition of its existence may tend
to explain many phenomena in history or ethnology. In
India, for example, it cannot be doubted that many a tribe
of obscure origin living beyond the limits or on the out-
skirts of civilised communities, owes its existence, in a

a? “ Ten Years in South Africa,” by Licut. J. w. D. Moodic, Lond. 1835.

 

CII. xv1.] OUTCAST TRIBES. 353

great part at least, to the shelter which woods, and fast-
nesses, and mountainous tracts afford, from time to time,
to persons whose character and habits of life are such as to
unﬁt them for the observation of laws, and for submission
_ to regal and priestly ordinances. Many writers on Indian
history have attributed this origin to the Bhils and Gonds,
and other tribes of the mountains, who display but slight
differences in physical character and language from the
peeple of the plains. The hypothesis that all such tribes
are aborigines of the mountainous parts of India has been
perhaps taken up in some instances hastily, and in others
extended too far, though it is not unlikely that some of the
mountains and wildernesses of the Dekhan may contain
descendants of an ancient population, which was at least
the original nucleus of the hordes of barbarians who now
dwell there, and among whom the languages of the plains
are still spoken, though with dialectic differences. It is
probable that there was always in Egypt a large p0pula-
tion of mixed races besides the pure castes of the Egyptian
stock ; and we thus are enabled to account for many
varieties of statement in ancient descriptions of the Egypt-
ians, and in the physical traits of mummies, while the
national type, as represented by paintings and sculptures,
was strikingly uniform. In Europe it is difficult to de-
termine how far the same observations may serve to account
for certain national relations. The Lappes seem to bear
a similar relation to the Finns and their vicinity, as the
Bushmen to the present Hottentots. They appear to have
been a wild and predatory tribe who sought the desert,
like the Arabian Bedouins, while the Finns cultivated the
soil like the industrious Fellahs. Between the meagre and
small Bedouins and the comparatively stout and athletic
Fellahs of the same race, a greater difference of bulk and
stature exists than that of the Bushmen and Hottentots;
and the Lappes and Finns perhaps differ from each other
still more in this respect. *

 

* Many instances may be remembered in ancient history in which tribes
A A

354: NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Another phenomenon deserving of notice, and interest-
ing in a general point of View, is the change of language
or the difference of speech between the Bushmen and the
Hottentots. .

The language of the Bushmen is merely a dialect of _
the Hottentot idiom, spoken by all of that race. This is
the decided testimony of all late travellers, though the dif-
ferences of words collected in vocabularies are so great as
to have given rise at one period to a diﬁ'erent opinion.
The peOple of some hordes speak much like the Namaa-
quas, others use the same words with a different pronuncia-
tion; a third party, as we are assured by Dr. Andrew
Smith, vary their speech designedly by affecting a singular
mode of utterance, and adopt new words with the intent of
rendering their ideas unintelligible to all but the members of
their own community. For this last custom a peculiar name
exists, which is—“ cuze cat.” This is considered as greatly
advantageous to the tribe in assisting concealment of their
exploits and designs.*6 The modiﬁed dialect is more or less

 

of people, who were probably of kindred origin with their masters, have
been reduced and kept in a state of vassalage for many generations, and
treated with the greatest cruelty. The Helots of the Spartans are said to
have been the enslaved people of Messenia, who themselves were akin to
the Lacedaemonians. At all events they were Greeks, and belonged to
the same family. In like manner, the people who are termed by St. Jerome
and Ammianus, Limigantes, appear to have been a servile race under the
ancient Sarmatae. It is related by historians, that having been armed for
the defence of their country against the Goths, they became aware of their
strength and greater numbers, and, after gaining a victory over foreign
enemies, expelled their masters. It is about this period, or soon after,
that the names of Sarmatze and Iazyges disappear from history, and that
of the Slaves, or Slavonians, is for the ﬁrst time heard.l

3“ .A similar custom is prevalent among the Circassians :—“ When they
set out on a plundering expedition, they use particular languages known
only to themselves. The two most usual jargons employed by them are
called Shakobshe and Farshipse: the former seems to be original, for it has

 

‘ Ammian. Marcell. lib. xvii. 12. See several other writers cited in the
“ Ancient Universal History,” vol. xvi. p. 133. It seems that the ruling
caste among the Sarmatae, who were expelled, were named Arcarogantes,
and the slaves Limigantes.

CH. XVI.] BUSHMEN. 355

. understood by the population belonging to each Bushman
tribe, but not to the Hottentots, or those who know only
the common language of the race. That clapping noise
occasioned by the various motions of the tongue, which is
characteristic of the Hottentot language, is particularly of
frequent occurrence among the Bushmen, who often use it
so incessantly as to make it appear that they give utterance
to a jargon consisting of an uninterrupted succession of
claps. The dialects of the Bushmen thus modiﬁed are not
generally intelligible to the Hottentots, though it is
observed, on the other hand, that such Bushmen as
live on friendly terms with the Hottentots in their neigh-
bourhood, and associate with them, acquire such a
modiﬁcation of utterance that their language is perfectly
understood. .
The fact that a savage nation is thus known to modify
its speech purposely for the sake of becoming unintelligible
to its neighbours, is by no means unimportant in regard to
the history of languages. It is impossible to say how many
of the apparently original diversities of human speech may
have derived their commencement from a similar cause,
and from the voluntary adoption of a new jargon by some
small separated community. The clapping articulation of
the Hottentots may have originated wholly from this habit.
The present abodes of the Bushmen are scattered
through the whole of the extensive plains lying between
the northern boundary of the colony, the Kamiesberg
range of mountains, and the Orange River. In former
times they were more widely spread, and are said to have
occupied many districts now far within the boundaries of

 

no analogy with Circassian ......... The Farshipse is made up by adding
the syllable ri to the syllables of Circassian words” (Klaproth, “ Voyage au
Mont Caucase,” vol. i. p. 381, Paris, 1823). The last-mentioned jargon is
like what our schoolboys term gibberish, by which they occasionally
endeavour to hide their doings from their teachers or less knowing school-
fellows. Among the examples given by Klaproth are—Iriari for Ia, the
hand; Jari/ceri for Ja/ce, the beard; T ari/c/zurimari for Talchuma, the ear.
ED.

356 NATURAL HISTORY er MAN. [BOOK II.

the colony, as the barren districts between the Olifant and
Greene Rivers and the Great Karreo, as , well as the
country on the Camptoes River. The population is thinly
spread, especially at particular seasons of the year, or when
the supply of game is scanty. In situations where nature
is liberal of productions readily applicable to the support
of life, small communities exist; where food is scanty or
water defective, it is rare to ﬁnd more than one or two
families in the same place. Little intercourse exists be- ‘
tweeen them, except when self-defence, or an occasional
combination in some marauding expedition undertaken in
the hope of booty, brings them into contact; and some
mischief is apprehended by the colonists when it is known
that many Bushmen have formed their kraals in the same
neighbourhood.

They are constantly roving about from one place to
another in quest of a precarious subsistence. Hence they
bestow but little labour on their temporary dwellings.
They erect a shelter of bushes for the night, or rest under
mats suspended on poles, or dig holes in the ground, into
which they creep. Their clothing is principally a kaross, Q
or loose mantle of sheep-skin, which is a garment by day
and a covering by night. They carefully besmear their
skin with fat as a protection against the parching eﬁ‘ect of
the heat and wind, and, like other savages, they are fond of ,
ernamenting their hair, and ears, and bodies, with beads and ,
buttons, shells and teeth, and other barbaric decorations. V

In physical characters the Bushmen differ little from p
the Hettentets in general. Dr. Andrew Smith declares '
that they are certainly not inferior in stature to the other
Hettentots. Among the latter there are individuals of
very puny growth, and those travellers who have given us
the most striking descriptions of the Bushmen were probably -
less acquainted than this intelligent writer with the other '
Hettentot tribes. .We are told by Mr. Leslie, who has E
described the Bushan of the Orange River, that, small '
in stature as the llottentet race is, they are in that quarter

CH. XVI.] BUSHMEN. 357

less than elsewhere. He adds that they seldom exceed
‘ ﬁve feet. This, however, indicates no great difference,—or,
at least, not more than may well be attributed to scanty
sustenance, beginning from childhood and continuing
through many generations. We are assured by Mr. Bun-
bury, who had better opportunities than most travellers for
observation, that the Hottentots are a very diminutive race.
He declares that the majority of those‘in the Cape corps,
at least of the new levies, are under ﬁve feet in height, and
by no means strong. Their hands and feet are small and
delicate, in which particular they differ remarkably from
the N egoes.

The perceptive faculties of the Bushmen are wonder-

fully acute. Like the nomadic nations of High Asia,
whom they resemble in the manner of their existence and in
the general contour of their cranium, they discern objects
with the naked eye from a distance at which Europeans
can only read by means of the telescope. In situations
Where the eye is unavailable, says Dr. Smith, it is wonder-
jful with what certainty and readiness the ear directs them
to an object ; and again, when distance renders sound in-
audible, the eye operates with a precision and power which
a person who has never witnessed the like would scarcely
be disposed to credit.

Like other savages, the Bushmen are cruel and re-
vengeful. The desire of revenge is one of the strongest of
their passions; it urges them to the most barbarous acts;
they commit the most frightful outrages under the impulse
:of momentary irritation, as well as in the gratiﬁcation of
long-fostered malice. The eagerness for vengeance is
so urgent as to render them indifferent on whom they
wreak it, provided the sufferer be of the same country as
the offender, and they make the innocent suffer for the
guilty. Dr. Andrew Smith assures us that he has seen
their cruelty and revenge exercised on their own relatives
with as much rancour as on strangers ; and several in-
stances have come Within his knowledge in which parents

358 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

destroyed their own children, and even boasted of their
cruelty towards their own offspring, and were praised for
it by their companions. The passion of anger has amazing
inﬂuence over them : it incites them to frequent murders.
A total want of forethought is one of their characteristics,
and the prOSpects of to-morrow, or of the time to come,
seldom occupy their minds.

Although the wild tribes of the Hottentot race display
ferocity and all the other vices of savage life, yet we have
abundant proof that these people are not insusceptible of
the blessings of civilisation and Christianity. No unculti-
vated people appear to have received the instructions of the
Moravian missionaries more readily than the Hottentots,
or to have been more fully reclaimed and Christianised.
In one of my former works I have taken pains to collect
the most authentic accounts of their change of condition,
and to compare it with that of other nations who in later
times have received the blessing of conversion to the
Christian religion.

OF THE GREAT SOUTH AFRICAN RACE.

I now proceed to the family of nations which I propose;
to designate as the Great South African race, and I shall
endeavour to lay before my readers a brief survey of its
principal branches, with an account of the countries in-
habited by them in different parts of the African continent.
They will be described under the following heads :—

1. The nations in the western parts of South Africa
within the so-termed empire of the Mani-kongo.

2. The tribes of Kaﬁrland, or South-eastern Africa,
comprising all those nations who are known to speak the
Kosa and the Sichuana languages.

3. The nations of the Mosambique coast and the adja-
cent inland countries.

4. The nations of the coast of Zanzibar and Ajan,
including the Suaheli.

CH. XVI j CONGO RACE. 359

I shall commence with the western nations, who were
ﬁrst known to Europeans.

Our earliest accounts of the western parts of South
Africa are derived from the Portuguese, who discovered
and founded colonies on the coast during the ﬁfteenth
century. The country was termed by the geographers of
that time, Southern Ethiopia. The ﬁrst Portuguese ship
is said to have made its appearance in the River Zaire,
under the command of Diego Caba, in 1484. The ad-
jacent country was described by Lopez, who resided in it
several years, and whose account was drawn up and
published by Pigafettaﬁ“ If we may believe the uniform
representations of these writers, all the native races in-
habiting the western side of Africa, from the equator to
Cape Negro, were, at the era of their discovery, subject to
a great empire, the sovereign of which, termed the Mani-
kongo, held under his dominion all the countries between
Loango in the north and Loanda in the south, inclusive.
This empire is said to have been entire at the arrival of
the Portuguese, but it became soon after that era dismem-'
bered, the governors of particular provinces assuming the
rank of independent Chieftains, or mama's ; and the pro-
vince of Kongo, which was situated in the middle, between
the north and south, remaining alone in subjection to the
sovereign and his descendants.

The Portuguese regarded all the inhabitants of the
region comprehended in the real or pretended empire of
the Mani-kongo as forming but one people or race. They
all spoke a common language, which was, however, di-
vided into many dialects, but these dialects, according to
the accounts transmitted by the Portuguese writers, dif-
fered not more widely than does the language of Lisbon
from that of Madrid.

 

* “ Descriptio Regni Congiani,” in the “ Vera Descriptio Regni Africani,
quod tam ab incolis quam Lusitanis Congia appellatur, per Philippum
Pigafettam, olim ex Edoardi Lopez acroamatis lingua Italicé. cxcerpta, nunc
Latino sermone donata ab Aug. 0. Reinio,” folio, Francof. 1698.

360 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

According to Ritter, the domain of the Mani-kongo
consists of a triple terrass of mountain-lands, situated in
successively declining levels, by which the high plateau of
Southern Africa is gradually lowered towards the ocean.
The highest terrass is bounded towards the lower country,
on the west, by the lofty chains of the Serras de Cristal, dc
Sal, and de Prata. All these chains run from north to
south, and, like the parallel ranges of the Alleghany
mountains, they are all intersected by the excavated
channels of those rivers‘ivhich ﬂow through them from
the interior upland towards_..the Atlantic. Such is the
direction given to the course of these rivers in the old
chart of Lopez; the modern maps ‘of the country are fre-
quently erroneous in giving to the mountain-chains a
direction parallel to that of the rivers.

On the lowest of these terrasses—that is, on the littoral
plain, sandy, and intersected by numerous water-courses—
is a region of torrid heat and pestilential climate, covered
with morasses, and abounding in reptiles and wild
beasts.

Very different from that above described is the middle
region, which the Kongos themselves regard as a terres-
trial paradise. It is extremely populous, and well culti-
vated, enjoys a temperate and delightful climate, and com-
vprehends all the most fertile provinces of the empire of ,
Kongo.

The most populous part of the empire is the celebrated
and luxuriant Bamba, which is termed by Cavazzi “la
chiave e lo scudo, la spada e la defesa del re.” Although
forming but a siirth part of the Kongoan realm, it is said
to have furnished an army of 400,000 warriors. “ In the
territory of the Ambriz,” according to a recent traveller,
“ and in the neighbouring provinces, the country presents
a succession of beautiful and picturesque landscapes,
swelling into undulations, with gentle eminences crowned
by thickets and clumps of trees, and divided by fertile
valleys or deep ravines, which are covered with the luxu-

CH. xv1.] JAGAS. 361

riant vegetation of the trepieal climate. In other parts
are barren hills, bleak and arid tracts, partially covered
with detached rocks and masses of granite, displaying
a striking contrast to the densely-wooded tracts through
which the River Zaire pursues its course.”*

The Portuguese had free access only to the littoral region
of Kongo. Here the Roman Catholic religion was intro-
duced at ﬁrst by Portuguese ecclesiastics, andwas afterwards
propagated by the ﬁrst and second missions of the Jesuits
in 1539 and 1613, and subsequently by Franciscans.
With the exception of Sogno, a district of the middle
region, the progress of Christianity was conﬁned to the
lower or littoral provinces, among which was situated the
mission of Loanda ; San Salvador was the centre of Por-
tuguese inﬂuence, and the chief seat of proselytism.

The high plain in the interior, towards the great inland
plateau, was the region over which the celebrated J agas,
or Giagas, wandered, represented by the writers who de-
scribe them as tribes of nomadic warriors of ﬁerce and
cruel habits, delighting in blood and carnage, of whose in-
roads the settled inhabitants of Kongo were in continual
dread. According to the representation of these people
drawn by the old Portuguese writers, they in many respects
resembled, and they may perhaps be considered as proto-
types of the present Kaﬁr tribes, the Amakosah, Amazulah,
Amatemba, and other barbarians of Eastern Kaﬁrland.
‘ The J agas, under the command of their terrible Chieftain
Zimbo, made their ﬁrst attack on the province of Batta in
1542, and in the following years they poured themselves in
an overwhelming torrent upon the whole kingdom of Kongo.
They were not expelled till after a war of four years in
duration, and then with the assistance of the Portuguese.
In 1569 the same people are said to have been completely

 

3“ “ Observations on the Natives of the Three Kingdoms of Ambriz,
Ambrizette, and Musula, southward of the River Congo, South Africa,”
by W. F. Daniell, Esq. M.R.C.S.: read before the Ethnological Society of
' London, November 12, 1847.

362 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

routed on the eastern coast, near Mombas, after having
laid waste the whole region of Monomotapa. The J agas
are uniformly described as wandering, barbarous hordes,
without knowledge of agriculture, and without ﬁxed dwell-
ings, who cut down forests for the fortiﬁcation of their
camps, burnt all the towns and villages, killed their ene-
mies, and devoured the bodies of the slain. Under their
queen Zingha, who is said to have established among them
a code of laws for the regulation of their sanguinary war-
fare, many tribes of J agas settled themselves in the con-
quered countries.

Mr. Daniell says that he has seen many J agas. They
now live in parts of Kongo, and speak with facility the
Kongo language, which is a sort of “ Lingua Franca”
among the natives of the neighbouring countries. He
supposed their own peculiar idi‘om to be a dialect of this
language. Their physical characters are those of the
Kaﬁrs : their complexion, like that of the Kaﬁrs, is a dark
brown, partaking of a red tinge.

\ A curious account of the Giagas, or J agas, was given
by Andrew Battel, a native of Essex, who sailed from
England in 1589, was captured by the Portuguese, and re-
sided in Angola and the neighbouring countries eighteen
years. His narrative was published by Purchas. He
says: “ These Giagas are the greatest canibals and man-
eaters that bee in the world, for they feed chieﬂy on man’s
ﬂesh.” Battel, however, was glad to make his escape
from his captivity in Kongo to the camp of the Giagas.
He says: “ The town of these people is very great, and is
so overgrowne with oleeander-trees, cedars, and palmes,
that the streets are darkened with them.” It seems that
the J agas were not, like the modern Kaﬁrs, destitute of
religious worship, for, says Battel, “in the middle of the
towne there is an image, which is as bigge as a man, and
standeth twelve foot high, and at the feet of the image
there is a circle of elephants’ teeth pitched in the ground.
Upon these teeth stand great store of dead men’s skulls,

CH. XVI.] JAGAS. 363

which are killed in the warres, and offered to this image.
They use to pour palm-wine at his feet, and kill goats and
pour their blood at his feet. This image is called Que-
sango, and the people have a great belief in him, and
swear by him, and doe believe when they are sick that
Quesango is offended with them. In many places of this
town there were little images, and there was great store of
elephants’ teeth piled.” “ There were in the camp of the
Giagas twelve captains : their generall, a man of great
courage, warreth all by enchantment, and taketh the
devil’s counsel in all his exploits. The great Giaga Ca-
lando hath his hair very long, embroidered with many
knots full of Bamba shells. His body is carved and cut
with sundry workes, and every day anointed with the fat
of men. He weareth a piece of copper crosse his nose two
inches long, and in his ears also. His body is painted red
and white. He hath twenty or thirty wives, which follow
him when he goeth abroad, and when he drinketh they
kneel down and clap their hands and sing.” “ The women
are very fruitful, but enjoy none of their children, for as
soon as the woman is delivered of her childe, it is presently
buried quiche, so that there is not one child brought up in
this generation, but when then they take a town they keep
the boys and girls of twelve 0r thirteen years old as their
own children.”

The name of J aga, denoting warlike nomades, is now a
title of honourable distinction, and is claimed as the ex-
clusive right of the Cassangas, a powerful tribe, who live
to the eastward of the kingdom of Kongo. It is in the
territory of the Cassangas, according to the information
obtained by Mr. Bowdich, that the most remote fairs, or
trading resorts, frequented by the Portuguese from Angola
and Kongo, are held. Attempts have been made to pene-
trate from the country of the Cassangas farther into the
interior, and to open, if possible, a communication with
Mosambique on the eastern coast. A Mulatto traveller,
sent from Cassanga, after a journey of two months, is said

364 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

to have reached the capital of a tribe termed Mulua, a
large town laid out in regular streets, where ﬁfteen or
twenty Negroes are sacriﬁced every day. From the
Muluas the Cassangas receive in barter the copper which
they sell to the Portuguese. The Cassangas have for their
northern neighbours the Cachingas, and the Domges on
the east, who maintain a communication with the Por-
tuguese at Mombas. The Mexicongos, or Kongos of the
interior, describe the Hocanguas as a powerful tribe,
beyond whom are the dominions of the Amaluca, a nation
of the interior, whose name indicates an afﬁnity to the
Kaﬁr Amazulu and Amakosah.

It seems that the J agas are no longer a formidable
people; they appear never to have survived the defeat
which they sustained not many years after their invasion
of Kongo. They are still known as a distinct people, scat-
tered in some of the higher districts to the east of Kongo.

Physical Characters of the People of Kongo.

From the great diversity of climate and local situation
in the different provinces of the domain of Mani-kongo, we
might be prepared to look for variety in the physical cha-
racters of the people, and this is what all travellers declare
to exist in a most striking degree. Their complexion is
said by Lopez and Cavazzi to differ considerably, some
being of a dark brown colour, while others are of an olive,
and some of a blackish red: all travellers are agreed in
ascribing to the people of Kongo this variety, both in
colour and in the form of their features.ale

This variation in physical character cannot be fully
explained on the hypothesis which attributes it to inter-
mixture of races. There are indeed various tribes in the
countries connected with Kongo, and these tribes, as we

 

3“ Professor Smith informs us, that a. Chieftain at Malambo, and many
of his retinue, had noble countenances, with more of the Arab than of the
Negro character.

CH. xvr.] CONGOESE. 365

shall have occasion to notice, are more or less mixed and
blended in the actual population of some of the provinces ;
but the tribes alluded to are themselves, for the most part,
and as far as we know without exception, merely branches
of the same great nation. The differences of dialect noticed
among them are but slight, and such as would tend to
prove them to be one people. There is but one race foreign
to the aborigines of South Africa, with whom it can be
imagined with any degree of probability that the tribes of
Kongo can have been intermixed: I mean the Portuguese.
The Portuguese have had for some centuries settlements in
this region, and in some parts have been intimately con-
nected with the native inhabitants ; but the Portuguese
colonists have been by far too few in number to produce
any impression on the stock of pe0ple inhabiting the great
empire of Kongo. We are assured that, in fact, there are
very few mulattoes among the inhabitants of the country;
and it is well known that the Portuguese colonisation has
been nearly conﬁned to Angola.

The limits of the country occupied by the kindred
nations of this part of Africa are not exactly known. The
distance from Cape Lopez to Cape Negro is about 300
leagues ; but it is probable that the natives of the country
to the northward of Cape Lopez are of the same race. To
the southward of Cape Negro are the people of Benguela,
Who are said to speak a different idiom from that of Kongo;
but whether this is a distinct language, or only differs as a
dialect from the speech of Angola, we have no certain in-
formation. There are many diiferent nations, long separate
and physically distinguished from each other, within the
limits above deﬁned; but they are, according to testimony
which I shall cite, all branches of one race. We have
obtained much new and valuable information as to the
languages of the tribes and their mutual distinctions, both
physical and moral, from a very intelligent traveller, Mr.
W. Daniell, a medical man, who resided two years in
different parts of the Kongocse country. The following

366 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

notices are taken, partly from a memoir presented by this
gentleman to the Ethnological Society of London, but
principally from information which the author has kindly
communicated to myself personally. The following sketch
gives the relative position of different countries and races.

Loango

Anzichi
Malemba
Cabenda Giagas
\ / or J agas
River Zaire KO NGO
Ambrizette //

Ambriz ' /

,//

Musula I

 

Mbunda

Loango, the northern country, has been described by
Proyart, who says that one dialect,———we may presume one
race,——extends through it and the other provinces to the
northward of the Zaire. This includes Kakongo and Ma-
lemba, as well as Cabenda or Angoy, which is inhabited
by a particular tribe, who differ from all the other nations
in physical characters.

To the southward of the Zaire is the proper country of -
the Kongos, who have a different language from that of
Loango ; the difference is only dialectical. Kongo is
divided into numerous provinces, among which are Bamba,
Sogno, &c. Included in the limits of Bamba are the dis-
tricts of Ambrizette, Ambriz, and Musula, among the
natives of which Mr. Daniell chieﬂy resided.

Angola lies to the southward of the river Danda, and

a .CH. XVI.] CONGOESE. 367

extends from 8° 30” to 16° S. lat. ' In Angola is Loando San
Paoli, the capital of the Portuguese possessions in Africa.

The language of Angola is termed the Ambunda,
’Mbunda, or Bunda language; and the people are called
by Mr. Daniell the Bundas. The Bunda or Angolan lan-
guage was studied by the Portuguese missionaries, and a
grammar and dictionary of it have been published, written
by Father Can'necattim.

The Anzichi or Antziki are a people of the interior
behind Loango. Their relation to the native tribes of the
empire has hitherto been only conjectured. Mr. Daniell
thus describes the people of Kongo proper. '

“ The characteristics of the primitive Kongoese are a
dark or jet-black colour of the skin or complexion, crisp
woolly hair, large black eyes, and a countenance of small

_ features, having, but in a moderate degree, the Negro
' peculiarity of thick lips, a ﬂat expanded nose, and a low

depressed forehead, with that placidity of mien, or har-

' monious softness and quietude of expression, which gives a
; pensive or somewhat melancholy look. Something almost

analogous to the subdued air of dejection that pervades the
physiognomy of the Eboes and other tribes to the north-
ward of the equator, may be recognised among the natives
of Kongo. This peculiarity, however, is relieved by the
bright and lively lustre of the eye when they are animated
by any unusual emotion. Their stature and development
of frame, as compared with the tribes of Northern Africa,
present a rather diminutive and effeminate appearance ; nor
have they that aspect of dignity and symmetrical rotundity

'of form, blended with a ﬁrm muscular organisation, so

commonly observed among the northern races, while the

, inferiority of their intellectual endowments is decided and

manifest.”

Mr. Daniell informs us afterwards that this description
applies more particularly to the peOple of low maritime
districts. He says,———“ It must be considered that this
description is only applicable within a limited sphere, and

368 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

must be qualiﬁed before it can be applied to the people of
the same race who inhabit the hilly regions adjoining ‘
Embomma, or those villages situated above the ﬁrst and ‘
second falls of the river Zaire. “ Here,” he says, “ the
dark hue and the rough dirty aspect of the skin become 9
less conspicuous, and in their place we observe a more deli- ‘-
cate cutaneous tegument, comprising the different grada-
tions of yellow, bronze, and deep-brown tints. The coun-
tenance in many instances, especially among the females,
assumes a more interesting and pleasing character from
the softened expression of the features, which is heightened '
in effect by the display of the feelings, more open and
unreserved than the repressed and vindictive passions pre-
dominant among the Negro tribes who reside amid the
swamps near the embouchure of the Kongo. The physical
traits, in combination with an air of inferior intelligence
and a corresponding outline of form, reveal a line of de-
marcation between various tribes of a common origin, in-
habiting the banks of the same river, but severed from
one another only by the peculiar endemic agencies of
situation, temperature, and elevation of soil.”

Mr. Daniell has given me the following notes on the
differences observable between the several nations of the .
Kongo empire :—

0f the People of Ambria—Ambriz is the name of a
province which formerly constituted a part of the princi-
pality of Bamba, one of the seven kingdoms or great states
included in the ancient empire of the Mani-Kongo.
Ambriz was distinguished by the name of Quitungo. In
the confusion and anarchy which succeeded the dismember-
ment of the empire, the Portuguese subdued Ambriz, but
were afterwards expelled by the natives. Ambriz and
Ambrizette, which were used as distinctive epithets of
provinces or states, are originally the names of the chief t
rivers which ﬂow through these countries. Musula is a:
third province, and they are all Within the limits of ~
Bamba. J ‘

 

 

CH. XVI.] CABENDAS. 369

“ The inhabitants of both Ambriz and Musula,” as Mr.
Daniell informs me, “ are closely allied in physical structure
and language, and other peculiarities, to the tribes resident
on the banks of the river Zaire, and within the kingdom of
Kongo”, Yet they have some peculiarities which may be
attributed to intermixture with the various hordes of
people in the interior who from time to time have de-
scended the channel of the river Ambriz. Compared with
the people of Ambrizette, or the natives of the town and
bay of Yuma, the natives of Ambriz are said by Mr.
Daniell to have no distinguishing marks. “ Their skin is
of various colours. They are of a mixed character between
the Negro and the Kaﬁr, and have the peculiarities of
both to a certain extent. Their features are far from
agreeable, and are not so pleasing as are those of the people
of Loango and other tribes farther northward. The hues
of the skin most commonly met with are yellow, brownish-
yellow, reddish-black, which is very common, and jet-black.
They are comparatively of short stature.”

Cabendas, 07“ People of Angoy.——The Cabendas are the
only race on the south-west coast of Africa who leave their
country and enter into the service of strangers, like the

a Kroomen of North Africa. They man the launches and
t the ships of Europeans ; they sail in boats, from Loanda
: as far north as Loango or Malemba, coasting the land all
' the way: the Portuguese implicitly trust them, and send
: their merchandise without any white men. The greatest
l peculiarity in their organisation is, that they are of much
I lighter colour than any other tribe—the predominant hue
1 of their skins being of a moderate yellow, varying into a
idarker tint. It is a very curious circumstance, that the
[ Kongo pe0ple to the southward are of a jet black, and the
[ Loango people to the northward equally so, while the
3 Cabendas are so different in colour as to be distinguished
from most of the tribes in south-western Africa. The
1 English do not trust them so much as the Kroomen ; they
[ have among the English a character for roguery.
B B

370 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

There are generally three classes of chiefs under one
king in this part of Africa. They are——

1. Mambookas, or governors of towns.

2. Mongroys, or king’s councillors, who also possess
some authority.

3. The Mafukas, or custom-ofﬁcers, whose duty is to
receive the customs for the monarch; they are among the
chiefs who attend the king’s council. .

On the Kongo the term Chenoo is given in the place
of Mambooka to the Chieftains or governors. The
governments in this part of Africa are not so despotic as
those in the north; the power of the kings is much re-
stricted; they are controlled by a council composed of the
higher class of chiefs, In Ambriz the king reigns only
a limited number of years: he is elected from amid the
highest class of chiefs, and his tenure of power will in some
degree depend upon the state of the seasons : for instance,
if during the rainy season little or no rain falls—a very
common occurrence—the country becomes parched, and a
famine frequently ensues: if this occurs often, the king.
becomes unpopular, and is deposed. The greatest popu-
larity that a king can obtain in Ambriz is from a heavy .
rainy season. When a king is once elected he is never
permitted to visit the sea-shore, or live within sight of the ,
ocean. The great distinction or prerogative of the king of '
Ambriz is, that he is allowed to wear shoes, which no one ,
else is permitted to do in his dominions. In Cabenda,
the wearing of European trousers, on the contrary, is a j
disqualiﬁcation for any one aspiring to the dignity of a l
king. .-,

The Amicki, or Bowman Tribes—The Anzichi are a race Y
of people resident in the country behind the Cabendas, to {g
the north-east of the river Kongo.* “ They are readily
distinguished from the Kongos by the much lighter colour
of their skin, the complexion of the Anzichi being of a

    
  
  

 

 

* Lopez places the Anzigues beyond the kingdom of Loango, viz. to the :‘
eastward of Loango.

CH. XVI.] ANZICHI on BOWMEN. 371

dark brown or bronze, and by their features, which have
more of the European character. The most decisive marks,
however, are four or ﬁve cicatrised incisions, extending
from the zygomatic arch to the: angle of the mouth on
both sides of the face. Their cheek-bones also project, and
the face has not the rotundity which is striking in the
Ambriz Negroes, but it is thin and elongated. They are
cannibals from choice, eating human ﬂesh,———not from
necessity, but from preference. They kill their parents and
relatives, never suffering them to live beyond a certain age.
The Anzichi are not more distinguished by anything than
by their malevolent disposition. They are perpetually
embroiled in hostilities with the people of Ambriz, whose
huts they frequently burn down.”

I ﬁnd frequent notices of this race in the old accounts
of Kongo, which agree very well with Mr. Daniell’s state-
ment.ale For two or three hundred years they have been
forgotten. They are described by Lopez, who, after
speaking of the people of Loango, says 2——

“Ulterius habitant alii p0puli,Anzigues dicti, incredibilis
feritatis, se invicem enim devorant, ita ut ne amicis et
prOpinquis quidem parcatur, quorum postea describimus
historiam. ’ ’

, “ Beyond the former are the dwellings of the peOple
termed Anzigues, of incredible ferocity, for they eat one
another, not abstaining from friends or relations,” &c.

4 He afterwards terms them “Anziqui, reliquas omnes
1 nationes barbaras, qum humanis vescuntur carnibus, feritate
1 superantes.” He says, “ They do not only eat their
enemies slain in battle, but their nearest relations and
U friends. They have public shambles, where human limbs
‘ are exposed to be sold instead of beef or other meat: they
3 make a display of their loyalty by offering themselves to be
E killed and eaten at the banquets of their kings. Their

 

 

3“ Mr. Daniell observes that there are two sorts of cannibalism 1n Africa:
1 one, he says, is from choice, the other from necessity. The cannibalism of
i the Anzichi 1s of the former kind.

372 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

arms are a light bow and arrows, and an axe with a short
handle (assagay).”*

According to Lopez, the country of the Anzichi, or
Anzichani, was on the upper course of the river Zaire.
There are many islands on this river inhabited by the
Anzichi.

’szmdas, 07' the People of Angolan—“The people of
Angola greatly resemble those of Ambriz, but are,” as Mr.
Daniell has observed, “ of a lighter colour. In this respect
they differ much from the nations of the interior, who are
of a jet-black. The skin of the natives near the coast, from
the greater care and more frequent ablutions practised, is
generally of a ﬁner texture. They do not appear to have
any distinguishing marks on their countenances, like those
of the Anzichi. There seems to be more uniformity in the
features of the natives of Angola,——perhaps from there.
being less admixture of various tribes.

“ The Loango people are almost all of them of a beau-
tiful jet-black or brownish-black colour. They seem to be
endowed with a superior organisation to the tribes in this
portion of Africa. They are a very lively and animated
people, especially the females, who may be considered as
the most beautiful Africans on the west coast. Their
beauty is proverbial among European travellers; their ;
features are symmetrical and feminine, and have more of
the European than of the Negro type. The males are
taller, and of a more manly organisation than that of the
people of Kongo.”

0F KAFIRLAND AND THE KAFIR TRIBES SOUTHWARD OF THE
PARALLEL OF DELAGOA BAY. ‘

The warlike nomadic tribes who inhabit or wander in
the plains of Southern Africa, and more especially in the
eastern parts, have long been known to Europeans by the
name of Kaﬁrs. This epithet was given ﬁrst by the Arab '

 

 

* “ Vera Descriptio Regni Africani,” before quoted.

CI—I. XVI] KAFIRS. 373

voyagers, who so termed all savage nations, and all nations
unconverted to Islam ; from the Arabs it was adopted by
the Portuguese and Dutch, and it became a general appella-
tion. But the Dutch long used this name in a vague sense,
and included nearly all the uncivilised nations of South
Africa. Accordingly we ﬁnd Caffraria, in the old maps of
Africa, as in that of Dapper,* comprising nearly all the
southern part of the continent. Not only the region of the
Kaﬁrs, but that of the Hottentots also, comes within its
limits. In later times the eastern people have been termed
Kaﬁrs, to the exclusion of the Hottentots, and the separa-
tion between them has been so fully carried out, that even
some qualities which they have in common have been over-
looked.

When the name of Kaﬁrs was ﬁrst used in a strictly
national sense, it was appropriated to one tribe of people,
the Amakosah or Kosa Kaﬁrs, who were the nearest
neighbours of the colonists, and lived beyond the Keis-
kamma river. It was afterwards extended to several other
tribes who resembled the Kosas, and spoke the same lan-
guage. Lastly, it was more recently made to comprehend
the Bechuanas in the interior, and a variety of nations in
the inland country, who from time to time have become
known to the English colonists. All these people speak
the Sichuana language, which, though differing from the
Amakosah speech, is only another dialect of the same
mother tongue. At present, therefore, the name of Kaﬁrs
must be considered as including, together with a number
of tribes living most to the east, and nearer to the coast,
who speak the dialect of the Amakosah, all those tribes of
the interior who speak the Sichuana language.

 

* “ Description de l’Afrique, par D. O. Dapper, traduit du Flamand,”
folio, Amsterdam, 1686.

From this old work of Dapper’s, which is now very scarce, and of which
I have only the French translation, now scarcely met with, many compilers
have taken a great deal of their matter. Dapper is a principal authority
with the writers of the Old Universal History in what relates to Africa.

3744 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

But though this name as a national and distinctive one
is conﬁned to the tribes above described, it must be ob-
served that the nations far to the northward of them speak
dialects which belong to the same family of languages.
This was ﬁrst, as I believe, observed by Lichtenstein, the
celebrated traveller, whose history of his journeys in South
Africa, and description of the country and its inhabitants,
are universally known. Lichtenstein, deriving his infor-
mation partly from personal experience, and in part from
the accounts afforded him by others, came to the conclusion
that the same race of people and the same family of lan-
guages were spread far into the interior, and at the same

time to a very great distance towards the north, far beyond '

the limits of the proper Kaﬁrs.ale

The people of the Mozambique coast, who belong to this
family of nations, differ considerably from the tribes com-
monly termed Kaﬁrs. The coast of Mozambique is that
part of the sea-border of Eastern Africa which is washed by
the channel separating Madagascar from the Continent.
In this tract are Malemba and Quiloa, places celebrated in
the history of Portuguese trade and colonisation, as well as
the more important settlement of Senna on the river
Zambesi. To the southward of this coast is the river
Inhambane, and the territory named from it, which
belongs to the Portuguese. Delagoa Bay, however, may
be considered as forming the division between Mozambique
and Kaﬁrland.

Kaﬁrland or Caffraria is, then, the country to the south-
ward of Delagoa Bay, and reaches on the coast to the river

 

* The researches of Dr. Krapf, and the vocabularies of Dr. Peters, prove
the correctness of this observation: they even go further, and appear to
unite all the eastern nations, from the Equator to the Cape Colony, in one
great family. The features, customs, and languages of these differ mutually
no more than the Sichuana from the Amakosah. Future researches will
determine whether or not this observation is to be extended throughout
the southern continent : it may certainly be predicated of the tribes on
the west coast—ED.

 

CH. xvr.] KAFIRS. 375

Keiskamma, or, according to recent arrangement, to the
Kei. It extends, in some parts, across the whole African
continent. But in this wide acceptation of the term we
must consider it as divided into two great regions, viz. the
Maritime or Eastern, and the ,Western or Inland Kaﬁr-
land. The former is the country of the Amakosah Kaﬁrs,
and the tribes who are closely allied to them in language
and manners; the latter is the region of the Bechuanas,
and all those tribes who agree with them in speaking the
Sichuana dialect or the idiom of Litaku.

To these two principal divisions of the Kaﬁrs, we must
add, with reference to the present state of our knowledge
of this race, a third subdivision intended to include the
natives of the coast of Natal, and the country immediately
bordering on Delagoa Bay. These people differ from the
nomadic Kaﬁrs in many respects. I shall term them for
distinction Paralian Kaﬁrs.

The Kaﬁrs, speaking generally, recede considerably in
features and the shape of the head from the prognathous
races; and by persons who form their Opinion from these
traits alone , they have been classed with Europeans or with
Arabs. Nothing, however, can be farther from the truth
than the idea entertained by some that they are of Arabian
origin. They are woolly-headed, and some tribes of them
are black, and display the general characters of the Negro,
though not so strongly marked as in the natives of Guinea.
Even in the same tribes who generally are considered as
receding most from the Negro character, and are undoubt-
edly of the Kaﬁr race, individuals are seen who would be
immediately pronounced to be Negroes, if found in any
part of Europe. The plate adjoining displays an exem-
pliﬁcation of this remark. On the other hand, the ﬁgure
given in the text (see over) exhibits a form of features
extremely different. It is the portrait of a Kosa Kaﬁr
taken by Mr. Daniels.

The Kaﬁrs, upon the whole, are a very superior people
when compared with the destitute savages who occupy

a

376 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

the insulated hamlets of central Negroland. It is yet un-
known from what quarter they have derived the rudiments
of art which exist among them, and the improvement of
moral and intellectual character which they have obtained.

FIG. 78.

 

Kosa Kama

One trait certainly directs us to a foreign source,—they
practise universally the rite of circumcision, though they
have no account of the origin of this custom. It is pro-
bable that its practice is a relic of ancient African customs,
of which the Egyptians, as it is well known, partook in
remote ages. The Kaﬁrs are associated together in large
«communities under chiefs, or kings; differing in this respect
from the more savage class of African nations who live in
insulated hamlets. They are semi-nomadic, although living
in towns of considerable size and population resembling
camps, which they occasionally move. Their clothing is
scanty,—the men wear mantles, and the females at more
complete covering of tanned skins.

CH. XVI.] KAFIRS. 377

The Kaﬁrs have considerable herds of cattle : they
practise agriculture, have ﬁelds and gardens, cultivate
maize, millet, kidney-beans, and water-melons ; make bread
and beer; and manufacture earthenware out of sand and
clay baked in ﬁre. They are acquainted with the use of
iron and copper, and have the art of working these metals,
and of manufacturing articles of use and ornament.

The Kaﬁrs are not, as some have thought, destitute of
religion. They believe in a Supreme Being, to whom they
give the appellation of Uhlunga, the “ Supreme,” and fre-
quently the Hottentot name, Utika, or “ Beautiful.” They
also believe in the immortality of the soul, but have no
idea of a state of rewards and punishments. They have
some notion of Providence, and pray for success in war
and in hunting expeditions. They believe in the attend-
ance of the souls of their deceased relatives, and occa-
sionally invoke their aid. They conceive thunder to
proceed from the agency of the Deity; and, if a person
has been killed by lightning, say that Uhlunga has been
among them. On such occasions, they sometimes remove
from the spot, and offer a heifer or an OK in sacriﬁce. .

They have some superstitions resembling those con-
nected with the brute worship and consecration of animals
prevalent among the Egyptians. If a person has been
killed by an elephant, they offer a sacriﬁce, apparently to
appease the demon supposed to have actuated the animal.
Sometimes they imagine that a shuluga, or spirit, resides
in a particular 0X, and prOpitiate it by prayers when going
on hunting expeditions.

I shall now, in the ﬁrst place, describe the Eastern
Kaﬁrs, including the Amakosah and the people who speak
their language.

1. The Eastern Kaﬁrs.—The Eastern Kaﬁrs consist of
four principal nations :——the Amakosah or Kosa Kaﬁrs,
the Amatemba or Tambookies, the Amaponda or Mam-
bookies, and the Amazulu or Zulus. The following

378 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

particulars are collected from Mr. Steedman’s account of
these nations :—

1. The Amakosah, who were formerly the subjects of
Hintza, extended from the colony to the mouth of the
Bashee river. The subordinate chiefs of this nation were
the sons of Islambia, the sons of Graika, Pato, Kama,
Kongo, Enon, Duchani, Botuman, and Phundis. The
Whole numbers of the Amakosah nation were estimated in
1835 at 150,000 souls.

A tradition prevailed among the Amakosahs in refer-
ence to their origin, that the ﬁrst great chief came out of
a cave called U’Daluve, Dala being a word which they
use for the Creator. This cave they describe as being
situated to the eastward, from whence the sun issues every
morning to warm and enlighten the world. They say that
they came from the north under a chief named Togul, and
ﬁrst settled on the Kei river, where they purchased lands
with herds of cattle, from the Gonaaqua Hottentots, the
former inhabitants of the country. This migration is
said to have happened 150 years ago.

2. The Amatemba tribes form the second grand divi-
sion, commonly called Tambookies. They dwell near the
Bashee river, and extend inland as far as the Karroo desert.
They also inhabit the country to the northward and west-h
ward of the Amakosah. Their Umkumkani, or Chieftain,
who died in 1830, was Vapani. Mangwa and Tabo are
the subordinate chiefs of this division, and, as they are in
alliance with Hintza, the power of the Amatemba is really
very small. _

3. The third division are the Amaponda tribes, called
Mambookies, whose territories extend from the Bashee to
the river Umsikalia, about thirty miles beyond the St.
John, or Umzimboobo river. Their Umkumkani is Fako,
a very powerful chief, a man of talent, and much dreaded
by the surrounding tribes.

4. The fourth and last division is the Amazulu or
Zulu tribes, who dwell near Natal, between the Um-

CH. XVI.] ZULUS AND BECHUANAS. , 379

iizimboobo River and Delagoa Bay, along the coast, and in-
, land as far as the source of the Orange River, bordering
r‘ on the Bechuana country. These are divided into two
' branches, one near Natal, under their chief Dingau, suc-
) cessor to Ohaka, and the other under Matacatzee, who
i resides far inland.

The Amazulu are a warlike nomadic people, who
have conquered and extirpated the former inhabitants of
the country to the southward of Delagoa Bay. They formed
a barbaric kingdom of great _ extent, strikingly contrasted
with the patriarchal sway prevalent among other tribes of
the same race. They are a ﬁne handsome people, said to be
superior in stature and in beauty to all the other branches
of the Kaﬁr race. Captain Owen terms them “ ﬁne
Negroes, tall, robust, and warlike; in their manners open,
frank, and pleasing, with an air of independence in their
carriage.”

Under the protection of Fako is a tribe of Fingoes.
The Fingoes are descendants of various wandering tribes,
a vast number of whom are scattered through Kaﬁrland.
1 They are considered by the Kaﬁrs as a very inferior race
:of people, having no chief of their own.*'6

2. The Inland Ifaﬁrs, or Beckuanas.——The inland Kaﬁrs
Bare separated from the Amakosah and the tribes already
Eenumerated, by a chain of mountains. They inhabit the
iinterior of Southern Africa, 300 miles to the northward of
dthe Orange River, and are known to extend to a vast dis-
:tance towards the east and north. Their limits in these
{directions are not ascertained, and it is probable that they
Eextend far beyond the tropic of Capricorn. The Batclapis
rare the most southern nation of this race. They speak the
ESichuana language, which is cognate with the idiom of the
éAmakosah; and the designation of Bechuanas may be
EI considered as belonging to all the nations who speak that
;, variety of the Kaﬁr language.

 

* “Wanderings and Adventures in the Interior of Southern Africa.”
~By H. Stecdman. London, 1815.

O

380 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

The Bechuana tribes are described as superior to the
Amakosah in arts and civilisation. They inhabit large
towns and well-built houses, cultivate the ground, and lay
up stores. In their physiognomy, they rise a degree above
the Amakosah ; their complexion is of a brighter brown;
their features more like the European, and often beautiful.

North-eastward from the country of the Batzegurs, the
most southern of the Bechuana tribes, along the elevated
part which limits the basin of the Gariep, the improvement
in the inhabitants increases. In the country of the Tam-
mahas, Mr. Campbell saw ﬁelds of corn several hundred
acres in extent, near the town of Mashow, which contains
10,000 people. Among the Murutsi, 160 geographical
miles north-east by east of Litaku, he was surprised by the
appearance of great progress in arts and industry. The
Murutsi cultivate sugar and tobacco; manufacture razors
and knives of iron, almost steel; build their houses with
masonry, and ornament them with pillars and mouldings.

Beyond the Murutsi, towards the north-east, are the
Macquaina, a numerous people, surpassing the Murutsi in
wealth and numbers. The Murutsi obtain from the Mac-
quaina beads, the money of the country, which are obtained
by the latter people from the Mullaquam, or cleared in
commerce from the Mahalasely, a great nation situated to
the north-east of the Macquaina. The Mahalasely, as well
as their neighbours, the Mateebeylai, are of brown com-
plexion, and have long hair. They wear clothes, ride on.
elephants, climb into their houses, “ and are gods.” This“
last expression is usually applied to Europeans, with who :.
the Mahalasely are placed upon a level. All the nations.
from the Murutsi to the Mahalasely have the art of
mitigating the virulence of small-pox by inoculating
between the eyes.

According to Mr. Archbell, a Wesleyan Missionary, to
whom we owe a grammar of the Sichuana language, the
Damaras on the western coast of Africa speak a dialect of
the Sichuana, and must, therefore, be considered as Bechu—‘

   
  

 

g
.'

3 CH. xv1.] DAMARAS. 381

i anas. Mr. Archbell is said to have visited their country
twice, viz.once atWaalvisch Bay, and again by way of Great
;' Namaaqualand; and as he was well acquainted with the
‘ language, his testimony may be regarded as trustworthy.'*
We have, however, a different account of the Damaras
; from Captain J. E. Alexander, who undertook an expedi-
tion for the express purpose of exploring their country and
visiting the peOple, under the authority of Sir B. D’Urban.
The Damaras inhabit the country between the twenty-ﬁrst
and twenty-fourth parallel. According to Captain Alex-
ander, there are two nations called Damaras. They differ
from each other nearly in the same way as the Hottentots
and Bushmen. The Damaras of the Plains are very rich
in cattle, and for the possession of them have to wage
frequent wars with the Namaaquas, who are their neigh-
bours to the southward, and live between them and the
Orange River. The Hill Damaras have, like the Bushmen,
no cattle, but subsist by hunting and on roots. The
Damaras of the Plains extend from the Swakop north and
east; the Hill Damaras, from Kuisip for a considerable
distance south and east.

With regard to their physical characters, Captain
Alexander assures us that both nations are negroes ; that
is, they are blacks, with woolly hair, small round noses,
and thickish lips. The Damaras of the Plains, from their
superior living, are much more robust than those of the
hills. Many of the former live as slaves among the
Namaaquas.

The huts of both nations are conical, and built of stakes
driven into the ground. The Damaras of the Plains wattle
them, plaster them with clay, and cover them with hides.
The Hill Damaras bring the stakes to a point at the top,
and cover them with bushes.

The Damaras of the Plains are circumcised, and extract
the two front teeth of the lower jaw. They are almost
entirely naked, men and women wearing only a sort of skin

 

 

9“ Boyce’s Preface to Archbell’s “ Grammar of the Sichuana Language.”

382 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II. ‘

kilt about the waist, reaching to the knees. In war the
men have a plume of ostrich-feathers on the head,a leOpard-
or lion-skin thrown over the shoulders, besides the usual
kilt and sandals. Their arms are bows and arrows, and a
stabbing assagay or javelin, made entirely of iron.

The account given by Captain Alexander of the lan-
guage of the Damaras differs from that of Mr. Archbell.
He says, the Damaras of the Plains speak a language
peculiar to themselves, of which he has got a vocabulary.
It is much to be regretted that this vocabulary is not
published, as it would afford an opportunity of comparing
the idiom of these people with the Sichuana. He adds,
“ that the Hill Damaras speak the clicking Namaaqua
language.” Yet it would appear that the two nations are
regarded by the Namaaquas as one race, since they are
designated by them under the same name. “The Na-
maaquas call the whole nation of Damaras,” says Captain
Alexander, “ Dam-ap,* and distinguish the Hill Damaras
by the name of Humi (hill) or Hau (dung, that is, vile)
Dam-tip. The Pastoral Damaras call themselves Om-oto-
ronto-rondu, or Oke-temba-kachi-hiqui." This seems to
be a Kaﬁr word.

It appears from this account probable that the Hill
Damaras are, like other outcast tribes, a mixed peeple.
They sometimes live together with the Namaaquas, or
inhabit the same tracts, and they are apparently more or
less intermingled with them. The Namaaquas carry on
bloody wars with the Damaras of the Plains.

Near the Kei—kuruh River, Captain Alexander found 4,
occasional traces of Haiji Aibib, the Namaaqua deity.
Along a pile of stones lay a few branches, the offerings of
wayfarers. Under the pile dwells Haiji Aibib, a person

 

* This termination is, without a doubt, the ordinary N amaaqua personal
sufﬁx, which is written (mp or aub by the missionaries; the labial consonant
restricting it to the masculine. The word Dam is not known to us; as
N amaaqua; it may be the native appellation, which however, appears to be
Herero in the Scripture translations mentioned in the next note—ED.

CH. xv1.j KAFIRS. 383

feared by the Namaaquas, but of whose appearance and
power they have no distinct idea. “ The only trace of
religion I found among the Boschmans (between the Hill
Damaras and the Namaaquas), was at a pool of water, near
the Tans mountain, where, before they dug for water, they
presented an arrow, or a piece of skin or ﬂesh, to a large
red man with a white head, who is supposed to inhabit the
place, repeating a prayer for success in the chase.” The
people are, according to Captain Alexander, anxious for
missionaries: the women in particular said, “ Send us
teachers for ourselves and our children.” It does not
appear clear whether this relation applies to the Hill
Damaras, or to the Hottentots, or Namaaquas, who live
in the same tracts.ale

3. Kaﬁr Tribes of the Coast near Delagoa Bay—The
natives of the sea-coast near Delagoa Bay, and reaching
from Dundas River to Inhambane, nearly under the tropic,
are tribes resembling each other in physical characters
and manners. A vocabulary of the dialect spoken near
Delagoa Bay was ﬁrst collected by White, by means of '
which it was discovered that these people are of the Kaﬁr
race. The observation was made by Lichtenstein, and it
has been conﬁrmed by Captain Owen. According to
Owen, all the people on this coast, as far northward as the
Inhambane, speak a dialect intelligible to the Amakosah.

The hordes of native peOple on the coast of Natal have
been conquered by the Zulus. They were partly expelled
from their country, and in part admitted by the conquerors
among themselves. They are described as inferior to the
Nomadic Kaﬁrs in stature, a less powerful and energetic
people, and more similar to ordinary Negroes. They have
been termed Kaﬁrs of a degenerate sortnL though originally

 

* The publication of several Scripture narratives in the Damara lan-
guage by the Rhenish missionaries, demonstrates the correctness of Mr.
Archbell’s statement. The language is a Kaﬁr dialect. See Bleek dc
nominum generibus linguarum Africm Australis, note 19, page 6.——~ED.

“f White, Owen, and others.

3841 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [1300K II.

of the same stock. The Eingoes above mentioned are said
to be chieﬂy vanquished people of this region, reduced to
a sort of slavery by the Amazulu warriors. Dampier
described the native people of the coast of Natal, long
before the Zulu conquest, as Negroes of a jet-black colour.

Physical Characters {3}” the Ka 729.

In the 317th and 318th pages of the “ Natural History
of Man,” I have collected the most authentic description
of the Kaﬁr nations in general. I shall now add some par—
ticulars referring to the different subdivisions of the race.

In the ﬁrst place, I must remark that the Eastern
Kaﬁrs, taking the Amakosah for an example of them,
display considerable varieties of feature and complexion.
Individuals of the pure Kosa breed approximate in colour
and in physiognomy to the ordinary Negr0.*

The complexion of the majority is, however, of a lighter
hue, and much redder. By some the Kaﬁrs are reckoned
among red rather than among black races of mankind;
and a late American traveller declares that they resemble
the so-termed Indians of the American continent. The
adjoining coloured plate, taken from a drawing, of the
accuracy of which I am assured by Dr. Andrew Smith,
may serve to exemplify the complexion general among the
Amakosah, and it will also exemplify a type of features
strikingly diiferent from that of the Guinea Negro, and
prevalent among this nation.

It must be observed, that however their features and
colour may vary, their woolly hair associates them with
the African races. However, their hair, as Captain Owen
assures us, is often intermediate in character between that ‘
of the Negro and the European. The cranium, as I have ?
elsewhere shown, makes a great approach towards the f}

European form. 1
The Bechuana tribes in the interior rise still higher 1

 

* The portrait of ’l‘zatzoe, a well-known Kaﬁr chief, which may be seen g
in the place referred to, exempliﬁes this variety. ‘

 

 

/ ' j / / /
47w / {a . ///////,/.'///V

 

 

:dmnwm‘uwfaza

 

 

"////"/"////

. CH, XVL] KAFIRS. 385

‘is

in all respects, and approximate still further to the fea-
tures, and colour, and general physical character of the
more cultivated races of mankind. The ﬁgure which
accompanies this page was furnished by Dr. Andrew Smith
as a characteristic specimen of the Bechuana races.

The Kaﬁrs, as we are assured by Mr. Bunbury, are in
general tall, though not gigantic, and extremely well pro-
portioned. He says their ﬁne forms and easy attitudes
reminded him of ancient statues. They are more remark-

' able for activity than strength, in which, like other savages,
they are inferior to Europeans. The colour of most of them
appeared to be a deep amber brown, frequently approaching
to black, while in some instances it had a tinge of yellow
or red. They are so bedaubed with red ochre that it is
difﬁcult to ascertain their real colour.

The Kaﬁrs, according to Colonel Smith, who commanded
in the late Kaﬁr war, are an uncommonly intelligent,
acute, high-spirited, and brave people, although, like the
ancient Spartans, they consider theft no crime. Their
belief in witchcraft leads to even worse horrors among them
than those which were perpetrated formerly in Europe on
the same account.axe The victims, however, are not poor
old women, but rich men, who are worth plundering.
iThey evidently believe in some supernatural power: since
their chief Makanna succeeded in persuading his country-
amen that he had a divine mission.

The Kaﬁrs sometimes display the peculiar accumulation
of fat over the glutei muscles, which is more common
Iamong the Bushmen. The widow of Gaika, as we are
assured by Mr. BunburynL had a hump which rivalled that
;of the celebrated Hottentot Venus.

Professor Lichtenstein gives the following description of
the physical characters of the Kaﬁrs :—

“ The universal characteristics of all the tribes of this

 

* This is a trait which is common also to the Fijis, and some other
races in Melanesia—ED.
1' Mr. Bunbury’s “ Travels in South Africa,” vol. i. p. 159.
C C

386 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

great nation consist in an external form and ﬁgure varying
exceedingly from the other nations of Africa. They are
much taller, stronger, and their limbs much better pro-
portioned; their colour is brown; their hair black and
woolly; their countenances have a character peculiar to
themselves, and which does not permit their being included
in any of the races of mankind above enumerated; they
have the high forehead and prominent nose of the Euro-
peans, the thick lips of the Negroes, and the high cheek-
bones of the Hottentots ; their beards are black, and much
fuller than those of the Hottentots. Their language is ‘
full-toned, soft, and harmonious, and spoken with clut- i
tering ; their root-words are of one or two syllables; their

sound simple, without diphthongs; their pronunciation is
slow and distinct, resting upon the last syllable. Their
dialects differ in the diiferent tribes, but the most distant I
ones understand each other.” 1

OF THE NATIVE TRIBES OF THE COAST OF MOZAMBIQUE.

The coast of Mozambique is that part of the sea-border,
of Africa which is washed by the channel that separates
the island of Madagascar from the mainland. The name
is taken from that of a town and fortress, built by the'
Portuguese in 1508 to be the seat of government over
the neighbouring countries of Africa, which they had
partially subdued and colonised. The Mozambique coast
extends from the river Inhambane northward as far as
Cape Delgado.

The history of this eastern coast reaches much further
back than that of the west of Africa. The Phoenicians ‘
traded to it, and probably had settlements on it ; and they;
Ophir of Solomon and Hiram is supposed to have been:
situated on this part of the continent, and to have giveni
to it that name Which the Romans perhaps learned from,
the Carthaginians, and made the perpetual designation of
this whole quarter of the world. In the year of our eraW

 

 

  
 

’ CH. xv1.] MOZAMBIQUE TRIBES. 387

950, Ebn Haukal mentioned the coast of Zinjbar, or
Zinguebar; and Massudi shortly afterwards described
Sofala as a country rich in gold, and covered with corn
and with towns, but without snow, rain, or ships. It was
often visited by Arabs and by foreign merchants from
India, “who came thither,” as Massudi says, “ to buy
‘ children and transport them into various countries of the
‘ world.” The slave-trade was practised, therefore, not only
‘ before Christian, but before Mohammedan merchants
navigated these seas. The king of Zanghi, or Zanguebar,
I commanded an army who were mounted on oxen like the
Ipresent Kaﬁrs , the people traded also in gold, ivory, and
steel. Such was the state of things 1n this part of Afiica
I more than eight centuries ago. 9*

The Portuguese overpowered the Arabs on the African
I coast, and expelled them from the borders of the Zambesi,
Ior Cuama, the great stream which falls into the sea of
EMozambique, and forms the harbour of Quilimani. This
iriver was regarded as the principal inlet to the riches of
lthe inland country, which was expected to rival the more
icelebrated regions of South America in its mines of gold
Eand silver. The remains of the Moslemin were miserably
idestroyed by their European visitors in 1569 ; and in the
ifollowing year the Portuguese made an expedition into
:the interior, for the conquest of the country and working
:of its mines. But they found enemies of a very different
ficharacter from the feeble natives of Peru whom the
ESpaniards had so easily subdued; the Africans resisted
f:them with obstinacy, and ﬁnally baﬂied all attempts to
Isubjugate them.

 

 

* There is a short vocabulary of the language of the African slaves in
iWestern India, called Seedees, in Lieut. Burton’s “History of Sindh”
:(London, 8vo. 1851), p. 372. Three- fourths of the words there given
«belong unmistakeably to Kaﬁr dialects ;—the numerals are l, moya;
t2, perhi; 3, tahti’i; 4 mme; 5, thano; 6, thandatu; 7,mf1'1ngat; 8, mnani;
9 mpya; 10, kummi. These may be compared with the Suaheli, N 1ka and
EKamba, p. 418; the only word not Kaﬁr in one dialect or other, is the
requivalent for nine—ED.

388 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The whole region behind the Mozambique coast was,
before this period, according to the intelligent Dom Joao
dos Sanctos, inhabited by the great nation of the Muca-
rongas long subject to the one sovereign of Monomotapa ;*
but this empire had been divided, like that of the Mani-
kongo, into several independent, though still powerful
states. One of these, still called Monomotapa, to the
north, was larger than the rest, and extended in length
and breadth upwards of 200 leagues. The second was the
kingdom of the Quitive, on the river Sofala ; Sedanda on
the Sabia, and Chiconga or Manien, are still well known.
The natives of all these countries were one race, and spoke
the Mucaronga tongue. To the northward of these were
the people of Abutua, which reached across Africa to
Angola, and abounded in ﬁne gold.

The Portuguese concluded their vain attempts to con-
quer the country by making a treaty with the Quitive, or
sovereign, who accorded them a free passage through his ‘
territory on the condition of a yearly tribute of 200 pieces
of cloth. An expedition, under the command of Barreto,
in 1570, was not without fruit in respect to the extension
of geographical knowledge. Barreto traversed the moun-
tains of Lupata, denominated the “ Spine of the World.” '
Afterwards he founded the settlement of Senna on the
Zambesi, and that of Tete, sixty leagues higher up the
river, and got possession of the silver mines of Chicova. f
But the warlike Mongas massacred their garrison at Tete, _7
and forced them to return to Senna. This was in 1600. l
The Portuguese still have factories on the Zambesi, and;
claim possession of the Mozambique coast. The port of f
Quilimani, at the mouth of the Zambesi, is the chief .§
entrepot of their trade.

The sources of the Zambesi are unknown: the river
ﬂows from the highlands of the interior ; it traverses, for I
a great distance, the so-termed silver plains of Chicova,

 

* Probably meaning the empire of the M0720 or Maui, or sovereign of
Motapa.

 

D CH. XVI.] MOZAMBIQUE TRIBES. 389

f through which it is said to be navigable, till it reaches the
1 cataracts of Chicoronga, and descends through them into
r the second level of the eastern border of the great African
[ plateau, which, according to Bitter, is the still elevated
t region of the Mucarongas, the subjects of the Quitive of
I Monomotapa. Through the mountains of Lupata it again
1 falls by a series of rapids extending eighteen geographical
E miles, which the same writer compares to the falls of the
E Indus at Attock and those of the Ganges at Hurdwar and
. of the Niger at Bammakou, into the lower level or littoral
g plain of Eastern Africa, on which are the Portuguese town
I of Senna and the tracts occupied by the Negro nations of
I the Mozambique coast. These three regions of succes-
: sively lower elevation have different temperatures, and,
: according to the notices that have been collected, present
: all the phenomena of very different climates, and all those
9‘ various peculiarities of organic nature which respectively
E belong to them. In the interior or higher region, according
' to the Portuguese traveller Pereira, whose statement has
E been conﬁrmed by later testimony, there is a great lake
T termed the Lake of Zambri in the country of the Movizas,
; a civilised people, whose sovereign is said to live in great
:magniﬁcence, and to be clothed in silk and gold. This
Z lake IS termed by the natives N’Yassa, or the Inland Sea.
‘ “ It is situated to the westward of a chain of lofty moun-
§tains, beyond which 1s an extensive highland plain. The
Elake becomes visible to the traveller who has ascended this
Ebmdering chain at a great distance, in the midst of the
gplain, studded with innumerable islands, it is said to
;‘ contain fresh water, but no hippopotami or crocodiles,
' though these creatures abound in the riv e1s below the
i mountains. The natives of this country are mountaineers,
Eand they display that superiority, both in their physical
i and social state, which often distinguishes the inhabitants
Eof elevated countries 1n Africa from those of the lower
i and hotter regions. The Moviza, the Mucamango, the
E Muchiva, or the Monomuezi, nations inhabiting the plains

i

390 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

above the souICes of the great rivers, are said to be of a.
bright b1 own complexion, tall, vigorous, handsome, like
the Amazuluh, or the fairest of the Bechuanas, near the
Cape of Good Hope. The fairest tribe are said to be the g
Wambungo :* these pe0p1e are termed whites by the neigh-
bouring black races, and it is supposed that they have given
the foundation to the story of white nations inhabiting the 1
interior of Africa.”+

The people of the middle region, or the Mucarongas of
Dos Sanctos, are plainly allied, as we shall ﬁnd, to the
nations of the Mozambique coast. I shall cite the quaint
description which this old writer has given of their physical 1
and moral characters :—

“ The Quiteve’s people,” as he says, “ are the strongest i
of the Mucarongas, and the best archers and most expert;
at the azagay.” “ The Quiteve, for so the king is termed, .
is of curled hair, a gentile, which worships nothing. ” “ I i!
believe for certain that this Caphar nation is the most {
brutal and barbarous in the world, neither worshipping; i
God nor any idol, nor have image, church, or sacriﬁce”

. . “ only they believe the soul’s immortalitie 1n another 5
world. They confess that there is a devill, which they?
call Musaca. They hold monkeys were in past time men
and women, and call them the ‘old people.’ ” “Every
September the king goes to a high hill to perform obites
or exsequies to his predecessors there buried.” “ In this
feast the king and his nobles clothe themselves in their
best silks and cottons. After eight days’ festivall they
spend two or three days in mourning; then the devill
enters into one of the company, saying that he is the soul
of the deceased king.”

“ The Cafres of Quiteve are as black as pitch, curled,
and wear their hair full of hornes made of the same hair, '
which stand up like distaﬂs, wearing slender pins of wood
Within their locks to uphold them without bending. The

 

3“ Query, Mpungwe.—ED.
1' “Edinburgh Review,” N o. 124:, p. 352.

 

CH. xv1.j MOZAMBIQUE TRIBES. 391

vulgar go naked, both men and women, without shame,
wearing only an apron made of a monkey’s skin.

“ In Mucaronga, some parents as black as pitch have
white, gold-locked children, like Flemmings. Whilst I
was in the country, the Quiteve nourished one white childe
in the court as a strange prodigie. The Monomotapa kept
two other white Cafres, with like admiration.”ale

Modern travellers describe the natives of the coast of
Mozambique as a race of Negroes. Mr. Salt has given an
account of two nations in this region. One of them is the
Monjou, who inhabit the inland country, and are probably
the Mujaos of Portuguese writers. He says they are
Negroes of “the ugliest description, having high cheek-
bones,thicklips,small knots of woolly hair, like peppercorns,
on their heads, and skins of a deep, shining black.” These
people may be the Mucarongas.+ The natives of the coast
are termed by Salt, and by Captain Owen, and many other
writers, Makua and Makuana; these are the proper Ne-
groes of Mozambique, well known in the slave countries of
the Portuguese. I have seen an individual of this race,
who was brought to England by Dr. Natterer from the
Brazils ; he was a tall Negro, very black, with woolly hair,
and features resembling those of the natives of Guinea.
He said that Makuani is the name of the Negroes of
Mozambique, and that the neighbouring tribes are termed
M’chauva [Muchiva P], M’nijempani, Mlomoi, and Maravi.
A short vocabulary of his language, which he gave me,
proves it to be a dialect of the Kaﬁr Speech. The 742’ or
ma forming the initial of these names is a Kaﬁr preﬁx.

The high country in the interior of Africa, in the lati-
tude of Mozambique, is situated under a very different cli- '
mate from that of the coast ; and it was to be expected that
the native inhabitants would display a different physical
character. As in other parts of the world, so also in

 

4‘ Purchas’s “ Pilgrims,” vol. ii. p. 1548—155].
1‘ A short vocabulary of the idiom of the Makua and Monjou, given by
Mr. Salt, proves these nations to be allied to the Mucurougas.

392 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11;.

Africa, the high mountainous tracts of the interior are the
abodes of races of lighter colour than the natives of low
countries on the coast. We have made this observation to
the northward, in the high regions of Atlas, and in the
East, in Abyssinia, Kaﬁ‘a, and Enarea, and now ﬁnd the
same remark to hold good in the countries inhabited by
the Great South African race.

The tribes of Mozambique were the ﬁrst people
called Kaﬁrs by Europeans, who acquired the epithet from
the Mohammedan navigators of the Indian Ocean. There
are many nations of them, all, so far as evidence extends,
speaking dialects cognate with the language of the Kaﬁrs
in the south ; but they are not generally termed Kaﬁrs by
modern writers. The names of these tribes, beginning
with Ma, or Mani, and Mone, afford some slight presump-
tion of affinity in their idioms: the vocabularies which
have been collected conﬁrm this suspicion, and lead us to
agree with those missionaries and travellers who regard all
the nations of the eastern part of South Africa as branches
of the same stock with the Amakosah and Amazuluh.

The features of the natives display the same varieties .
as in other parts of the African coast. Captain Owen
says, the farther our travellers advanced from the coast,
the more they observed the natives to improve in appear-
ance. Of those of Moroora, many seem ﬁrmly knit, stout,
and elegantly proportioned; some are perfect models of
the human form. They go naked, with the exception of
a piece of cloth barely sufﬁcient for decency of appearance.
Some have their beard shaved, others only in part, but
many not at all. In this latter case, the hair—for it is ‘
worthy of remark that they have not wool—grows long, is
neatly plaited, and turning in slender curls communicates
to the countenance a wild and savage aspect; in this re-
sembling the people of Madagascar, whose covering is

 

 

* For further information on this subject, I must refer my readers to
the second volume of my “ Researches into the Physical History of Man-
kind,” treating on the ethnography of the African nations.

lCH. xv1.j ZANZIBAR TRIBES. 393

neither wool nor hair, and is dressed in a similar manner.
The variation here noted from woolly to merely frizzled
hair, or the diﬁ'erence of description, is often disconnected
in the accounts of cognate races, or of the same tribe seen
by different travellers. The mode of dressing the hair
practised by these people is similar to that used by the
Kosas, as well as by the nations of the mountainous
regions, particularly the Mucaronga.
FIG. 7 9.

 

Mozambique.

The accompanying ﬁgure displays a specimen of the
physical character of Mozambique Kaﬁrs : it has some-
thing of the Negro character, though improved. The head
of a native of Mozambique, in the opposite plate, which is
taken from the atlas of Rugendas, exhibits a physiognomy
which might well pass for European, were it not for the
black colour and the woolly hair.

OF THE NATIVE TRIBES OF THE COAST OF ZANZIBAR.

. To the northward of Cape Delgado and 0f the Mozam-
blque Channel and the Island of Madagascar, the sea-

3941 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

border of Africa is termed the coast of Zanzibar. This
reaches to the Equator; from thence northward to Cape
Guardafui and the Straits of Babelmandeb, is the coast of
'Ajan, or that of the Sumali. The Sumali are the race of
peeple who inhabit this coast: they are a tribe altogether
distinct from the Suaheli or Suhaili who possess the coast
‘ of Zﬁnzibar. These two nations divide between them all
,theimaritime tract of Eastern Africa, from the great pro-
jecting Cape of Guardafui to the Channel of Mozam-
bique.

The inhabitants of all this eastern coast have received
some portion of foreign culture from the trade which has
been carried on immemorially in the Indian Ocean. Set-
tlements have long existed at the different havens of the
coast, which have been the resort of traders from various
ports of Arabia and of India. In later times,since the mari-
time discoveries of the Portuguese, these places have been '
visited by European merchants. The native inhabitants
are no longer savages or pagans ; they may be considered
as semi-civilised nations, and they profess the Mahommedan
religion, which implies some degree of elevation above the
condition of idolaters or fetish-worshippers.

The Sumali who have the northern part of this coast
reach from the Gulf of Aden to Magadoxo. They are a
pastoral people, and in their seaports are addicted to com-
merce and navigation. The seaport of Barbara belongs to
them; there they hold a fair or mart, and exchange the
gold, ivory, and slaves brought from the interior of Africa,
for the gums, myrrh, and incense of Arabia. To the south-
ward of the Sumali, the Suaheli occupy a similar position.
They are more rude than the former people, and differ
from them in physical characters. A late voyager has con-
trasted the ﬁne, regular features of the Sumali, their soft
hair, ﬂowing down their shoulders in soft ringlets, and
artiﬁcially changed to a ﬂaxen colour, with the jet-black
complexions and woolly hair of the Suaheliﬁ“

 

I“ ‘5‘” Bird: “ Journal of Royal Geographical Society,’V’—vol.iv:"p.w 154.

01{.xv1.] ZANZIBAR TRIBES. 395

An interesting fact in the ethnology of Easte1n Africa
has been made known by a comparison of the languages/eh
these nations with those of the barbaious people wh/ m- .
habit the adjacent countries in the inland. By thi'v:clue ﬂ’i’ﬁa;
we have discovered that the Sumali and the Suaheli ‘3
foreigners who have come across the sea to colonis ’
coast of Africa, but are akin to the tribes of the mo ‘
tains and forests in the interior behind the sea-borde1
which they inhabit. The Sumali speak a dialect of the
language of the Galla, and the Suaheli are proved by their
idiom to be a branch of the Great South African race, to
which the Kongoese and the Kaﬁrs belong.

The extremely unhealthy climate of the eastern coast of
Africa has prevented the growth and increase of Portu-
guese colonies. Although settlements were made on
the coast of Melinda and Mozambique some hundred years
ago, they have never ﬂourished, and there is now scarcely
any population of Portuguese origin on the whole extent
of the sea-border. The same cause probably impeded in
earlier times the increase of Arabian colonies; and in still
more remote ages were, perhaps, the only obstacles which
prevented the existence of Phoenician cities on the coast of
Ophir which might have rivalled the fame of Utica, and
Carthage, and Gades, on the shores of the Mediterranean. To
this cause the Sumali and the Suaheli are indebted for their
present existence as distinct parts of the human family.

The whole length of the maritime tract from Cape
Guardafui, near Aden, to Cape Delgado, Opposite the
northern extremity of Madagascar, has been claimed of
late years by the Imam of Muscat. The pretensions of
this new potentate, as it has been observed, are not founded
on the right of conquest or acquisition by any means, but
on the maxims of the policy of our times, which allows the
possession of it to none of the European powers. The
English have restored to him the island of Mombas, and
have thereby obtained an additional claim to his friendship
and alliance. He has conquered some other places on the

  
    

396 ‘ NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

coast, or they have voluntarily surrendered themselves to
him, and are subject to him so long as he leaves them
unmolested under their own governments. The commerce
which Europeans carry on upon this coast has been hitherto
very proﬁtable. Copal, valuable furs, annually about
6000 elephants’ teeth, and spices from Zanzibar, are ex-
ported, whilst all European wares are admitted; and the
trade carried on by the natives is only to Madagascar,
Arabia, and India. The Imam is in the meantime the
sole great merchant of the country, and employs his twenty
great and smaller war-galleys chieﬂy in commerce. In
spite of all his treaties with the English, he permits along
the whole of this long tract of coast avery proﬁtable slave-
trade to be carried on; a slave may be purchased on the
coast for two or three dollars, while the proﬁt obtained
from each slave in the trade amounts to forty or ﬁfty
dollars. The Mohammedans excuse the capture and sale
of slaves by reason that the captives thereby obtain the
privilege of Islam ; but experience proves that this
is only a pretence, and even after the slave’s conversion
he is just as cruelly treated as before by his believing
owners.*

The following extracts contain the latest information
respecting the Suaheliﬂr They are part of a communication
from the Rev. Mr. Krapf, sent to Von Ewald, and published
by that learned writer in the “ Zeitschrift der deutschen
morgenlandischen Gesellschaf 2”—

“ The inhabitants of all this narrow line of coast, from the
fourth degree of south latitude to Mozambique, are termed
Suaheli (that is,in Arabic, inhabitants of the sea-coast): they
are themselves Mohammedans. Their language, however,
proves that they are the aboriginal people of this country,
since, though mixed with foreign words, it is funda-

 

'* Krapf. See “ Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenl. Gesellsch.” Th. i.

T The word Suaheli is derived from the Arabic Sat/ml, signifying “a
plain,” and it means merely a lowlander. The Suaheli call themselves
Wa-zumba.——ED.

CH. XVI.] ZANZIBAR TRIBES. ' 397

mentally allied to other languages spoken further inland.
These people formerly undertook, either in conjunction
with the Portuguese, or else alone, many warlike expedi-
tions into the interior, in order to carry off slaves and other
booty. But in later times the pagan tribes of the interior
have pressed more towards the sea-coast, and have destroyed
many of their places. Even Melinda has been given up
to the Mohammedans through fear of the Gallas. Islam,
which elsewhere in Africa makes such rapid progress, seems
in this part to set up no pretence of the kind. Nomadic
and pagan Gallas at present frequent the sea-coast from
the equator to about the fourth degree of south latitude :
their number may be computed at eight or ten millions.
The ferocity which in this people inspires so much terror
in Abyssinia is in these countries still more remarkable.
Here, for instance, they are known to be excessively fond
of the blood of goats, sheep, and other animals,and they open
their veins in order to suck the blood.” Krapf observed
the extreme leanness of the goats belonging to these Gallas,
which was explained to him by reference to this circum-
stance. “ The Gallas in Abyssinia who till the soil have not
this custom, and are otherwise distinguished in language,
government, and many other particulars, from these nomadic
tribes of the sea-coast. For the rest, these maritime Gallas
live in a sort of subjection under the more powerful tribes
in the interior, for whom they are obliged to defend the
sea-coast against the Mohammedans. Their caravans go
from thirty to forty miles inland to a country which is
traversed by a great river, and resorted to by the Abys-
sinians. The country described is probably J ingiro and
Kaffa. .

“ To the southward of these Gallas, and behind the
Suaheli, dwell the Wanika, Ukuaﬁ, and Matambas,
people very different from the Gallas in manners, lan-
guage, and physical conformation. Among these races the
Ukuaﬁ are the most remote from civilisation ; they do not
bury their dead, but leave them to be devoured by wild

398 ' NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

beasts. The Wakamba go generally quite naked, but are
obliged to put on clothing when they resort occasionally to
the sea-coast. The Wanika, who live in the forests, about
200,000 in number, are pagans, though they have no
images: they are in the habit of preparing a strong drink
from cocoa-nuts, and are much addicted to intoxication and
other vices. They are fond of certain games in which the
young men engage, and in which one of the company must
always become a victim. Still further towards the south
are the abodes of the Masambara, and beyond them are
the Msegua tribes, opposite the isle of Zanzibar, through
whose country a caravan-road leads far into the interior of
Africa.

“ Although scarcely any regulations of society exist
among these tribes, except that in every village the oldest
man of the place becomes a sort of king, the nature of the
whole country to the southward of the equator is such as by
itself would seem likely to lead its inhabitants to a higher
culture. It is not, like the region further northward, spread
out in level deserts of sand, but is full of hills and forests,
and fertilised by frequent showers.”

Physical Characters of the Saaheli.—We have some
accounts of the Suaheli in an excellent memoir by Mr.
Bird, published in the “ Journal of the Royal Geogra-
phical Society.” In this we are assured that the Suaheh'
are of a jet-black colour, and that they have woolly
hair. It is observed that they have not the thick lips or
the protruding mouth which are characteristic of genuine
Negroes.

Captain Owen has mentioned the Suaheli repeatedly,
but he has not fully described them. He merely remarks
that they are Mohammedans, and that they differ in person
and character both from Arabs and from native Africans,
meaning Negroes.

[The zeal and learning of our missionaries, and particu-
larly of the Rev. Dr. Krapf, have recently added very con-

CH. XVI.) ‘ KAFIR TRIBES. 399

siderably to our knowledge of Africa south of the equator,
and have conﬁrmed most satisfactorily the expressed
opinions of the author that nearly the whole of that vast
territory, with the exception of the small space still inha-
bited by the Hottentots, is held by people of one family
as closely allied in language to one another as are the
Indo-germanic races,—perhaps even more so; the analogy,
so far as the languages are yet known, being more like
that between Gothic, Lithuanian, Slavonic, Celtic, Greek,
Latin, and Sanskrit, to the exclusion of Albanian,
Armenian, and any other more remote or doubtful
branches. This territory, which we continue to call Kaﬁr,
is encroached upon by tribes of the Galla family, all of
whom appear to be essentially nomades and warriors,
while the Kaﬁrs are certainly cultivators, and therefore
stationary; and in compensation, the Kaﬁr area, in one
quarter at least, goes over to the north of the Equator.
The notices we have of habits and customs, and of mental
character generally, coincide with the evidence afforded by
language: the testimony of physical characteristics is not
so complete, our informants having been rather interested
in describing the mental than the bodily qualities of the
people they saw ; but is only deﬁcient, never antagonistic.
In general, the personal characters are mentioned as com-
pared with those of Negroes. Dr. Krapf says expressly
that all the people from the sources of the Nile to the
Cape of Good HOpe are distinguished from the Negroes by
their less intense colour, which he calls brownish, by their
less projecting lips, and less woolly hair.9K

Dr. Krapf’s many years’ residence in South Africa gave
him greater opportunities than have fallen to the lot of
any man, to obtain a knowledge of the inhabitants; he
spoke with ﬂuency several of the languages, and made
occasional incursions far into the interior, always accom-
panying the discharge of his duties as a missionary by
an anxious inquiry into the languages of tribes still farther

 

 

* “ Church Missionary Il’ltelligencer,” vol. ii. p. 56.

400 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

advanced, with a View to facilitate the progress of future
missions beyond the point to which he was himself able to
penetrate. He thus collected ﬁfteen vocabularies, ﬁve of
which,in Kaﬁrdalects,—the Suaheli,Nika, Kamba, Pokomo,
and Hiau*—he published at Tubingen in 1850, with one of
the Galla language, all in parallel columns. He also pub-
lished a Grammar of the Suaheli language. The following
information respecting the Kafir tribes is condensed from
the prefaces to these valuable works, and from the journals
of Dr. Krapf and Mr. Rebmann, printed in the “ Church
Missionary Intelligencer.” The Rev. Mr. Rebmann accom-
paniedDr. Krapf in some of his journies,and on two occasions
in 1848- 49 he visited alone the more remote countries of
the J aggas, of whom he brought back interesting infor-
mation.

The Suahelis, who call themselves, in their own language,
Wa- zumba, live on the eastern coast of Africa, south of
the line. The language 1s generally understood, from 11°.N
to the Mozambique country south, by all the Mahometans
of South-East Africa. It is the vernacular tongue of
Melinda, the ﬁrst place on the eastern coast visited by
the Portuguese, and so poetically described by Camoens.
The language is the most cultivated of the Kaﬁr tongues,
and is almost indispensable to a traveller in East Africa,

 

* The Editor has taken the liberty to remove the Kaﬁr preﬁx, which he
thinks not only awkward but positively incorrect. Dr. Krapf calls these
languages Kisuaheli, Kipokomo, Kigalla, &c. The fact is, that all the
Kaﬁr tongues have certain particles distinguishing singulars from plurals
(and sometimes duals), adjectives from substantives, and one kind of sub-
stantive from another. Dr. Krapf, in the narrative of his journeys into Sam-
bara in 1852, speaks of the Kisambara language, spoken by the Wasambara,
who live in Usambara; and now and then mentions a Masambara, one of
a Kisambara family. Different dialects have different particles: in the lan-
guage which the Editor would wish to call Chuana, a native of the country
is a Mochuana, two are Buchuana, the people generally are the Bichuana,
and the language is Sichuana: and the latter w ords have become current 111
English, to the puzzlement of readers of African intelligence. Wherever
the Kaﬁr preﬁx has not become part and parcel of the English appellation,
the Edito1 omits it.

O

CH. XVI.] KAFIR TRIBES. 401

who by its aid will easily be able, as we are informed by
Dr. Krapf, to master any of the dialects of the interior.
The New Testament-has been translated into this language
according to the dialect of Mombas. It is spoken by
about 400,000 people.

The N ika tribes [Kinika, Wanika, &c.] occupy the
higher country between 3° and 5° south lat., beginning 15 or
20 miles from the sea. They are pagans, but they worship
a Supreme Being, whom they call Mulugnu, offering to him
prayers and sacriﬁces. They also offer sacriﬁces on the
graves of their deceased relatives, generally of rice and palm
wine. This custom, whether it be worship or a mere mark
of respect to the deceased, is common to most Kaﬁr tribes,
but milk is the usual offering among those of the interior.
The Wanika are well provided with wine, and much
addicted to excess ; they are a drunken race, according to
Dr. Krapf, and the preference of wine to milk as an offering
is thus accounted for. They are also more sensually disposed
than the rest of the Kaﬁrs, and they use the privilege of
divorce, which is accorded to all the tribes, to a much
greater extent than the rest. The Government is a loose
sort of republic, and the language is intelligible without
much difﬁculty to the J aggas, Kambas, and Taitas, far in
the interior. They number about 60,000 souls. The
Gospel of St. Luke has been printed at Bombay in the
language of this tribe. ,

The Kambas [Wakamba, Ukambani, 860.] are 4.00 miles
from the coast, but they are also found elsewhere, being
the special traders of South Africa, and therefore more
migratory than Kaﬁrs generally, easily establishing them-
selves in various localities. In the course of their trade
they go to the centre of the continent to procure ivory,
either by barter, or by hunting the wild elephant, and
they return to the coast at Mombas to exchange their
merchandise for the articles they want themselves. They
are of a cheerful disposition, and live on terms of friendship
with all the tribes of the interior, of Kaﬁr race ; but have

D n

402 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

no intercourse with the Masai, Kuaﬁ, and Gallas, who
are nomades, and, as a consequence, plunderers. Most of
the Kambas have long hair, which they dress in very many
small twisted strings, frequently made up with little white
beads. They also place strings of beads of various colours
round the neck, loins, and ankles; and wealthy persons wear
a great number of small brass or iron chains, very neatly
made. They grease their bodies with butter and red ochre,
like all the African tribes seen by Dr. Krapf. Their houses
are circular, without windows, having a low and narrow
door through which the inhabitants creep ; their furniture
is of course scanty ; their beds are made of a cow’s skin laid
over a frame of bamboo or other wood, in form not unlike
a four-post bedstead. They use a chair, which is neatly
made, and carried about when they travel, for they do not
sit upon the ground like most of the other tribes. Their
dwellings usually contain a good provision of ﬁre-wood,
carefully cut, split, and dried, and neatly piled up in a
corner. Their food is principally Indian corn, in the form
of pudding or gruel, but they take also some meat and
milk, and they prepare an intoxicating drink called uki,
made from the juice of the sugar-cane. They are talkative
and merry, but the men generally enjoy themselves in
small parties, drinking and chattering and laughing, while
the women are employed in domestic matters or in culti-
vating the ground. The wealthy marry ten or more Wives,
whose business is to attend to the care of the husband’s
property, which maybe scattered about in various hamlets,
the head wife alone living in the establishment of the
husband; so that polygamy appears rather to be the engage-
ment of a household of servants "and stewards than a real
multiplication of marriages. The Kambas marry at ﬁfteen, g
and even twelve years of age, though it is not at all un- 1
common to ﬁnd persons of twenty or twenty-ﬁve years old i
unmarried. Dr. Krapf thinks that marriage is checked by i
the large amount required to be paid for a wife by her i

1

parents, and by a singular custom among the Kambas, g

g
.1
ll

5
x

CH. xv1.] KAFIR TRIBES. 403

according to which the bridegroom is required to carry off
his bride by force, after the preliminaries are completed.
This is attempted by the help of all the friends and relatives
that the man can muster, and resisted by the friends
and relatives of the woman ; and the contest now and then
terminates in the discomﬁture of the unlucky husband,
who is reduced to the necessity of waylaying his wife, when
she may be alone in the ﬁelds or fetching water from the
well. When the lady is brought home the price is paid,
and all contest is ended. The habit of begging, which is
found so annoying by travellers in Africa, is scarcely known
to the Kambas of the interior, though it is common enough
among such as have had intercourse with the Mahometans
of the coast. Dr. Krapf found these Kambas to be “ great
liars and most boisterous beggars.”

The belief in sorcery, in the power to produce rain and
thunder, and to put a charm, called utzai, into the house or
plantation of an enemy to destroy him, is universal among
them, and is found also in many other Kaﬁr tribes. But
by no means in them exclusively : the Negroes have some
of these practices; the Mongols and Fins of EurOpe and
Asia all believe in the power of affecting the weather ; the
navigators of the Scandinavian coast buy favourable winds
of the Lapland witches, and some very curious accounts
of the storm-producers among the Mongols are given by
Mons. Quatremere in his notes to the “ History of the

‘ Mongols” of Rashid-eldin (see the“ Collection Orientale,”
' Paris, 1836, vol. i. p. 428, et seq.)

The Kambas are not without mechanical skill; they
: smelt the iron ore of their country, produce iron of excellent
I quality, and form swords, knives, and hatchets,——useful,
I though somewhat rough; and are very expert in the manu-
Ifacture of ﬁne points for their arrows. They fashion their
1 clay into pots which stand the ﬁre, and they make tobacco
1 pipes which are found perfectly serviceable. The bark of a
1 tree is pounded and converted into ﬁbres, which are twisted
lby the women into thin strings ; and of this they make
lbags which are far better than those met with on the coast.

404k NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The produce of their skill in such fabrics, and of their hunt-
ing expeditions in the wilder regions of Kikuyu, Mb‘e, and
Uimbu,t0 the north-west of their own country, together with
the cattle, goats, and sheep reared upon the rich pastures
of Ukambani (Kamba country), give them the means of car-
rying on an extensive trade; and they have proﬁted by this
power to make themselves the most wealthy tribe of
Eastern Africa. Many individuals in the interior possess
several hundred head of cattle, besides sheep and goats; and
From their trade with the coast they obtain cloth of various
colours, beads, brass wire, red ochre, pepper, salt, and the »
many other articles which constitute wealth and luxury in
Africa. There is no general government among the
Kambas, but an irregular sort of patriarchal 0r clannish
system prevails, and the judgments pronounced by the
heads of families, or by the most inﬂuential men of a dis-
trict, if not repugnant to what is considered the custom of
the country, are invariably obeyed. It would appear that
superior wealth, or age, or acknowledged wisdom, which.
may consist in eloquence or fame of witchcraft, constitutes
power in the non-monarchical communities of Kaﬁrland.
The wealth of the Kambas, and their intercourse with the
Mahometans of the coast, have recently introduced among
them the curse of slavery, but it has not appeared in the
more detestable form of selling slaves ; they only purchase

for domestic purposes, ——a crime shared by too many white ,

nations. The Kamba nation may amount perhaps to
80,000 persons; a missionary station will probably be
established in their country, “ as the ﬁrst link of an equa- -
torial mission-chain,” which will probably be the means of
making known and Christianising all South Africa, with
which they have extensive intercourse. The Gospel of
St. Mark is printed in their language.

The Pokomo tribes live on the river called on our maps
Quilimancy [Kilima, mountain; mansi, water], three or
four degrees south of the equator. The Gallas give the name
of Marc to this river, which is also called Dana and Pokemo.
The language of the Pokemos has received some Galla

 

 

l

CH. xv1.] KAFIR TRIBES. $05

admixture, from their constant intercourse with the Gallas,
to whom they are subject. They are a commercial and
agricultural people, raising rice and corn for the purpose of
barter with the Gallas for ivory, which they sell to the
Suahelis for manufactured articles. They navigate the
Quilimaney in small boats, but avoid the upper river,
their intercourse not extending into the interior.

The Wahiau live on the NE. of the lake Nyassa, which
Dr. Krapf believes to be the Maravi of our maps. The
Doctor learned the language of a slave brought from the
country, which appears, from the accounts he received, to
be the great mart of east African slaves. He heard an
account of the capture of 7,000 of the Hiau people by the
Mawizi, a tribe on the SW. of the lake, who must be the
Moviza of our maps. The most brutal acts of cruelty,
according to his informants, accompanied this capture;
they may be deemed incredible, but the concurrence of
native information left no doubt of the main fact.

Of the above tribes Dr. Krapf has printed vocabularies,
as stated above.

The Sambara nation, between the 4° and 6° of south lat.,
and 100 miles from the coast, were also visited by Dr.
Krapf, and described in the fourth volume of the “ Church
Missionary Intelligencer.” The country is mountainous, and
the people are named Eldonio (i. e. mountaineers) by the
Kuaﬁs, a neighbouring nation probably of Galla origin.
Dr. Krapf found the Sambaras quiet, intelligent, and desi-
rous of improvement; peace and order prevailed generally,
and “a foreigner was not more safe in the metropolis of
France or England than in most parts of Usambara,” (p.
110). The food, general habits, and customs of the people,
resembled those of the Kambas, whose language was not
so dissimilar as to be unintelligible, but the country being
poorer they were less commercial, and polygamy was less
common. The government is monarehical; the consent
of the king is required before a foreigner is allowed to
enter the country, but when that is obtained he is protected,

4106 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

and, as in Abyssinia, an ofﬁcer is appointed whose especial
duty is to guide him and supply him with food. The
monarch, who is absolute, may appoint a Viceroy to any
portion of his dominions, and the ofﬁce is generally here- -
ditary, going to the eldest son born subsequently to the
appointment of the father : in one place Dr. Krapf found a
woman in the viceroyalty, whose husband was a prince
consort, who was not permitted to interfere in the govern-
ment. Like the Israelites, the Sambaras have towns of
refuge where a manslayer is safe from the avenger of blood.
In the same manner he is safe if he can touch the person
of the king. A runaway slave who can succeed in reaching
the house of any near relative of the king, can no longer
be reclaimed by his master, but the master is empowered to
receive back the price of the slave from the slave-dealer
who sold him. On this account slave-dealers in their way
to the coast always avoid passing through Fuga, the capital
town and royal residence, where so many opportunities
occur to deprive them of their prey. The dress of the
Sambaras is composed either of skins, or of a sort of ﬁne
matting made of rice-straw, and the women ornament
their persons with ear-rings and large strings of beads,
amounting in some cases to ﬁve or six pounds’ weight.

The J aggas, called in their own tongue Kirima, were
visited by Mr. Rebmann, who passed some months in their
country at the beginning of 1848, and again at the close of
that year and the commencement of the following. It
seems hardly possible that the people described by Mr.
Rebmann can be the same with the J aggas so famous in
the early accounts of South Africa for their extraordinary ,
ferocity and barbarism, but the name, and to a certain eX- 1
tent the geographical position, seems to leave little doubt. i,
There may have been amelioration in the lapse of time, .
but the difference may perhaps be more probably accounted
for by the different points of view fr om which these inde- ‘
pendent Kaﬁrs were seen by the peaceful missionary arrived
among st them as a benefactor anxious to coneiliate, and |

I
i.
l
I

cu. XYL] KAFIR TRIBES. 407

the warlike if not ferocious Portuguese seeking the subju-
gation of their country, and too often cruelly treating the
people: the manly vigour with which an uncivilised tribe
defended their independence would probably have been
represented by any civilised people of that date as brutal
ferocity. Mr. Rebmann describes the J aggas as being of a
“ darkish black ;” he found them a clean, industrious, and
healthy people, and generally friendly ; the women make a
sort of embroidery with beads, and help to take care of their
ﬂocks of sheep and goats; and the men build houses, plant
trees, make fences, and form water-courses for the purpose
of irrigation. They carry on a good deal of trade by barter
with the neighbouring tribes, named Dafeta, Ugono, and
Kahe, and hold frequent assemblages of these and of many
more remote tribes at various spots, called sangarras, or
markets, resembling the fairs of Russia and India. They
have no towns, like most other Kaﬁr tribes, but each family
has its own separate area or farm-yard, surrounded by a
fence strong enough to keep out wild animals, within which
are generally built three or four cottages : such habitations
are spread much about the country, at distances of half a
mile or more from each other. The government is an
absolute monarchy, like that of the Sambaras ; the religion
is a kind of adoration of their deceased relatives, to whom
they offer sacriﬁces of milk, and address prayers. The
snow-capped mountain of Kilima-njaro is in the Jagga
country.

The missionaries at Rabbai, near Mombasa, have from
time to time heard of a people called Ala, found in groups
scattered through a large section of Eastern Africa, from
the interior region beyond the J aggas to Bondei and the
Nika country near the coast. They are called Masaka by
the Nikas, Wassi by the Sambaras, and Wandurobbo by
the Kuaﬁ. Another tribe, called Ariangulo, living in a
state of dependence among the Gallas, is believed to be
of the same race. The habits of these people are those of
hunters, and consequently nomades. They are skilful

408 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

archers, but they employ their weapons only against game
or wild beasts, carefully avoiding the presence of any tribe
excepting their own. Their language is said to be unintelli-
gible to any of the other people of Africa, but no Specimens
of it have been given, nor have we seen any notice of their
physical characteristics, though from their vicinity to the
coast, and the circumstance that some of them are said to
be held in slavery by individuals of known Kaﬁr tribes, it
might not be difﬁcult to obtain more information respecting
them. Dr. Krapf believes them to be remains of some
aboriginal tribe which once peopled a large part of East
Africa. It would be interesting to examine their language,
which may perhaps show them to be a remnant of some
Hottentot tribe, and would thus afford additional proba-
bility to the opinion that the Hottentot area at some former
period has embraced the whole of South Africa. The
Hottentots, so far as we know, have always receded before
the Kafirs, and we cannot suppose any territory now
Hottentot to have been ever Kaﬁr. But where shall we
get our Kaﬁrs from? Their present wide extension over
a large part of the earth’s surface, their languages allied to
each other at least as closely as those of the Indo-germanic
race, and their general physical and moral resemblance,
would argue that they have been for ages where they are
now found]

CHAPTER XVII.

OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE DIFFERENT BRANCHES
OF THE GREAT SOUTH AFRICAN RACE.

THERE is nothing in the general character of the various
nations which I have described that would entitle us to
refer them all to one group, or to conclude that they are
more nearly related to each other than to other African
tribes. There are, indeed, great physical differences be-

CII. XVII.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAI’HY. $09

‘ tween some of them. The ﬁerce and enterprising and
E energetic Kaﬁrs of the Amakosah and Amazuluh races, tall
, and handsome, with almost Iranian countenances, and of a
i brown or copper colour, which has been thought to re-
; semble that of the Red Warriors of North America, are very
1 different people from the indolent Negroes of Mozambique
i or the black Suaheli. The proof of consanguinity between
= these nations depends on the evidence afforded by their

languages. But as this seems to place a great weight on an
:argument which requires a particular scrutiny before it
i can be allowed to afford adequate testimony to such an
i inference, it will be requisite to show that the phenomena
l are such as admit no other explanation, and that there is
‘ no way of escaping the conclusion. This can, as I think,
F be done by examining the kind of analogy which has been
\traced between these languages, and by showing that it
x cannot have arisen from the intercourse between the several
ltribes,———that it is such as to preclude all idea of the opera-
I tion of after-causes, and must needs be primitive or
[primordiaL and growing out of the original development
:of the several languages. When the fact of the kindred
)origin of these nations is once demonstrated and allowed
Ito have been established on the evidence of their kindred
iidioms, there will be found many circumstances that tend
lto conﬁrm it; but it could never have been arrived at by
sany other method of proof.

The discovery of this connexion of languages has been
avery gradual, and the proofs have been brought to light
Eaccidentally. The earliest notices of the South African
3 languages were obtained by Portuguese and Italian mis-
isionaries in the empire of Kongo. A grammar of the
Jlanguage of Kongo, by Hyacinth Brusciotti a Vetralla, was
qpublished at Rome in 1659. This work, though of small
sextent, is sufﬁcient to explain the principal peculiarities of
'cthe language. Some other treatises on the languages of
lLoango and Angola were afterwards written, and were
iknown to the authors of the “ Mithridates ;” and since

A10 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II. it;

their time, a more copious grammar, with a dictionary or .
vocabulary of the Kongoan, Bunda, or Angolan idiom, has
been compiled by Father Cannecattim.

These three principal languages of the Kongo empire M
are distinct from each other, but the distinction is little
more than that of cognate dialects. Vater compares it to 5
the difference between English and Danish. The old 1'
writers say that the diﬁerence between the Loangoan and w
Kongoan and Angolan is nearly equal to that which dis- ‘ 2
tinguishes the Castilian from the Portuguese ; and by one E
writer it has been compared to the difference between the ‘
Venetian and the Calabrese dialects. .

Although the Portuguese had settlements on the eastern .
as well as the western coast of South Africa, it does not
appear that any knowledge was attained by them of rela- ‘
tionship between the languages and the races of the people i ‘
in these two regions, nor was the fact that they were con— :
nected known to the authors of the “ Mithridates.” ; ,

The ﬁrst traveller who made inquiries into the history »
of the Kaﬁrs and their language, and their relations to
other African tribes on the eastern coast, was Professor 1'
Lichtenstein. The extensive diffusion of this language if:
on the eastern parts of Africa may be considered as his ;
discovery. He professed to draw his information in part 5
from Mauritz‘Thoman, a Jesuit, who resided many years
on the coast of Mozambique. Lichtenstein says that after -
much research, and after studying the works of Portuguese
writers and visiting the eastern coast of Africa at two
different times, and at places remote from each other, he
came to the conclusion that all the tribes of people as far
northward as Quiloa are allied to the Kaﬁr race.

But the very remarkable fact, that the nations of ,
Western Africa are of kindred language with those of the
East, was ﬁrst pointed out, as I believe, by Mr. Marsden.
In an appendix to the narrative of Tuckey’s Voyage to the
Zaire this discovery was announced. Mr. Marsden says
that he had, many years before the date of that voyage,

 

V—r

 

   
  
  
 
 
   
 

 

CH. xv11.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPHY. 411

collected a short vocabulary at Bencoolen from the mouth
of a Negro servant, a native of Mozambique; and that he
had recognised a decided resemblance between the words
of that vocabulary and those to be found in specimens of
dialects spoken in Kongo and the adjacent countries, given
by Oldendorp and Brusciotti, as well as in the vocabulary
from Delagoa Bay obtained by White. The opinion which
he had formed from these data was conﬁrmed by examining
the vocabularies obtained by Captain Tuckey of the dialects
of Malemba and Embomma, in. Kongo. Specimens of the
analogy between all these dialects are to be seen in Mr.
Marsden’s appendix.
Lastly, our acquaintance with this family of languages
has been greatly extended by the late researches of Dr.
Krapf among the nations of Africa much further to the
northward than Mozambique or the eastern side of Africa.
Of these languages nothing was formerly known further
than what could be collected from a short vocabulary of the
language of the Suaheli collected by Mr. Salt. In the
second volume of my “ Researches into the Physical
History of Mankind” this vocabulary was collated with
those of the Kaﬁr and Kongo languages, and a near re-
semblance in the words, arguing an extension of the same
family of languages over the coast of the Suaheli, was
pointed out. We have lately obtained from Dr. Krapf
much more satisfactory information. After that excellent
missionary, whose exertions in Abyssinia had already ob-
tained for him the esteem and admiration of the Christian
world, was banished from that country, he sought a new
ﬁeld for his labours further southward, and ﬁxed his re-
sidence at a spot on the coast opposite the island of Mombas,
in a region as yet unknown. The people of this coast are
p the Suaheli, called formerly Suahili and Sowhylese by dif-

ferent writers. Dr. Krapf penetrated sixty miles into the
: interior of the country, and here began his work by
: studying the languages of the Suaheli and the Wanika. He
icollected a vocabulary of the former, consisting of more

412 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

than 10,000 words, prepared a short grammar, and trans-

lated into the same dialect the Book of Genesis, and the 1
Gospels, and the Acts of the Apostles.axe He communicated §
to the celebrated philologist Von Ewald the results of his E

researches; and the last-mentioned writer has published

from the version, as a specimen, fourteen verses of the ‘

Gospel of St. John, to which he has added a most able

and interesting analysis of the grammatical structure of E
the Suahelian idiom. This paper throws the greatest light 2

on the nature and essential structure of the language, and

enables us at once to ascertain its relation to the idioms 1
of the Kaﬁr nations, as well as to those of the nations .
of Kongo. We had, previously to this time, two short 5
grammars of the Kaﬁr languages by Wesleyan missionaries, 1
one representing the idiom of the Amakosah, and the other ‘

the Sichuana of the inland nations.

From a comparison of these sources of information I
have collected the following remarks illustrative of the
history and relations of the languages spoken by the Great
South African family of nations.

It has been observed by Von Ewald, that the most re-
markable phenomenon in the structure of the idiom of the
Suaheli relates to the peculiar conception of material objects
which it displays. It observes no distinction of genders in
the ordinary sense of the term, and has neither amasculine
nor a feminine form in verbs or nouns. On the other
hand, it has a distinct form for the living and the inanimate,
according to which, words are modiﬁed as they are by the
distinction of genders 1n other languages.

Von Ewald says that he had long ago observed the ‘

same phenomenon 1n the Sanskrit, andb traces, though more
disguised, of the same construction in the Semitic languages.
He is of opinion that the distinction of male and female
does not belong to the primitive groundwork, or was not

 

 

 

* The additional pages at the close of the preceding chapter will give '

some idea of the increased information afforded by D1. Krapf since the
above was written—ED.

E
E
E

 

“' V“ r”:-

 

0
CH. XVII.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPHY. 413

made in the original development of human Speech, “ so
much as that 0f the more strongly and more weakly per-

. sonal, or the animate and inanimate.”

This phenomenon is more conspicuous in the South
African than in any other known language; and Von
Ewald considers the Suaheli as strikingly exemplifying the
opinion which he had expressed in the investigation of
other languages before the peculiarities of the Suaheli
became known to him.

But these African languages carry further a sort of
metaphysical distinction between objects, which they
separate into different classes, on aprinciple which it is not
easy to deﬁne, but which I shall presently exemplify.

It must be remarked, in the ﬁrst place, that the in-
ﬂections of words are chieﬂy effected in these languages by

f preﬁxed particles, of which there is a great variety. In
y the High-Asiatic languages every change of meaning is
indicated by a post-ﬁxed particle. The South African
take quite the opposite method, in which they remarkably
’ agree, as I have before noticed, with the Coptic.

These preﬁxes mark the numbers of nouns, and dif-

ferent preﬁxes are used, not only in reference to animate and
' inanimate objects, but also to other subdivisions of these
, objects, founded on some metaphysical distinction. Thus
: the names of rational and irrational beings require different

articles or preﬁxes, and these are again subdivided, as also

‘ are the names of inanimate things.

Thus nouns designating rational beings have ’m or

i am for the preﬁx of the singular, which is changed into ea
1 (in Kosa Kaﬁr, aba) in the plural, as ’mtn (a person),
‘ vat-a (persons), ’msnngo (an EurOpean), pl. vasnngo.

Nouns in the Suaheli, designating irrational creatures,

: have no plural ending, but adjectives connected with them
1 have va as in the former: thus zimba va-knba va-vili means
‘ two great lions, the order of words being reversed.

In inanimate things the plural is formed by ma or mi,
as maleaslza (chests) from lcaska, miti (trees) from mti.

414 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

V?) is found in other instances, as mitu m’dogo, little things,
the plural of kitu kidogo.

The preceding observations are taken from Von Ewald’s
remarks on the Suaheli language. I shall now extract the
following table from Boyce’s Kaﬁr Grammar, in order to
show that this language follows the same principle of in-
ﬂection, and for the purpose of displaying its effects more
fully.

Mr. Boyce divides the Kaﬁr nouns into declensions by
the different preﬁxes used. The six forms are thus dis-
played. The ﬁrst changes the preﬁx

1. Um into aba; as, um-ntu (a person), pl. aba-ntu.

u 0; u-Faku (Faka), pl. o-Faku.
2. i ama; i-bashe (horse), pl. ama-hashe.
ili ama; ili-zwi (a word), pl. ama-zwi.
3. in izin ; ’ in-hlu (a house), pl. izin-hlu.
im izim; im-azi (a cow), pl. izim-azi.
4<. isi izi; isi-tya (a basket), pl. izi-tya.
5. ulu izin; ulu-ti (a rod), p1. izin-ti.
u o, i, or im; u-lwimi (a tongue), pl. i-lWimi ; u-bambo
(a rib), pl. im-bambo.
G. um imi; um-lambo (a river), pl. imi-lambo.

It is remarked that in, in the third declension, when
preﬁxed to nouns of living objects having sex, has the
plural in coma, as,—

In-doda, man; ama-doda, men.

In-kazana, girl; ama—kazana, girls.
In-kwenkwe, boy ; ama-kwenkwe, boys.

A great part of the system of inﬂection is regulated by
a complex euphonical method, which it would be impossible
to explain in a short compass : it pervades the whole
grammatical structure of that language. I must refer my
readers to Von Ewald’s memoir, and to the grammars of
the Kaﬁr Kosa and Sichuana by Messrs. Boyce and
Archbell, for a further illustration of this subject.ale

 

* These classes, as well as the further characteristics noticed, are found
in more or less completion in almost all the languages of South Africa
examined, and in several of those of the people north of the equator, uni-
versally called Negroes—ED.

i; CH. XVII.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPI—IY. 415

E Another peculiarity in these languages is calculated to
remind us of the structure of the complex languages of
America: I allude to the insertion of abbreviated pronouns
in the middle of compound verbs. The pronouns become
inﬁxes instead of suﬁixes ; and of the inﬁx-pronouns there
is a great variety, corresponding with the classes of preﬁxes

] to nouns. I shall only take one example from Von Ewald,

i in which the pronoun is inserted between the preﬁx-

! particle, denoting the tense of a verb, and the verbal root

I itself :—

ame-m-finika, he covered him ,- 2'. e. mtu, the man.

ame-i-ﬁnika, he covered it ,- miiesa, the table.
ame-u-ﬁnika, he covered it ; mti, the tree.
ame—ki-ﬁnika, he covered it ; kitu, the thing, or
dsuo, the book.
ame-li-ﬁnika, he covered it ; neno, the speech.

Von Ewald observes that the Suaheli language has a very
i soft and euphonious intermixture of consonants and vowels,
3 and that every word terminates with a vowel. The roots
‘ may therefore be dissyllabic, and a change of vowels at the
‘terminations of the roots may serve to distinguish verbs
3 and nouns. Thus soma is the verb to read, and somo
! becomes a noun meaning the act of reading. A noun thus
tdistinguished from the verb may serve for an inﬁnitive
i mood, but is incapable of forming a plural. Forms stand-
é ing for the agents are derived from verbs by preﬁXing m ;
l as msoma (or msomi or msomai), reader; msémw, speaker ;'
imudni, seer (from one, to see) ; all of which, like simple
gparticiples, may be joined with the accusative, as mséma
I momma, the speaker of the word, as if “ locutor verbum.”
. The formation of more distinctly ideal words is like that
of utalcdtg'fu, purity, from ta/cdtu, to be pure; uharibgfu,
destruction, from karibu, to destroy.

The signs of tenses likewise precede the verbal root, as
gformative particles in this language generally are placed
5 rather before than after the roots. The present is apemla,
‘ he loves, from penda, to love ; the past tense, amependa ; the
r plusquam-perfect, alipemla ; the future, rotapemla. The

3

416 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

imperative is in short, penda ; in plural, pendam' ; the opta-
tive from the present, apende. The negative verb preﬁxes
an It, as Impeach, he loves not ; hapendzli, he is not loved;
but sipemlw is love not (imperative). A participle from
the present, upended, is equivalent to amber (he) lmaxmba
(who) apemla (loves).

In all these traits a striking and decided analogy exists
between the Suaheli language and the Kosa and Sichuana
Kaﬁr, and the dialects of Kongo.

The causative form in verbs is produced by inﬁxing an
s or es, which is sometimes reduced to a mere vowel, as
kuésa, to raise, from lame, to rise; someslm, to cause to
read, from some, to read; lettea, to send, from letta, to
bring ; pigia, to cause to beat, from piga, to beat.

I may here observe that the causative form is con-
tructed precisely in the same manner in the Kaﬁr dialects,
both the Kosa and the Sichuana, and likewise in the lan-
guage of Kongo, according to Brusciotti a Vetralla.

The passive is formed by inserting an 0 before the ter-
minating vowel, as pendéa, to be loved, from penda. Some-
times there is a slight irregularity: as mime, to be
killed, from 2m, to kill; haribiwa, to be destroyed, from
ham‘bu ; sailiwa, to be hindered, from sm’a.

In the Kaﬁr dialects the passive is formed exactly in
.the same way. Tcmdoo, loving, makes tandwa (according
to Mr. Boyce’s orthography), equivalent to tcmdoa, in the

passive. In the Sichuana, kekang, buying, is kekoang in '
the passive, being bought, according to Mr. Archbell’s ,»

grammar.
The reﬂective form is made by preﬁxing dshi (ji), as

dshipenda, to love one’s self; dskifunsa, to learn, from ,

fmzsa, to teach.
Mr. Archbell’s grammar of the Sichuana contains little

more than a collection of paradigms of declensions and con-

'u0*ations. We have, however, enough to demonstrate a);
D

strict grammatical analogy between these languages and
the Suaheli.

 

7

~_——E‘

 

CH. xv11.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPHY. 417

The same observation may be applied to the dialects of
Kongo in comparison with the Suaheli. Brusciotti a
Vetralla observes, that what other languages effect by
changes in the terminations of words, is done in the Kongo ‘
languages by preﬁxes, or, as he terms them, “ principia-
tives.” He says that the “ principiatives” set before nouns
have eight forms, which are connected with variations in
the articles. Proper names, and names of men and of ani-

‘ mals, when joined with adjectives or the verb substantive,

have certain articles. The other classes of nouns have pecu-
liar preﬁxes. Brusciotti gives the following examples :—

When the “ principiative” or preﬁx begins with e, the
article Ma is used, and the following variation takes place :——-'

Sing. En-tondo ria n’Ziampunga, the praise of God.
Plur. Ma-tondo ma n’Zz‘ampunga, the praises of God.

In the second form the initial syllable is mm, a, or 0,
the article act, and the plural is made by taking mi from the
initial syllable of the noun.

In the third, fourth, ﬁfth, sixth, seventh, and eighth
forms, the articles are quiet, yo, Irma, 1m, law, tact, which
make in the plural y, m, tact, ta, &c.

Something very similar to this is found in the Angolan
language.

The personal pronouns in the Kosa and Sichuana
Kaﬁr display a near relation to those of the Kongo and
Angolan languages. I shall add the ten numerals and a
few common words as specimens of the resemblance of
these several idioms.ale

 

 

* The following table is corrected and arranged from materials obtained
since the author’s death, furnished by Dr. Krapf. Grammars have since
then been published in several South African dialects, and the Rev. J.
Appleyard has communicated much valuable information in his sketch of
the History and Grammar of the Kaﬁr language, published in 1850. The
Galla and N amaaqua words are added for the sake of comparison, and the
Kuaﬁ, corrected from Krapf’s Vocabulary of that tongue, published in
1854:, is separated from the Kaﬁr dialects, because the language appeared
to the Editor to be of a totally distinct class; though he is at present
unable to say where it should be placed—ED.

EE

NUMERALS IN THE LANGUAGES OF SOUTHERN AFRICA.

 

O—l

 

. Kum LANGUAGES.

Kosa
Slchuana

Zulu
Delagoa Bay
Mozambique
Suaheli
Nika.

Kamba
Pokomo
Hiau
Msegﬁa

II. EMPIRE OF KONGO.

Kongo (Daniell)
Ambriz (Daniell)
Loango (Oldendorp)
Kongo (ditto)
Mandongo
Malemba
Embomma.

Sonho ‘
Bunda, or Angola
Mpongwe

Galla
Kuaﬁ
Namaaqua

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 2 3 4: 5 6 7 8 9 * 10
Inye Bini Tatu Ne Hlanu Tandatu Xenxe Mboxo Itoba. Ishumi
’Ngue Pedi Taru ’Ne Tlanu Tataru Shupa. Diheramanwa— Diheramanwa- Shumi

namabede namangwahéla‘

Nye Mbﬂi Ntatu Ne Thlanu Tatisitupa Kombile Kyiyangalobili ’Agatisile Ikyumi
Chingea Bizi Rarou Moonau Thanou . . ... . . . .. . Koumau
Moosa Pili Thara Ssessé Thana Thana moasa. Thana pili Thana ssessé Looko Mino komili
Mmoja Mbﬂi Tsitu Nne Taino Setba Sébaa Nane Kenda Kumi

’ Mmenga Mbﬁ‘i Téhu,héhu Nne Tséuo Tandihu ‘ Fungéhe Nane Kenda Kumi
Umue Ili Idétu Inna Idino Dand‘étu Monsa Niania Ikenda Ikumi
Mméza Mbii Héhu Nne Zéno Fungéhe
Yumpépe Siwﬁ‘i Sitétu J éje Séno . . . Tanona siwiri .. . .. . . . .
Mosi Pili Tutu Kanne Shano Enditu Fungéte Name Kenda Kumi
Mosa Meola Tatoo Meale Tourroo Sambavo Sambade N’ana E’vauh Coomy
Bosa Cola Tatoo Keale Tarroo Sambaavoo Samboide Emannah Avou Ecoomy
Boose Soli Tattu Ens). Tanu Samba-an Samboari Nane Voa. Kumi
Moschi Meere Sitattu Siza Sitan ... Samboari Sin an Sivoa Sikumi
Om o B oelli B atati Anna. Attani Sanu N shumi Mpumo Kifa Kumi
Basey Meoly Tatau Si-ja Tanoo Sanbanu Sambodi Enanu Evana. Kumi
Mosey Colo Tatoo Yaea-kea . . . ... ... . . . . . . ...
M ochi Solle Satu Maia. Sanu Sama’m 1'1 Samboari N ane E oua Kumi
Mochi Yari Satu Uana. , Sanu Samannu ‘Sambuari Naqui Ivoa Kunhi
Mori Bani Raru Nai . Otanu Ozubar Urwakime Innanai Iunogumi Ikumi
Téko Lama Zadi Afur Zan Dya Torba Zadeta Zagala. Kudan
Obo Arre Uni Oton Imiet Ille Nabshana Isiet Sal Tomon
Kwii Kam Nun Haka Kore Nanni Huuku Kayssa. K6izi Diizii

 

 

 

 

‘MVK L'IO KHOLSIH 'IV’EILLVN 8]]?

‘ '11 510021]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

KONGO ! ;
K05; SICHUANA D 13:?“ MOZAMBIQU] SUAHELI NIKA KAMBA POKOMO Emu MSEGUA £32333" GALLA KUAFI ‘NAMAAQUA
EMBOMMA '
MAN Uhmto Motu Monhee Mantu Mtu, pl. Mﬁtu Mﬁndu,pl.ML’mtu Mﬁndu, Mtu Moontau Nama Aito 'Kip
watu aindu pl. wandu
WOMAN Umfasi 'Massari Aduhast Mahe, Mtﬁmke Mutshetu, Mundu, Muke Mundu, Mﬁére Kenton, Niti Endangﬂi Tarras
mekﬁnque mutumlije muka yunam, quinto [
kongue ‘
FATHER {Bao Hay-a Tete Baba Babs. ’Adza Baba Déde Dadi Tata,bantu Aba Baba !Iip
MOTHER ‘1\Iao Ma Mama, amaoo Méma Méyo Mﬁajdo, Méma Améo Mlela Mama Héda Yeya 1Iis
lgma,
BROTHER Um- Mogolue Molupa- Molupahaka, N dﬁgu Ndﬁgu Endui, Ndﬁgu Mléngo Endugu ;Oboléza EnganashelKaap
‘ klhueh liika aloombo muina ‘ l
EARTH iUmmaba Lehatsi Nti Zi Ndf Nsi Jirambo Zii Lafa,adu, Anhepo iHap
biftu
SUN ‘Ilanga Tsatsi Diambo Ezooa-h Dshua Dzua Kua Zua Ezooloo, Engolo gTsoris
I tengua.
MOON Inyanga Khueri Molungo, Mesi Mesi Muéi Mesi Mesi Muesi Tangua, Jia, bati Lubbo f’Khép
moyse mooezy 1 l
}
WATER Maasi -Metse Matee Maschi Méji Mézi Méusi Mézi Méssi Madshi Maza,muza1Bizéni Engarre ’Kammi
BREAD Inhloko Bogobi Mutuwe Kitaa, Dshitﬁa, Matﬁe, Mukahe Mtui Noone, 1Budena Luk‘ﬁnTa ‘Birip
mukéte mukéhe mukée noonee é

 

 

 

['IIAX 'HO

'lHJVHBONHLEI NVOIHJV HJJIOS

6F?

420 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

It would probably be tedious to many of my readers to
pursue this subject further at present. What I have col-
lected is quite sufﬁcient to establish a near and truly
kindred relation between the languages of South Africa in
the east and west, of which it appears difﬁcult to imagine
any other explanation than that obvious one afforded by the
hypothesis, otherwise probable from local circumstances, of
a common original. The South African idioms constitute
a particular family of languages, and afford an instance of
a peculiar, and in some respects singular development of
human speech. They are, however, not without- external
relations, though it is difﬁcult to say what place will ulti-
mately be assigned to them among the different groups of
languages. In what relation they, and the languages of
Africa in general, stand to the Semitic or Syro-Arabian
family, is, as M. von Ewald has observed, a problem not
yet solved. Some words have been recognised in the Sua-
heli similar to Semitic words, but it is possible that these '
may have been introduced by Arabian, or even by old
Phoenician traders on the eastern coast. In one respect 4
these languages coincide remarkably with the COptic. I ;
allude to the law by which both preﬁx all modifying par- l
ticles and the whole apparatus of small and abbreviative
words which answer the end of inﬂections ; while other lan- '
guages, either in part or universally, sufﬁx them. In the
complex system of verbal conjugation, which may be seen
displayed in Boyce’s Grammar, they certainly make some ‘
approach towards the involving method of the North Ame-
rican languages, of which Mr. Howse’s Grammar of the
Cree, or Algonquin Knistenaux, exhibits the construction.
Compared with the simple jargons of the tribes on the ‘
coast of Guinea, the languages of Kaﬁrland, with the kin-
dred dialects, certainly indicate a higher development of
intellect among the native races of Africa.9K '

 

5“ It is scarcely necessary to say that increased philological information .f
necessitates a considerable modiﬁcation of these conclusions. The Kaﬁr I
complexity is chieﬂy euphonic, and has no resemblance to the American

 

 

CH. XVII.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPHY. 4:21

‘ One objection will be offered to the supposition that all
the nations who speak the various dialects of this mother

 

‘ grammatical system; at the same time it is far surpassed by the languages
of the Australians, whose intellectual development is of so low a character:
we should almost be inclined to regard the simplicity of a language as a
‘ mark of superiority of intellect. It may be observed here that the grammars
of the South African languages since published by Dr. Krapf, and the
researches of Dr. William Bleek, have enabled us to see with greater
evidence the diffusion of the same system of languages throughout South
Africa. As our grammatical knowledge extends, we ﬁnd traces of the same
structure far north of the Kaﬁr area: the learned Bishop of Sierra Leone
(Introduction to Yoruba Grammar, p. 7 and 31) ﬁnds it in the Timmani,
Bullom, and Sherbro’, and he particularises the eleven Kaﬁr-like modiﬁca-
tions of the Timmani verb. A few Timmani fragments, printed in 1847, by
theRev. C. F. Schlenker, of the Church Missionary Society, have enabled the
Editor to see the identity of the Timmani and Kaﬁr pronouns, of the initial
changes (compare the Timmani genitive particles wah, rah, yah, mah, with
the Sechuana waga, loga, yaga, baga, &c.), and of some other striking pecu-
liarities of structure. Some of the Fulah modiﬁcations, though much less
in degree, are indications of a like afﬁnity. There are Kaﬁr—like resem-
blances of structure even in the Galla language, though they seem to be
rather accidental than constituting an afﬁnity : we allude to the formation
of a causative verb by the addition of a sibilant. The Kaﬁr soma, for
example, makes somesha, and lcuea, kuésa; so the Galla debia makes
rlebz'za, and [0a makes loza. The passive, too, is made in Kaﬁr by w, as
tanda, tandwa, and the Galla passive by the cognate m ; as ega, egama.
The structure of the Hottentot languages proceeds upon a wholly different
principle, and the following note, drawn up from such an insight into the
Namaaqua dialect as the Editor could get from reading the Rev. Mr.
Schmelen’s version of the Gospels, will, he believes, prove its total and
radical distinction from the Kaﬁr languages. The language is also an
interesting study of itself, on account of its remarkably simple and yet
comprehensive and expressive structure, and from its possessing some
features, such as the grammatical gender and accusative case, usually
considered as peculiar to the most highly organised languages. Its few
afﬁnities, strange to say, appear to be rather with Coptic and Semitic, than
with anything else. The vocabulary is very limited, and many words, as
in Chinese, appear to have the same sound. In Chinese, a distinction is
made by a varied intonation, and the Editor is inclined to think, though
in opposition to the valuable opinion of Dr. Bleek, which is not to be
neglected, that the remarkable inarticulate clicks used by the Hottentots
may have been adopted for a similar purpose.

In the Namaaqua, nouns have two genders,—real grammatical genders,

422 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

tongue are of one origin, and that is, the great extent of
their physical diversity. The tribes of the coast of Ajan

as in the Semitic, Roman, and Celtic languages, distinguished by their
terminations: p is masculine (sometimes mi) and s feminine. Thus tip is
“ father,” and it's “ mother ;” lamp is “brother,” [was “ sister ;” lclzﬁp
“moon,” tsdris “ sun.” They form their plurals respectively by [toe and
ti, as [ma/toe “brothers,” and [cacti “ sisters.” There is also an inde-
ﬁnite form terminating in i for the singular, and n for the plural ; as lcooi,
“ a man,” Icooin, “ men ;” Icamam’, “ a robber,” kamaun, “ robbers,” kamaup,
and Icamau/coe, would be “the robber,” “ the robbers.” There are two dual
forms, one appropriated to a pair, like the Semitic dual, the other to two
individuals, as in Greek.

Some words appear to take either gender, as moep, or moes, “the eye ;”
and frequently the diﬁ'erence of gender shows a modiﬁcation of meaning,
the feminine denoting a smaller object, or a part of it : as Izawoop, “ shoe,”
kawoos, “ sandal ;” hoemmi, “mountain,” hoems, “ hill ;” nanoep, “ the sky,”
mmoes, “ a cloud ;” hag/p, “tree,” hays, “ stick,” &c. &c.

There is a copious declension, formed, as in the Finnish language, by
terminations, which may be called post-positions ; the genitive has its
distinct form, ending in dz' ; and the accusative, terminating in a like the '
Arabic, is regularly used.

The adjective goes betOre the substantive, and by the addition of ze it
becomes an adverb : as, key, “ good,” kayze, “ well,” amma, “ true,” ammaze,
“truly.”

The pronouns are very copious, and have distinct forms for almost every
conceivable modiﬁcation of meaning; the second persons, as well as the
third, distinguish the genders, as do the Semitic pronouns, and the third
persons have the indeﬁnite form, like the nouns ; as ayip, “ he,” ays, “ she,”
ayi, “ he” or “ she,” indeﬁnite. The dual is complete, and the ﬁrst persons
dual and plural distinguish the inclusive and exclusive values, as in Poly-
nesian, and some American, Dekhanic, and Tartar languages. All are
completely declined, and all have abbreviated forms for the complements ‘
of verbs or of nouns, or for combination; and this is done with a regula-
rity and simplicity which admit of no mistake. An example or two Will
show this :——The pronouns of the singular number are tita, “I,” zaats, ‘
“ thou, m.” zaas, “thou, f.” ayz'p, “ he,” ays, “ she ;” the abbreviated objec-
tive forms end in i, and the nominatives in a consonant, except the ﬁrst, ‘
which is ta. We have then, with the verb maa “ to give,” maati, “ give me,” ‘
maatits, “ thou givest me,” maatip, “ he gives me,”maabz‘z'ta, “I give him,’ ’ :
maassz‘p, “he gives her” (or thee, f. ), maatzz'ita, “ I give thee,” &c. These i
forms, be it observed, are used only in indirect sentences; in the direct ‘
way the nominative is put ﬁrst, without abbreviation, as tita maabii, “I i
give it,” zaats maati, “thou givest me,” &c. &c.

I
E
E

CH. XVII.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOGRAPHY. 4123

are, as we have seen, of a jet black, while the Bechuana are
of a light brown, the Amakosah being somewhat darker.
In Kongo there are various complexions; the features
also differ. The nomades of the high plains beyond the
tropics have often features which approach the Arabian
type, and an Arabian origin has been assigned to them,
whilst the natives of the Mozambique coast have nearly
the Negro characters. But there is enough that is peculiar
in the hair and colour of all these tribes, to preclude the

i notion of an Arabian parentage. On the other hand, the

deviation in physical characters is not greater than that
which is to be found in the Dekhan among tribes of the
native Tamulian family, where we may compare the tall,
handsome, and comparatively fair Tudas of the Nilgherry
Mountains with the puny tribes of black people who are to
be found in the low plains of Malabar and Coromandel.

In like manner the physical characters of these nations,
though differing considerably in different parts,—all,
however, presenting the same diﬁ’erence within the limits of
one and the same tribe,—may all be reduced to one de-
scription, or admit of the same general remarks. On the sea-
coast, and among the more savage races, as the Makua of

 

The verbs make all modiﬁcations by the addition of certain syllables;
the past tense preﬁxes Ice, the perfect (co, the future m’i, the conditional Ica ;
the inﬁnitive postﬁxes 2a, the passive hii, the reﬂected verb ssen ; as aye
m'i maa, “ she will give,” tita [ca mad, “ I would give,” maaza, “to give,”
maahiiza, “ to be given,” maassen, “to give one’s self,” 850. &c.

The N amaaqua tongue is provided with a fair supply of conjunctions,
a part of speech which is generally very deﬁcient in uncultivated languages ;
with the exception of the simple copulatives, they come at the dew of the
sentence to which they belong; an example is ’ays ’ag/p /co ltd ammu/ra,
“because her hour is come ,” literally, “ her time has come because.”

It is very singular that the consonants of the form-syllables, p, 6, n, s,
&c., very rarely occur in nouns 0r verbs, as if they had been borrowed
from a language of a wholly distant phonology.

Enough has been said to prove the peculiar character of the Hottentot
languages, and their utter disconnection with Kaﬁr; any further detail
upon a subject so little calculated to interest readers generally, would be
su peril uous.—En.

424 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II. ,

Mozambique, they have much of the true Negro phy-
siognomy. Yet even here a milder and more intellectual
expression is observable than among the natives of Guinea.
Their hair is woolly, and their colour black, but their
skulls, as may be seen by a variety of crania from the
Mozambique coast in various collections, are more vaulted
and capacious in the anterior part, and have much less of
the prognathous character. The sketch of a Mozambique
Negro, inserted in a previous page, will exemplify the above
remark. But a great many of the people of Kongo, Ben-
guela, and Loango, as well as of the natives of the eastern
countries on the opposite side of the continent, recede
greatly from the Negro physiognomy. Professor Christian
Smith, who accompanied the late expedition to the river
Zaire, coincides with the old Portuguese navigators in this
statement.

In proof and illustration of these remarks, I have
selected several portraits from the excellent work of
Rugendas, which display the character above described in
the natives of South Africa. One of them is the portrait of
a native of the Mozambique country. It has the tattooed
stars which appear to be the characteristic ornament of
that people, and which are seen upon the preceding por-
trait engraved on wood. The features and expression are
almost European. Very similar observations will apply to
other ﬁgures copied from the same work, one of which
is marked a native of Loango ; the other a woman of
Benguela. ,

I shall here advert once more to the ﬁgures of a
Kongo cranium, of which several delineations have been
given.

In Plates III. and IV., facing page 111, I have given two ‘
representations of the skull of a native of Kongo. One .
displays the form of the basis, and the other the front .
View. The front view, as may be seen at a glance, bears .
a strong resemblance to two other skulls represented '=
in the same plate. Both of these belong to races who have '_

 

 

on. xv11.] SOUTH AFRICAN ETHNOLOGY. 425

‘ crania of the pyramidal form, and broad ﬂat faces, though

not in the greatest degree. One of them is the skull of a

‘. Chinese; the other that of a native American, a Chiti-
macha of Louisiana. In all these the zygomatic arches

project laterally in nearly equal degrees; the orbits are
wide, and rather far apart; the nasal bones rather ﬂat ;
and the transverse diameter of the face below the eyes

' nearly plane, or with very little convexity ; the foreheads
; rather conical. All these are characters of the pyramidal

skull, though they appear not so strongly marked as in

' the Esquimaux and other Polar races. Plate IV. exhibits
, the bases of the same three skulls, and these are very
, much alike: the Kongo head is not more prognathous

than the others, but it is somewhat more elongated.
For the rest, the Kongo skull is heavier than the others,
displaying in this respect an African character ; while the

‘ large round sweep of the zygomatic arches, and the breadth
- of the diameter of the anterior third part of the cranium,

exhibit approximations to that form of the head which

is so common among the nomades of Northern Asia.
From what has been said, it will be evident to the

reader that it is vain to attempt to reduce the nations of

. Africa, even if we conﬁne our view to the so-termed woolly-
: haired tribes, under any particular stock or number of

original races. We may call them all Negroes, if we
deﬁne that expression to mean people with woolly hair;

I but they agree in no other character ; and even this seems
. arbitrarily assumed as a mark of separation, since there are
1 tribes who have hair that nearly approaches to this cha-

racter, as the Galla and some of the Nubian races before
described, and are yet excluded by a general consent from
the class to which the Negro belongs. As for the form of
these skulls, we ﬁnd all the three principal types of the
human cranium among these woollynations, the Soudanians
having elevated foreheads and capacious heads, without the
prognathous countenance ; the Ibos, narrow and elongated
skulls; and the Hottentots, broad-faced and pyramidal ones.

426 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

Since these pages were written, I have received from
New York a grammar, recently published, of the language
of the Mpongwe, the people on the Gaboon river, near
Cape Lopez and Cape St. Catherine, whose country extends
300 miles in the interior. This language, the structure
of which is said by the American missionaries who com-
posed the grammar to be beautiful and philosophical, is a
cognate of the Suaheli. We have thus reason to believe
that the South African race reaches nearly up to the
Equator, both on the eastern and western side of the
continent.

[Taking into consideration all the facts in relation to the ‘

languages of Africa which have come to the knowledge of
the Editor, he would provisionally map out the whole con-
tinent in the following manner, premising that it is merely
a rough attempt, awaiting further information :—The
northern division, extending from the Atlantic on the west
to the Red Sea on the east, and from the Mediterranean on
the north to an irregular line on the south, which will in-
clude the Great Desert, and reach an undeﬁned Negro and
Kaﬁr frontier near the Equator as it proceeds eastward, is
all Semitic, or at least what has been called Sub-semitic;
including the Berber, Tuaric, andAbyssinian languages, and
it is believed, the Galla in its different branches. These will
have to be subdivided into smaller families, as is done with
the great Indo-Germanic class ; but we have not yet sufﬁ-
cient data for doing this with any degree of minuteness. The
Hottentots, as before stated, occupy the extreme south, and
all the rest is occupied by Negroes and Kaﬁrs. From the
notes occurring here and there in the preceding pages, it will
be seen that we are inclined to class these in one great group.
About the Kaﬁrs there can be no hesitation, and not much
as to the fact that Kaﬁr languages and Kaﬁr physical and
moral characters graduate in many instances into such as
are universally termed Negro, as we proceed from south
to north-west. But there are Negro tongues which seem to
elude classiﬁcation or graduation ; and taking some that

 

 

CH. XVIII] PELAGIAN NATIONS. 427

have been carefully investigated, as the elaborately varied
Wolof, the simple Mandingo, the intonated Gha or Accra,
.the Ashanti and the Mongol-like Bornu, we seem to have
the phenomenon of wholly different families of languages
in a space much smaller than could be anticipated. Fur-
ther researches may, and probably will, disclose principles
uniting the whole in one great class; and we anticipate
valuable results from the expected publication of the voca-
bularies of 200 Negro languages recently brought from
Africa by the Rev. Mr. Koelle, in which he has very
judiciously inserted a considerable number of phrases that
may enable us to see more of their structure than we can
do from the vocabularies usually furnished. The negroes
hitherto have been considered as constituting one race
rather from physiological than philological evidence]

 

CHAPTER XVIII.

or THE PELAGIAN RACES. 1. MALAYO-POLYNESIAN RACE.
‘ 2. PELAGIAN NEGROES. 3. ALFORAS.

‘ AFTER surveying the population of Africa, we are naturally
led to direct our attention to the extensive regions of the
globe lying to the eastward of that continent, which,
though formerly supposed to be occupied by one great
southern land, is in reality a vast expanse of ocean, inter-
spersed with groups of islands of various extent and
elevation. Disjoined and widely separated, these insular
tracts are found to contain races of inhabitants more nearly
connected with each other, and at the same time much
more widely scattered, than any of the families of men
who occupy the continuous lands of Asia and Africa. The
habitable tracts of this region lie principally, but not
entirely, within the tropics. In longitude, it may be con-
sidered as reaching in its greatest extent, namely, from
Madagascar to Easter Island, through nearly half the
equatorial region of the globe. The whole of this region

428 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

is made, by Maltc-Brun, to constitute a ﬁfth great division
of the globe, under the name of Oceanica. Some of the
islands in it are of great elevation, which are principally
volcanic; and although in others the presence of ﬁery
mountains has not been ascertained, we know already, as
Malte-Brun has observed, a greater number of volcanoes
in Oceanica than in any other portion of the world ; in all
the most elevated lands volcanic rocks are found, and
craters either now burning, or effete, or still emitting
smoke. The low islands are of a different description:
they have for their foundation reefs of coral rocks,
generally disposed in a circular form, and enclosing a
lagoon. There is no region of the world which affords a
greater variety of local conditions, and none which opens a
better ﬁeld of observation to those who are desirous of
tracing the inﬂuence of physical agencies on the organisa-
tion of living bodies, and particularly on that of the human
kind.

The human inhabitants of Oceanica divide themselves
into three groups. One of these may be termed a race
or family of nations, since a real kindred or community
of origin has been proved,‘by aﬂinity of language, to exist
among them. The two others probably constitute as many
races, since we seem able to trace them from one cluster
of islands to another ; but certainty is yet wanting on this
point. I shall distinguish them by the following names.
The ﬁrst is the race termed by different writers Malayan,
Polynesian, and Oceanic. The identity, or the near aﬁinity,
of the Malays and Polynesians has been doubted, and even
denied, by writers of great authority ;* but it has lately
been fully established through the researches of Baron
William von Humboldtt I shall term these people the

 

9* Crawford’s “ History of the Indian Archipelago.”

1' See the great work of W. von Humboldt, entitled “ Ueber die Kawi
Sprache auf der Insel Java, nebst einer Einleitung iiber die Verschiedenheit
des menschlichen Sprachbaues und ihren Einﬂuss auf die geistige Ent-
Wickelung des Menschengeschlechts.”

on. XVIII.] « PELAGIAN NATIONS. 429

I Malayo-Polynesian, or, in short, the Malayan race. The
second group consists of tribes of peeple of darker com-
plexion, with hair crisp, and more or less resembling
African Negroes: they are spread over many islands,
within a narrower range than the Malayan race. I
‘ shall term them the Pelagian Negroes. They have often
T been called Papuas; but we have seen that this last
designation belongs properly to a mixed race, descended
partly from the people last described, and in part from
another tribe with straight hair. The mixed people are
.: termed hybrid Papuas by MM. Quoy and Gaimard, and
i other French writers. A third distinct group consists
of tribes who differ in physical characters from the two
. former. They are the Alfoers, Alforas, Haraforas, of
' different voyagers. They are savages of dark colour, lank
thair, and prognathous heads. To this group the natives
of Australia belong. I shall term them collectively Alforas.
' By the name of Pelagian races I mean to designate
‘ collectively the whole assemblage of nations inhabiting
Oceanica.*

The Malayan stock may be subdivided, in a manner
that will much facilitate the description, into three branches.
The ﬁrst branch is the Indo-VIalayan, comprehending the
Malays preper of Malacca, and the islanders of the Indian
Archipelago, as the inhabitants of Sumatra, Java, Celebes,
the Moluccas, and the Philippines. These last nations
resemble the proper Malays, both in language and in phy-
sical characters, much more nearly than do the Polynesian
tribes. To the Indo-Malayan branch may, perhaps, be asso-
ciated the natives of the Caroline Islands and the Ladrones,
who appear to be nearly related to their neighbours, the
natives of the Philippines. 2. To the second, or Polynesian
branch, belong the Tonga Islanders, the New Zealanders,
the Tahitians, and the Hawaii: these are the four prin-
cipal groups of the Polynesian family, arranged according

 

 

* I use this name Pelagian, because the term Oceanic, as well as Poly-
nesian, has been by different writers appropriated to one particular branch
of this stock.

430 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK IL -

to the indications of their languages. 3. The third branch ,
are the Madecasses, or people of Madagascar.

Blumenbach placed all the Pelagian nations in one i
class of human races, and, in his system, they constitute
one of the ﬁve varieties into which all mankind are by him
distributed. At the time when Blumenbach made his
classiﬁcation, the distinct line which separates the Pelagian
Negro and the Australian races from the Malays was
hardly recognised. He otherwise would not have placed
all these nations in one group, or have assigned to them
one common description. Neither would he have stationed
the Malays at all, as he has done, in a place intermediate
between the Caucasian and the EthiOpic varieties, or have
assigned them a peculiar form of their own. The Aus-
tralians, and some other tribes in these regions, have, it
is true, some characters in which they resemble African
Negro races ; and they might be arranged in the same, or
in a proximate department of the human species. But
the Malays, properly so termed, have no traits in common
with the Negroes, nor do they make any approach to the .
Ethiopian type. Neither do the Polynesian tribes bear
any real resemblance to the Negro in the shape of their
heads. If, therefore, Blumenbach’s arrangement be pre- 7
served, the Malays, and all the nations akin to them, must
be excluded from this fourth variety of mankind, and it ?
must comprehend only the two remaining groups, namely 1
the Pelagian Negroes and the Alforas. In adverting to i
the question, what place in the ethnological system belongs
to the Malayo-Polynesian race, we are led to the statement ’
of a fact which manypersons will not be disposed to admit,—-
that the entire group of these nations, though, strictly ;
speaking, one race, do not display the same physical type.
Many late voyagers, indeed, have been struck by the great
difference, in this respect, which exists between the natives 1;
of the Indian Archipelago, of the Malayan stock, and the
remote Polynesian races; and on this ground they have”;
pronounced them to be of distinct origin. ',

Great as the physical difference is between these na—

 

CH. XVIII.] PELAGIAN NATIONS. 431

tions, it will be found by those who give due weight to the
evidence offered by late researches into their history, that
there is full and complete proof of the unity of descent in
the whole class, and that there is no probable way of
explaining the diversities that exist between them, unless
we attribute these diversities to the spontaneous variations
which display themselves in tribes of people who have
inhabited from immemorial ages diﬂ‘erent climates, and
have existed, in many respects, under different physical
conditions.*

 

* The division into three groups made by the Author is in the main
correct, though the extensive and valuable information received since his
death in relation to the Pelagian races, and some linguistic researches pro-
secuted at home, enable us to draw the line more deﬁnitely ; and, further,
to show in some degree the relation which the ﬁrst two of the groups
named bear to each other. Dr. Prichard himself recognised the incorrect-
ness of the name Alforas, which Mr. Earl’s investigations proved to be
merely a Portuguese term signifying outcasts, or separated tribes, and its
improper application to any division of the natives of the smaller islands
(see note in p. 21). But as the natives of the great insular continent of
Australia, whom he included under the Alforas, are wholly different in
physical features, moral character, and structure of languages, from all the
other Pelagian races, they may remain the sole owners of the name. The
Editor has no objection to any name whatever as a mark of distinction,
and will not pretend to suggest any partial changes: for a nomenclature
wholly new, the time is not yet arrived, though it may come by and by.
The Malayo-polynesians and the Pelagian Negroes of the Author, as is
shown by the structure of their languages, and by the mental character of the
people, however variously developed, are of one great family, in the same
sense as are the Germanic races and the Persians: all the languages yet
investigated have like grammatical characters, pronouns resembling, verbal
structure the same; and although the languages beyond the Polynesian line
have very distinct vocabularies, yet they graduate from tribe to tribe, and
island to island, in such a way as to render it impracticable to cut off from the
family even the most remote branches. ‘We have the phenomenon indi-
cated by Dr. R. Gr. Latham as being the normal condition : one pervading
language (the Polynesian here) extending over a very large area with little
dialectic variation, and an adjacent population split up into tribes speaking
a great number of idioms, all allied to the great body, but differing from
each other far more decidedly than the most distant dialects of the language
spoken by the ﬁrst-mentioned people. There is in the case before us one

432 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

CHAPTER XIX.
MALAYO-POLYNESIAN RACE.

I. [ado-Malaya”; Branch.

THE Malays, prOperly so termed, are well known to
all voyagers in the Indian Archipelago as a people of short
and slender stature and small limbs, with ﬂat faces, and
features resembling the Chinese; they are, in complexion,
considerably darker than that race, yet muchi-‘fairer than

 

great line to be drawn, coinciding to a certain extent with that indicated
by Dr. Prichard :—-the people Whom he calls Polynesians speak languages
not only similar to each other in structure, but in vocabulary also, to such
a degree of resemblance that tribes separated by a quarter of the globe’s
circumference might with little trouble understand each other ; at all events
an educated European who can read, for example, the New Zealand language,
will have little difﬁculty in comprehending the meaning of a book in the
language of the Sandwich Islands. On the other side, the idioms of the
Pelagian Negroes, whom we may call Papuans, vary so greatly in their
vocabularies that even in small islands two or more languages mutually
unintelligible are frequently in use: in a Church Missionary voyage around
the Papua Islands [Pelagian Negroes], with several natives on board speak-
ing English, who had been competently educated in the College of Auckland,
and; were good interpreters in 26 of the islands, it was estimated that they
visited districts containing 200,000 inhabitants, speaking 40 distinct lan-
guages, averaging 5000 persons only to each tongue. We have before us
translations of small portions of Scripture in several of the tongues spoken
in New Caledonia and the more eastern islands, and an examination of their
structure fully conﬁrms what is above stated. The languages examined are
but very few among the many spoken by these races, and the specimens
received being only Scripture extracts, often rather paraphrastically trans-
lated, and but scantyin amount, may not have enabled the Editor to see deeply
into the structure of these idioms—and he admits that he is generalising
rather largely on a small basis—but, so far as they go, they seem to prove
that the languages are allied to those of the other Pelagians in the same way
as the Teutonic to the Slavonic tongues ; the grammar having much resem-
blance, the pronouns being often almost identical, but the bulk of the words
different. We ﬁnd the transition well marked in the Fiji, an idiom which
is allied to both these divisions of language, in words as well as grammar.
Geographically, this might be expected. The New Zealanders may probably
be also considered as partaking somewhat of the second class, or Pelagian

écn. XIX.] MALAYO-POLYNESIANS. 433

the Hindus. They inhabit the southern part of the
Peninsula of Malacca, where they have many towns, or
cities. They likewise possess a considerable part of the
Island of Sumatra, the people of Menangkabao being
Malays, and speaking the Malayan language, properly so
termed. On the coast of most of the islands of the Indian
Archipelago they have formed settlements, and carry on
trafﬁc in most parts of the Indo-Chinese seas; they are
the Phoenicians of the Eastern seas. All the dispersed
peOple thus"far described are Malays in the strictest sense
of the term; they are people of one dialect, and nearly of
the same manners andcultivation. There are numerous

 

Negroes; certainly very much less so than the Fijis; but their decided
though recently abolished cannibalism, the distinction into two great
families—the Maoris, and the darker Mangamangas—and, we may add,
some few features of the language, all point to a Papuan intermixture. The
language of the Tonga Islands has even more Fiji analogies, «though de-
cidedly Polynesian ”on the whole; the physical character also indicates
intermixture. Some scanty vocabularies would seem to show that the so-
called Micronesian groups will be included under this, or another distinct
division of the same great family, but there is not suﬂicient material at
hand for coming to a decision. The preponderance of evidence in regard to
the Negritos of the Philippines is that they speak the languages of the
more civilised natives of the ﬁrst or Indo-Malayan group, though so
corrupted as to be scarcely intelligible to them. Of many of the islands,
and of the large island of New Guinea, we have“ only short vocabularies,
often little more than numerals, but these, on analysis, shew decidedly a
Malayan or Polynesian basis. We expect the fuller detail of the characters
and divisions of these tongues from Mr. Logan, the penetrating and inde-
fatigable editor of the Singapore Journal, who has studied this subject
more extensively and scientiﬁcally than any other man, and has already
published very valuable papers in relation to it. We may add that, under
very opposite moral conditions, the mental qualiﬁcations of the whole family
are alike ; all live in ﬁxed habitations, all cultivate the ground, all observe
something like a government and political arrangements, all have manufac-
tures more or less rude, and all, when not alarmed by fears or experience
of treachery, have shown an aptitude, and even considerable anxiety, to
receive European improvements and education. Twenty-ﬁve candidates
for scholarship were carried to New Zealand on the return of the missionary

    

dation. It is unnecessary to show how totally opposite all this is to the
state of things in Australia—En]

FF

voyage above alluded to, and many more were rejected for want of accommo- _»

434 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

tribes besides them who speak cognate dialects of the samei
speech, and differ in their degrees of civilisation. The;
Orang Benua are a race of savages who live in the moun- :
tainous tracts in the interior of the Peninsula; they arei
conjectured to be the original stock of the whole raceq
The inhabitants of other parts of Sumatra, exclusive of l
the people of Menangkabao, are likewise of this class, asi
well as the original people of the Sunda Isles.

The people of Sumatra are thus described by Mr.
Marsden: the description refers principally to the Malays;
of that island 2—- 1

“ Their eyes are uniformly dark and clear, and in some, 3
especially the southern women, bear a strong resemblance}
to those of the Chinese, in the peculiarity of formation so1
generally observed of that peOple. Their hair is strong,1
and of a shining black: it is constantly moistened with
cocoa-nut oil. ‘The women wear their hair long, some-1
times reaching the ground. The men destroy their beards!
with chunam, or quick-lime ; and their chins are so smooth?
that an uninformed person would imagine them naturally}
destitute of hair. Their complexion is properly yellow,
wanting the red tinge that constitutes a tawny or copper!
colour They are generally lighter than the Mestees, ori
half-breeds of the rest of India: those of the superiorl
class, who are not exposed to the rays of the sun, andl
particularly the women of rank, approaching to a degree
of fairness.”

The people of Java are described by Sir S. Raﬁles as
short, well made, slender, their extremities small. “ Their
forehead,” he says, “is high; the eyebrows well marked,
dark, and distinct from the eyes, which are somewhat
Chinese, or rather Tartar, in the formation of the inner
angle; the colour of the eye is dark; the nose somewhat
small and ﬂat; the cheek-bones are usually prominent;
the beards very scanty; the hair of the head lank and.
black, but sometimes waving in curls, and partially tinged
with a deep reddish-brown colour; the countenance is?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

’ CH. XIX.] INDO-MALAYANS. 435

mild, placid, and thoughtful.” The natives of Celebes are
said by Labillardiere to be short, of a yellowish com-
plexion, and to have features somewhat resembling the
Chinese. A nearly similar description is given of the
natives of other islands in the Indian Archipelago.

Blumenbach has ﬁgured and described the cranium of
a Bugis of Celebes in his ﬁfth decade of skulls. Viewed
in front, this skull resembles, as he says, the Mongolian
in its great breadth, jugal bones, the ﬂatness of the nasal
bones, and the distance of the orbits: the jaw was promi-
nent, and like the African. This last character, however,
is not general in the Malayan race.

M. Lesson was so struck with the difference in physical
characters between the islanders of the Indian and the
Paciﬁc Oceans, that he positively denies the Malayan origin
of the Polynesian tribes. To the natives of the Caroline

‘ or New Philippine Islands, who are well known to belong
to the same stock,* he gives the appellation of Pelagian
Mongoles, and constitutes them a particular family. He
; says that they have decidedly the obliquely-placed eyes
1 which characterise that race ; their countenance broad, or
‘ extended transversely, and the nose ﬂattened ; the natural
. complexion of a Citron-yellow, but becoming brown on
8 exposure. The Oceanic race, by which name he desig-
' gnates the Polynesian tribes, is, on the other hand, in his
1 opinion, the most beautiful and the most regular in fea-
E tures of all the nations who inhabit the isles of the Great
1 Southern Ocean.
1 The Plates here selected to illustrate this variety of our
1 species are portraits of a Malay, and of a native of the
E Marian Islands, exemplifying the character above de-
1 scribed. It will be seen that the countenance of both
a approaches considerably to the Chinese physiognomy, and
iis strikingly different from that of the Polynesian tribes
I who will next be mentioned.

-

 

* Le Gobien says, “La langue des Carolines a beaucoup de rapports
'11 avec la Tagala.”

4436 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

2. 0f the Polynesian Branch of the Malaya-
Polg/nesian Race.

0

The fact which I have in the preceding pages ventured
to assert—namely, that the Polynesian nations, though
belonging to a different physical type, are nevertheless
genuine descendants, or really cognate tribes, of the
Malayan family—is, for obvious reasons, one of considerable
moment in its bearing on the natural history of mankind.
I cannot attempt, in the present work, to exhibit in detail
the proofs, founded chieﬂy on a minute and elaborate
comparison of languages, which lead to this conclusion.
They form one of the principal inferences to be collected
from the great posthumous work of William von Humboldt,
which occupies three quarto volumes of the Transactions
of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Berlin. To this
work I must for the present refer my readers who are
desirous of investigating the subject.*

The Polynesian races display considerable variety among
themselves, both as to physical and moral characteristics.

The Tahitians are considered by Lesson as the type of
the whole Polynesian race. He says that all the Tahi-
tians, almost without exception, are very handsome men:
their limbs are of graceful proportions, but at the same
time robust; the muscular parts are everywhere covered
with a thick cellular tissue, which softens the contour of
their projecting lines. Their physiognomy has generally
a mild, and gentle, and frank expression. The head of l
the Tahitian would be European, were it not for thej
spreading out of the nostrils (l’e’patement des nam’nes), g
and the too great thickness of the lips. ‘

Blumenbach has ﬁgured the skull of a Tahitian, and
one of a native of the Marquesas, who are very nearly
related to the Tahitians. He remarks that the former is

 

* In the last volume of my “ Researches into the Physical History of ‘
Mankind,” the reader will ﬁnd a brief statement of this evidence.

 

CH. XIx.] POLYNESIANS. 437

somewhat narrow in form, but remarkably prominent at
the summit; the upper jaw somewhat prominent ; a ridge
extending from the middle of the forehead over the vertex.
The forms of these skulls in Blumenbach’s plates are
among the ﬁnest in his Decades. Mr. Lawrence has re-
marked, in reference to them, that the Tahitian skull does
not differ in any essential points from the European forma-
tion. The front and lower part of the forehead may be a
little contracted and slanting. The face is altogether large,
and the upper jaw fully developed : its alveolar portion, too,
projects slightly in front. He says, “ The head of a native
of Nukahiwah, one of the group called the Marquesas
Islands, presents a very beautiful and symmetrical organi-
sation, corresponding to the descriptions of the great
stature, ﬁne proportions, and strength of these islanders.

FIG. 80.

 

A NHUVC of Tahiti.

Except that the face is larger, its lower part especially
more considerable and prominent than in the best models

4:38 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

of the Caucasian variety, and that the jaws and teeth
altogether have a marked projection, this head is not very
essentially distinguished from that form. The forehead is,
indeed, more slanting than in the intellectual European
heads.” Mr. Lawrence concludes that the Marquesas,
the Society, Friendly, and Sandwich Islanders, might
almost be arranged under the Caucasian variety.

The natives of the Society Islands, including Tahiti,
are, according to Cook, of the largest size of Europeans.
The men are “ tall, strong, well-Embed, and ﬁnely shaped.
The women of the superior rank are also in general above
our middle stature, but those of the inferior class below it;
and some of them are very small. Their natural com-
plexion is that kind of clear olive, or bmmette, which many
people in Europe prefer to the ﬁnest white and red. This
refers to the females of the better class, who are sheltered
from the wind and sun; they have no tint in their checks
which we distinguish by the name of colour. Their hair
in general is black, but in some it is brown, in some red,
in others ﬂaxen; but in the children of both sexes it is
generally ﬂaxen.” “ Nothing,” says Anderson, “could
make a stronger impression at ﬁrst sight on our arrival
here than the remarkable contrast between the robust
make and dark colour' of the people of Tongataboo, and
a sort of delicacy and whiteness which distinguish the
inhabitants of Otaheite. The women struck us as superior
in every respect.”

The people of the Marquesas are very nearly related
to the natives of the Society Islands, and they may be
almost considered the same nation. They have similar
features, and an equal variety of complexion. Captain
Cook thus describes them :—“ The inhabitants of these .
islands collectively are, without exception, the ﬁnest race
of people in this sea. For ﬁne shape and regular features
they, perhaps, surpass all other nations. The men are
tattooed from head to foot ; this makes them look dark; but
the women, who are but little punctured, and youths and

 

CH. XIX.] SANDWICH ISLANDERS. 439

young children, who are not tattooed, are as fair as some
Europeans. The men are in general tall,——that is, about
ﬁve feet ten inches, or six feet. Their hair, like ours, is
of many colours, except red, of which I saw none.” The
Spanish writers expressly mentioned red hair at the Island
of La Madalena, which Cook did not visit : perhaps they
may have given that term to auburn or ﬂaxen hair. They
observe different modes in trimming the beard, which is
generally long. Their clothing is the same as at Tahiti
and made of the same materials, but not so plentiful, nor
is it so good.

The Hawaii, or Sandwich Islanders, are another branch

FIG. 81.

 

/’ '7
/ K7- .E

A Native of the Sandwich Islands.

of the Polynesian stock in the arrangement of nations by
Humboldt; they stand next to the Tahitians. Their

4140 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

language is nearly allied to the Tahitian. Their physical
characters have been described by M. Choris :—

“ Les enfans, en venant au monde, sont completement
noirs; la jeune ﬁlle la plus jolie, et la plus delicate, qui
s’expose le moins a l’action de l’air et du soleil, est noire ;
celles qui sont obligées de travailler constamment a l’ardeur
du soleil, sont presque de couleur orangée.”

The hair of these people is sometimes crisp or frizzled,
approaching to the woolly appearance ; in other instances,
soft and ﬂexible. M. Choris says, “ Les grands se distin-
guent aisément du peuple ; ils sont de haute taille, et gras;
leur teint est brun foncé ; ils ont les cheveux moins longs
que les gens du commun, souvent crépus, et courts; les
lévres généralement assez grosses; tandis que le peuple
est petit et maigre, a le teint plus jaune, les cheveux plus
lisses.”

The adjoining coloured plate, from the Atlas of M.
Choris, exhibits characteristic portraits of two natives of
the Sandwich Islands.

The New Zealanders.

The skulls of the New Zealanders differ somewhat
from those of the nations ,
already mentioned ; but the ,
deviation is inconsiderable. ,
There are many in different
collections in England, and
several may be seen in the
Museum of the Royal Col-
lege of Surgeons ; the an-
nexed ﬁgure represents one
of them.

The Ombai Islanders are
a tribe of this race.

It seems that there is great variety in the complexion
of the New Zealanders. We have seen that many of them V
were, according to early voyagers, of a colour which is de-

 

 

 

 

CH. XIX.] NEW ZEALANDERS. 441

scribed as “ a pretty deep black ;” and alate writer, Crozet,
divides them into white, brown, and black people. The
latter are of smaller stature than the former ; but there is
no clear indication of their belonging, as some have conjec-
tured, to a different stock. It has been supposed that New

FIG. 83.

 

A Native of Ombai island.

Zealand was inhabited bya tribe resembling the Australians
before the Polynesian race arrived, and that the darkest
peopleare descended from these aborigines.* But no evi-

 

* See the note in p, 432—3. If Papuans [Pelagian Negroes] be substituted
for Australians, the opinion expressed in the text will coincide with the
suspicion indicated in that note—ED.

442 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

dence of any such fact has been found: the language of
the people gives no testimony of intermixed descent ; it is
a simple Polynesian dialect. Similar physical varieties are
traced among all the other races scattered through the
Great Southern Ocean; and if we admit this conjectural
explanation of the phenomena of variety in regard to one
of these insular tribes, we must adopt a similar hypothesis
in regard to almost every other group of islands in the
Paciﬁc; and even this will afford no way of accounting for
the appearance of a type so nearly European in several of
them. The mixture of Malays with Australians, or with
any people resembling the aboriginal inhabitants of the
Indian Islands or Austral countries, would never give
origin to a form so nearly approaching the European as
that displayed by the handsome and xanthous inhabitants ‘
of the Marquesas.

[In a paper by Dr. Thompson, printed in the Journal of
the Statistical Society, it is stated that the average height
of males near Auckland is 5 feet 6% inches; one man, a
chief, was measured, whose height was 6 feet 5% inches.
Their bodies generally are 1% inch longer than those of ’
Europeans, and their legs, from the knee joint to the feet,
as much shorter. Their feet are broader than ours, and
nearly an inch shorten—En]

The Tonga Islanders.

The Tonga Islands, formerly called the Friendly
Islands, of which Tongataboo is one of the largest, are
inhabited by a tribe of people nearly resembling the New
‘ Zealanders. Their language, according to Mr. Anderson,
bears the greatest afﬁnity imaginable to the idiom of that
people.

In their physical character, they are described as
seldom above the common stature, of strong and stout
form, great muscular strength rather than beauty, and
not subject to the obesity which is observed among the

CH. XIX.] TONGA ISLANDERS. 443

Tahitians. “ Their features,” says Mr. Anderson, “ are
very various, insomuch that it is scarcely possible to ﬁX on
any general likeness by which to characterise them, unless
it be a fulness at the point of the nose, which is very
common. But, on the other hand, we met with hundreds
of truly European faces, and many genuine Roman noses
amongst them. Few of them have any uncommon thick-
ness about the lips. The women have less of the appear-
ance of feminine delicacy than those of most other nations.
FIG. 84:.

 

Matabula of the Tonga Islands.

The general colour is a cast deeper than the copper-
brown; but several of the men and women have a true
olive complexion, and some of the last are even a great
deal fairer: this, as we are told, is the case principally
among the better classes, who are less exposed to the sun.
Among the bulk of the people, the skin is more commonly

444 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [3001: II.

of a dull hue, with some degree of roughness. There are -
some albinos among them.

“ Their hair is in general straight, thick, and strong,
though a few have it bushy and frizzled. The natural
colour, I believe, almost without exception, is black; but
some stain it brown, purple, or of an orange cast. In
this custom, they resemble the islanders to the northward
of the New Hebrides.”

The Tonga Islanders are divided into several distinct
hereditary castes, to whom different oﬂices are appropriated
by ﬁxed institutions. One of these castes are the Mata-
bulas, who are a sort of middle class, below the Egaz's,
or nobles, but above the common people. The preceding
sketch gives the portrait of a Matabula, from M. d’Ur-
ville’s collection. It displays the character which the hair
assumes in many of the tribes of the Southern Ocean.

The Samoan Archipelago and its Inhabitants.

The Samoan islands are situated near the conﬁnes of
the three great Oceanic provinces into which the vast
regions of the Paciﬁc have been divided by late geo-
graphers. On the western, or the Asiatic side of that
ocean, and between the Samoan Archipelago and the in-
sular empire of Nippon, is situated Micronesia, so named
by the late much-lamented Admiral Dumont d’Urville,
who has been followed by many writers ,of recent times.
Micronesia is a region of small islands: it comprehends
many insular groups, widely dispersed, of which the par-
ticular islets are mostly of small extent. Their inhabitants
are said to differ in some respects from the Polynesian tribes
in general—that is, from the various nations, the Tongans,
Tahitians, Hawaiians, and Maorians [New Zealanders], who
people the principal groups of distant Oceanica. The Micro-
nesians have been thought to approach more nearly to the
Tagalan and Bisayan races of the adjacent Philippines;
and by a celebrated naturalist, who has traversed the Paciﬁc

CH. XIX] SAMOAN ISLANDERS. 4:45

in one of the naval expeditions sent by the late French
government to pursue nautical discovery in the Austral
seas, these people have been termed Pelagian Mongoles.
They are regarded by M. Lesson as foreigners in Oceanica,
and by him supposed to have descended from the high
table-land of Central Asia, as an offset of that race who,
according to their own mythological tradition, issued by
aid of ﬁre and blast from the iron-bound valley of Irguene-
konn. The opinion of M. Lesson has been, if I am not
mistaken, sufﬁciently refuted by Admiral Lutké, who has
displayed in full the proofs of relationship between the
dialects of the Micronesian islanders and the Polynesian
idioms. It seems, on the whole, evident that the Micro-
nesian islanders differ somewhat in physical characters and
habits from the rest of the Polynesians, but the differences
are not such as are usually typical of separate races—I
mean of races which have been immemorially separate, and
Without indications of original consanguinity. The idioms
of these islanders differ only as dialects from the languages
of the great Malayo-Polynesian family. To Which group
of these nations the Samoan islanders are to be referred,
whether to the Micronesian, the Tongan, or the Maorian,
has not been proved. It seems not improbable that they
.will be found to be in some respects intermediate between
these subdivisions of the Oceanic race.

Another region of the Great Ocean, which has been
separated by geographers from Polynesia, and made a dis-
tinct province of the Paciﬁc, approaches and almost touches
on the limits of the Samoan Archipelago. This province
may be termed “ Kelaenonesia,” or the “ region of islands
inhabited by blacks.” It lies to the southward of Micro-
nesia, and to the westward of the central spaces of Oceanica.
Kelaenonesia presents a striking contrast to the beautifully
variegated groups of the Polynesian islands, covered with
rich vegetation, and spread out in clusters of gems under
the sunny sky of the great Ocean.* The more extensive

1* DumontdlUrville, “Voyage Pittoresque autour du Globe.” Paris, 1835.

 

 

446 , NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

lands of Ke1‘aenonesia contain denser masses of lofty moun-
‘ tame and unexplored wildernesses covered with primeval
‘ forests. Unlike the lively, cheerful Polynesians, the natives
of these gloomy retreats, ferocious and sullen, of repulsive
and menacing aspect, have ever shunned the approach of
strangers. The moral and physical characters of these
savage people distinguish them equally from the agile,
graceful, and comparatively fair Polynesians. Some of the
tribes of Keleenonesia recede further than others from the
almost Asiatic beauty of the Marquesans and Tahitians,
and even exceed, as it is said, in ugliness the most ill-
favoured brood of the African forests, whom they rival in
the sooty blackness of their complexions. We shall form 1
a correct idea of this region if we represent Australia as

its nucleus or great continental centre. The outskirts of

Kelaenonesia, or Oceanic Negroland, stretch themselves

into far-distant spaces to the eastward, northward, and

westward of Australia, and form a crescent of islands and

groups of islands which presents its convex. front towards

the more ”open seas of eastern Oceanicaf"

Situated near the junction of these departments of the
Great Ocean, the Samoan Archipelago appears likely to .
become the centre of a widely-spreading inﬂuence, and the
Christian mission which, since the misfortunes of Tahiti,
has there established the seat of its active Operations, is
already beginning to produce a strong impression on the
surrounding insular nations. The inﬂuence of this mis-
sion may be expected before long to open a way into the
darkest parts of Pelagian Negroland, on the history and
languages of which a new light is very soon to be diffused.
Some brief notices of the Archipelago, which has hitherto
been very obscurely known to Europeans, cannot fail, I
think, to be interesting to the students of ethnology.

The chain of the Samoan islands occupies an extent of
almost 100 leagues from east to west, nearly under the
fourteenth degree of southern latitude. The most westerly

ﬂ =x= See the note in pp. 4231, 432, and 433.—ED.

 

CH. XIx.] SAMOAN ISLANDERS. 449

ofﬁcers. He described the inhabitants as a tall,‘athletic
race; he says the ordinary stature of-the men was ﬁve
feet ten inches, and the proportion of their limbs colossal ;
the females were tall, slender, graceful, and.s0metimes
beautiful. His account of their moral character is by no
means very favourable. Kotzebue was the next writer of
celebrity who gave an account from his own observation
of the Samoan islanders; but I believe their name was
ﬁrst made known by M. Mariner, who spent some years in
captivity in the Tonga islands. In his time the natives of
these islands had frequent intercourse with the people of
the Samoan Archipelago. Among these Mariner obtained
much information respecting the Samoans, but he modi-
ﬁed their name according to the peculiarity of the Tongan
dialectft

The most full and detailed account yet published of the
Samoan islanders is that which has been given by Mr.
Wilkes, the commander of the exploratory voyage sent out
by the United States of America. We have, however, still
more recent information in the papers published by the
Christian mission to the Samoan Archipelago, the members
of which not only exert themselves with zeal and remark-
able success in their sacred calling, but seize every oppor-
tunity that permits itself of collecting matermls for the
.history of the native tribes with whom theyhave intercourse,
and their languages. It is from them that we are likely
to obtain a satisfactory account, not only of the Polynesian
‘ tribes in this part of the ocean, but likewise of the yet un—
explored nations of Kelaenonesiaﬂ'

 

* Mariner termed this group the Hamoan Islands, and by that
. name they have been lately designated in European maps. The Tongan
llanguage, like almost all the Polynesian dialects, the Fiji and the
i Samoan excepted, wants the sibilant consonant. Like the Greek and the
Persian languages, and the ancient British, all of which repudiate sibi-
,lants to a considerable degree, these dialects supply their place with
aspirants and gutturals. Thus, Samoa becomes in the Tongan Hamoa. I
1' The following is a curious and almost prophetical passage in one
G Gr

450 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The missionaries began their operations in the Samoan
Archipelago in 1830, and at the end of the six following
years six English missionaries were settled on those islands.
Their labours now extend over ten islands, two of which are
nearly as large as Tahiti, and contain a population of
between ﬁfty and sixty thousand souls. Beyond the limits
of the Samoan group they have likewise exerted themselves
in establishing missions to several islands in the chain of
the New Hebrides, New Caledonia, and the Loyalty group.“E
At the time when the Samoan islands were visited by Mr.
Wilkes and the American expedition, 14,850 are said to
have been converted to Christianity.

The mythology of the Samoan islanders is very similar
to that of the Tongansand other Oceanic tribes of the Poly-
nesian race. It contains the same legend of Tangaloa, the
god who ﬁshed up the islands from the depths of the sea.

Physical Characters—The Samoan islanders are described
by the missionaries as a people of yellowish brown com-
plexion and black hair, who in their features and stature
bear a resemblance to the Polynesian tribes, and likewise
to the Malayan race, distinctively so termed.

Among the Polynesian islanders the men of Samoa are
said to rank in personal appearance as second only to the

 

of the works of the late Admiral Dumont d’Urville on the Paciﬁc Ocean.
It occurs in his account of the Samoan, or, as he termed it, Hamoan
Archipelago :—

“Aprés avoir complété leur travaux évangéliques dans la Polynésie
Orientale, les missionaires s’ouvriront probablement ces terres de l’Ouest,
plus sauvages sans doute, mais plus riches et plus essentielles a convertir.
La, peut-étre, le Christianisme aura quelques martyrs, mais la tache
accomplie n’en sera que plus utile et plus glorieuse: a eux d’ailleurs est
resérvé l’honneur d’éclaircir de graves questions géographiques, qui
demandent pour étre tranchées qu’on ait tout ensemble et la foi de
l’apotre et la conscience du savant l”——Voyage Pittoresque. ‘

* ﬁe the ﬁrst number of the “ Samoan Reporter,” published by the
missionaries forthe purpose of spreading information respecting the his-
tory of these and the neighbouring islands. [See subsequent notes by the
Editor relative to the still further extension of these missions] ‘

 

 

 

 

/
[Mﬂ/

/
» ////// '////

/‘
//

//

//

//¢

 

 

CH. XIX.] SAMOAN ISLANDERS. 451

Tongans, ' the W omen are r'athei ill- formed and sto (mi?-
ve1y young, some of them are pretty, and tb r colou1 1s ‘22—;
light, being little darke1 than that of a brune e or Soiith ""
American Spaniard. The girls are lively, have Q‘gOOd eX- Q,-
p1 ession of countenance, and, what is rare in '
some degree of bashfulness.

“ The average height of the men is five feet ten inches,
and some of the chiefs, whose limbs are well rounded,
would be called ﬁne-looking men in any part of the world.
Their features are not in general prominent, but are well
marked and distinct, and are all referable to a common
type.” This type is thus minutely described :——

“The nose is short and wide at the base, the mouth
large, and well ﬁlled with large and white teeth, with fullw ’
and well-turned lips ; the eyes black, and often large andMg
bright; the forehead narrow and high, and the cheek-’4’“
bones prominent. It was observed that some of them’had' ‘
the eye turned up at the outer corner, like the Chinese.
Of beard they have but little, but their hair is strong,
straight, and very black. Little difference was perceived
in the shape of the head between the two sexes. The
general form of the skull is broad and short, and it is
highest near the crown.”*

Two natives of the Samoan Archipelago were lately
brought to England by the Rev. Mr. Stair, one of the
missionaries who had been resident in those islands. I
have availed myself of the kindness of that gentleman,
and havetaken the opportunity aﬂ’orded me of obtaining
correct portraits of these persons, which will furnish the
best idea of the physical characters of the race.

   
  
  
 
  

 

 
    

 

The groups now enumerated and described appear to
comprise the most numerous of the nations into which the
Polynesian race is subdivided. But there are other offsets
of this stock, less known, but perhaps not less peculiar.

 

* “Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition,” vol. ii.
. p. 131.

452 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The inhabitants of Easter Island may be considered as one
of these. In many respects, they differ considerably from
the other tribes, from whom they are separated by a vast
space in the Great Southern Ocean. Another curious and
interesting people are the inhabitants of the small Island
of Tikopia. They are described in the Notes of MM. Quoy
and Gaimard, appended to Captain Dumont d’Urville’s
voyage round the world. The plate adjoined contains the
ﬁgure of a Tikopian, accurately copied from M. d’Urville’s
picturesque Atlas. .

[All the tribes who come under the denomination of
Polynesians appear to have adopted with readiness the
Christian religion, and the elements of civilisation. The
Sandwich islanders, who were the ﬁrst population of any
extent that received the faith and habits of the people of
Europe, are now wholly professors at least of Christianity,
and they have regularly-conducted ecclesiastical establish-
ments, colleges, and ordinary schools. But in their schools,
where the mental powers of the race are best appreciated, ‘
they show the same rapidity of acquisition in the lower 1,
branches of knowledge, with a deﬁciency of ‘ the higher .
faculties, which is observed in other of our colonies, and
even in the less favoured races of Eastern Europe. Accord-
ing to Lieut. Walpole, in 1849, “ The masters [of the
schools at VVoahu], say that 1n all the early parts of their
education they are exceedingly quick, but not in the higher *
blanches; that they have excellent memories, and learnt
by rote with wonderful rapidity, but will not exercise their ;'1
thinking faculties.” The capital of the Sandwich Islands, ;
Honolulu, can boast of its theatres, hotels, and ball-rooms, ;
as well as churches, and the richer natives have the housesé
and dress of Europeans , but the people generally are stated 1
to live and clothe themselves much as they did before the is
white man came to reside among them , even those who is
conform in public to the foreign customs are said to recurg
to theii old habits, when at home and unseen. The most

 

X'X/X,

       

 

   

/ ,7" ,’ /

 

CH. XIX.] POLYNE SIANS. 453

unfortunate circumstance noted is the steady decrease in
their numbers, which unmistakeably forces itself on our
attention. In 1849, while the births were 1422, the deaths
amounted'to 4320, more than three times as many. Such
a proportion, if continued, will soon leave the Hawaians
among the “ things that were.” A similar observation is
made in the Friendly [Tonga] Islands. The Rev. Walter
Lawry says they do not live long. “ The females are
women at thirteen, and grow old women before thirty.
Their food is very simple, and mostly vegetable; but in
size they far outstrip Europeans,—so also, as they think, in
personal attractions and beauty. But, alas! they quickly
pass away, and are gone.”* Some authorities, however,
declare the Tonga islands to have an increasing population.“
The same decrease in numbers is also observed in our
thriving colony of New Zealand ; but this may be accounted
for by the horrible practice of female infanticide, which
was very prevalent during the last generation; giving rise
to a visible scarcity of young women among the native
tribes at this day. This cause of decrease has now
wholly ceased, and we may expect that here at least the
Polynesian may not perish before the EurOpean. In the
language of Governor Grey, who is speaking of the English
intercourse with the natives, “ both races already form one
harmonious community, connected by commercial and
agricultural pursuits, professing the same faith, resorting
to the same courts of justice, joining in the same public
sports, standing mutually and indifferently to each other
in the relation of landlord and tenant, and thus insensibly
forming one people.”

May not the New Zealanders owe their exemption from
the fatality which appears to attend the appearance of
Europeans among the Polynesians, to the slight intermix-
ture of the more energetic Papuan, which has been sus-
pected, as alluded to above?

They now vie with Englishmen in many of their pursuits :

* Second Missionary Voyage, 1851.

 

41:54: NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.‘

they are expert riders and breeders of horses, they under-
stand perfectly how to make a bargain, they erect buildings,
cultivate land, and form good roads, far beyond the limits
of the English settlements. The more opulent among
them become ship-owners, landlords, and millers, the latter
being especially a favourite occupation; the poorer people
make roads, till the ground, tend cattle, build houses and
ships, ﬁsh for whales, and navigate ships generally; accord-
ing to good authority, the most regular, clean, and orderly
of all the coasting vessels plying between Auckland and
the Bay of Islands, is owned and manned wholly by natives,
and is preferred by the public as a conveyance for passen-
gers, before all the others. They resort readily to the
English law-courts, becoming even annoyingly litigious;
and their favourite conversation is said to be “religious .
and political discussion, and the general news of the day.”
Of their skill in military tactics, and great courage in ﬁght,
we have had some unpleasant experience, and they have
decidedly abandoned all their ancient barbarous warlike
customs, conducting their combats with us in the most
chivalrous spirit, and carefully avoiding injury to all but
actual combatants. From men capable of such an advance
we may hope much, and we cannot fear that the English
mixture will produce any deterioration among them. The
only drawback we know is, that they do not acquire English
enough for steady intercourse,—the English rather learn
their language; a result fatal to the mental progress of _
the native, and injurious to that of the Englishman. It is .
perhaps accounted for by the great facility of the New i
Zealand language ; we would not willingly attribute it to ‘
the same want of national stamina which has made the
Spaniard and Portuguese in South America forsake their
own tongues and European usages, to acquire the difﬁcult
idioms and listless habits of the Guaranis, and kindred
tribes]

 

CH. XIX.] MADECASSIANS. 455

3. 0f the JIIadecassicms, 07‘ Natives of Jlladagazscomale

It has long been known that the language spoken in
the Island of Madagascar bears some resemblance to the
Malay. Some writers, adOpting a conjecture which seems
at ﬁrst sight most probable, have assumed that this resem-
blance is the merely casual effect of commercial inter-
course between the trading Malays and people on the sea-
coast of that island. This is not the fact, as it has been
fully proved by Baron William von Humboldt.

Through the whole Island of Madagascar only one
language is spoken. There are particular dialects in
different parts ; but the diversities between them are but
slight, and such as do not constitute what can be termed
_ cognate or sister languages. This was the testimony of
Flacourt, who wrote a history of Madagascar in 1658, and
likewise completed a dictionary of the language ; and it is
conﬁrmed by all later accounts that are worthy of regards!“
The people differ, as we shall see, considerably in their
physical characters. Some tribes resemble the woolly-
haired blacks on the opposite coast of Africa, and others
are more like the Malays ; but they have all one language.

The learned authors of the “ Mithridates” compared
this language, as far as they had materials enabling them
to investigate its nature, with the Malayan ; and they came
to a conclusion that the connexion between them was not
original, and that each idiom had a distinct basis. But
this opinion has been entirely refuted by Humboldt, who
has set the question for ever at rest, and has demonstrated
the Madecassian to be a genuine and real oﬁ‘spring of the
great Malayo-Polynesian language. The mass of the popu-
lation in this island must be considered as of Malayan
descent. From what part of the Great Ocean they ori-

 

* The people of this island are often called Malecasses, or Malgasches,
the d and I being interchangeable. Madecasses, or Madecassians, is the
form of the name adopted by Baron XV. von Humboldt.

1‘ Humboldt’s Kawi Sprache, vol. iii. p. 326.

456 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300]; II.

ginated cannot be ascertained ; their idiom contains
numerous words common to it and the remote Polynesian
dialects, and wanting in the Proper Malay; on the whole,
it bears, perhaps, the nearest afﬁnity to the Tagala, the
prevailing language of the Philippine Islands.

Though so many English persons have visited the
Island of Madagascar of late years, we have great reason
to complain that none of them have thought it worth while
to give us correct information respecting the races of people
who inhabitit, and the diversities of their idiom and physical
characters.”’6 It is chiefly from French voyagers that we
have obtained What information we possess on these sub-
jects. Flacourt, the Abbe Rochon, and other old writers,
have taken much pains to collect materials for the history
of the Madecasses. Alater account of the different races is
to be found in the narrative of M. J. B. Fressange, which
was published by Malte—Brun in his “ Annales des Voy-
ages.”"r I extract chieﬂy from it the following particulars.

“ The Madecassians,” says Fressange, “are one of the
ﬁnest savage races known : they are of great stature (d’mze
stature trés grcmde), and of agreeable ﬁgure, well—shaped
in all their proportions, and of an olive colour.” This
general description he afterwards modiﬁes: “Their cha-
racter is serious and reﬂective: they are incontinent and
revengeful, lively, susceptible at once of the most brilliant
qualities and the greatest vices. Hospitality is reckoned
honourable through the whole island.” The people of the
interior differ much from the preceding description; they
are of short stature, with Malay features, lank and long
hair; they are knavish and deceitful, and bear little or
no resemblance to the natives of the coast.

The Madecasses believe in a Supreme Being, inﬁnitely

 

* I must except an interesting paper in the ﬁfth volume of the
“ Journal of the Royal Geographical Society,” by Captain Lewis, RN.

't A more detailed enumeration of the different tribes may be seen in
the voyages of M. de Froberville to Madagascar ﬁnd the Comoro Isles,
published in Paris in 1811. »

3 CH. XIX.] MADECASSIANS. 457

‘ good, and likewise in an evil genius. They believe in the
immortality of the soul.

Madagascar is divided into different provinces, whose
E inhabitants differ in character, person, and manners. In
E the northern part are the Antavarts, People of the North,
. or People of Thunder, because thunder comes generally
: from the north. Next to them are the Bestimessaras,
‘ Good People, or Great People.‘ 3. Betanemenes are
‘ people inhabiting a red country. 4. The Antaximes are
People of the South. This is the succession of tribes along
the coast : in the interior are the Ambarivoules, or people
living at the feet of mountains covered with bamboos. The
third tract, reckoning from the coast, is occupied by the
Bézonzons, the Amayes, or Antamayes, the Ancovesovas,
or Ambolambs, the Andrantsais, the Antsinaxes, and the
Saclaves. The provinces of Queen Borbétoe and of the
Bay St. Augustin are little known, and the western coast
is seldom Visited.

The Bestimessaras are the ﬁnest race in the island:
they are a pastoral and agricultural peOple, of mild charac-
ter; their chief place, the village of Andévourante, sends
out 10,000 armed men. The Antaximes are a rude and
predatory tribe; on this part of the coast the people are
black, and have woolly hair. The Antamayes, whom
Rochon mistook for Arabs, resemble the Malays in features
and complexion, and blacken their teeth with betel; they
inhabit a high steppe between two ranges of mountains,
eighty leagues in length; their plains are covered with
ﬂocks, and their villages are situated on hills. The An-
covas, Ovah, or Ambolambs, are divided into two nations,
the North and South Ovahs; the despots of both tribes
carry on war between themselves for the trafﬁc in slaves ;
the people resemble the Antamayes, but are of fairer
colour.

The Andrantsa'is are a pastoral people, of rude and
cowardly character. In the villages of these people there
are sometimes born dwarfs; and this is the race which has

 

458 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.’

been reputed to be a natiOn of dwarfs, and described under
the name of Kimos. They ignore any such epithet. M.
Fressange saw one dwarf from their country, but says that
they are only occasionally seen, and that no race of dwarfs
exists in Madagascar.

It seems that circumcision is practised through the
whole island; but it is not the Mohammedan custom.

Of all the Madecassian tribes, the Ovahs are the most
remarkable ; they were described under the name of Vir-
zimbers by Robert Drury, in the account of his captivity
in Madagascar, about eighty years ago. Of late they have
become the dominant tribe ; Radama was a Chieftain of
the Ovahs, who subdued under his power nearly the whole
island. The province of Ovah is the smallest in Mada-
gascar, and it is situated at the distance of 160 miles from
the nearest coast.

Although the Ovahs are said to resemble the Malayan
race, it does not appear that they have all the peculiarities
of the genuine Malays. Several men of distinction from
the Island of Madagascar were in London some years ago
on a mission from the Queen of the Ovahs, the widow of
Radama ; their portraits were taken by a good artist,
and it is remarkable that they all bear the most striking
resemblance to each other. If we may consider them as
specimens of the Ovah race, it must be allowed that this
tribe has acquired a peculiar physiognomy, having nothing
of the Chinese type, to which the Proper Malays approxi-
mate ; neither has it the almost European character of the
Polynesian Islanders. Their hair is curly and bushy, but
it is not woolly; neither is there, in general, any thing
indicative of an approach to the Negro character. The

coloured plate opposite is copied from one of these portraits. '

 

 

CH. XX] PELAGIAN NEGROES. 459

CHAPTER XX.

THE PELAGIAN N EGROES.

BLACK, woolly-haired people, resembling in their fea-
tures and colour the Negroes of Guinea, are widely spread
in the Indian Archipelago. They inhabit the interior of
many islands, and, according to Mr. Crawford, there are
traces of them in others Where they are no longer found.
Dampier, and other early navigators, found them spread
. along the northern coast of New Guinea, New Britain, and
. New Ireland ; for, besides the hybrid Papuas, already
described, it seems, from the account of voyagers, that
there are in these countries tribes much more resembling
the Africans, with short woolly hair. At what period they
spread themselves over these regions cannot be determined ;
neither do we know the source from which they originated.
It is remarkable, however, that the mountainous country
in the interior of the Malayan Peninsula is inhabited by
woolly-haired tribes, who are well known under the name
of Samangsﬁ‘e and are supposed to be the aborigines of the
land, which they divide with the Orang Benua, inhabitants
of the plains. The latter are said to resemble the Malays.
A similar people are known in the Andaman Islands, in
the Bay of Bengal ; and these are the most eastern points
to which they are to be traced.)L

 

3“ A short notice of the Samangs, by Mr. John Anderson, Secretary to the
Government of Penang, appeared some years ago in a Penang newspaper,
and was reprinted in the second volume of Mr. Logan’s “Journal of the
Eastern Archipelago,” p. 425. A partly civilised Samang, residing at Jan,
was seen by Mr. Anderson: he was quiet and inoffensive. “His height
was 4 feet 9 inches; his hair woolly and tufted; his colour a glossy jet black ;
his lips were thick, his nase ﬂat, and belly very protuberant, resembling
exactly two natives of the Andaman islands, who were brought to Prince
of Wales Island [Penang] in the year 1819.” See inﬂ-d, p. 462—1431).

1’ The Editor’s views with regard to the subjects of this chapter are
brieﬂy stated in pp. 429—431. He has preferred to call them Papuans, in

460 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Pelagian Negroes have long been well known as inha-
bitants of the interior of the Penang Islands, in the Archi-
pelago of the Philippines, where they occupy rocky and
mountainous tracts in the inland parts. One of the small
islands is named from them “ Isla de los Negros :” in other
islands they are termed “ Negritos del Monte.” They are
called Aigta and Inagta, which, according to Don Fran-
cisco Garcia de Torres, means “ Blacks.” Igolote is
another appellation given to them. We have nume-
rous descriptions of these people in the writings of
Catholic missionaries who have resided in the Philippine
Islands.

It appears, from these reports, that there are two races
of Blacks in the interior of the Philippine Islands. The

 

accordance with general usage, the restriction of the term to the supposed
hybrid races having been tacitly abandoned by common consent. His
views are founded on a consideration of the grammatical structure of a
very few of the languages of this race, and those spoken by a small section
only of the islanders of the New Hebrides and New Caledonia. There
appears to be no other source of linguistic information yet accessible; for
mere lists of words, and these but scanty, are of little use. He would also
attach value to the statement of Torres and de la Fuente, cited by the
Author, that the languages of the N egritos of the Philippines are the
Boholan, Bisayan, 850., only “corrupted” and mixed with foreign words,
which can hardly be the result of intercourse; the separation of the tribes
is too decided. The testimony of missionaries who spoke these languages

far outweighs the negative evidence of Mallat and de la Gironiére, who

did not understand them ; a Frenchman with a fair knowlege of our lan-

guage, on hearing the English spoken by many of the Sierra Leone Negroes,

would ﬁnd it wholly unintelligible. In regard to the Andamanners, Tas-

manians, people of New Guinea, and others, We can only adduce some

general resemblance of habits, manners, and physical features, as rendering

the connection probable. The most.recent and copious details respecting

the Papuans of the Indian Archipelago are given by Mr. Earl, in the ﬁrst

volume of the Ethnographical Library, 1853. Capt. Erskine’s “ Islands of

the Western Paciﬁc” contains the best and fullest notices we have of the

Eastern division of this race. The Editor would willingly limit the term

Papuan to the subjects of the two last-mentioned volumes, and would con-

tinue the appellation of N egritos to the races inhabiting the northern

islands: this was certainly the practice of the author himself in his latest -
writings—ED.

‘ CH. XX.] NEGRITOS or THE PHILIPPINES. 461

following account was taken from the narrative of the
Abbate Bernardo de la Fuente :—

“ The Negroes of the Philippine Islands are of two
races. One of them is supposed, in those countries, to be
descended from the Malabars, or Sepoys; because, although
their skin is perfectly black, their hair is long, ﬁne, and
glossy, like that of other Indians, and their countenances

l-are not deformed in the nose and lips, as those of the
iNegroes of Guinea. These peOple, whether in a state of
i slavery or freedom, are tolerably civilised in their manners.
' There is another race of Negroes, termed A’I'gta, who
wander about dispersed among the mountains : these have
’ somewhat of the deformity of features, and they have
t crisped hair, like that of the natives of Guinea. Of these
Negroes, some are found in the Isle of Luzon; and they
are very numerous in the Isla de los Negros, of which they
suppose themselves to be the original inhabitants. The
.said race of Negroes seems to bear upon themselves the
.malediction of Heaven; for they live in the woods and
mountains like beasts, in separate families, and wander
about supporting themselves by the fruits which the earth
spontaneously offers to them: it has not come to my know-
ledge that a family of these Negroes ever took up their
abode in a village. If the Mohammedan inhabitants make
slaves of them, they will rather submit to be beaten to
death than undergo any bodily fatigue; and it is impos-
'sible, either by force or persuasion, to bring them to labour.
Not far from my mission at Buyunan, in the island De
los Negros, there was a horde of Negro families who had
trafﬁc with some barbarous Indian people, and were by
these given to understand that I counselled them to receive
baptism, in order that the government might force them to
pay the tribute: in consequence of this, I could never
reclaim one of them ; and I believe that very few Negroes
have been converted, for I only found the name of one in a
register containing the baptisms of two hundred years. I
ever maintained with these Negroes a gentle and friendly

«5

"J-

462 , NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

intercourse, hoping that the grace of the Lord might
fructify in their hearts ; and I began to discover that they

Mtrusted me and obeyed me in many particulars.” He adds, 1

“That their language was the Boholan, and that they
were supposed to descend from African Negroes :” a con-
jecture of as little weight as that which derives the other
race of straight-haired black people from the Malabars.
The same writer was informed, that in the interior of the
island were Negroes with perfectly red eyes, who were
cannibals; but he never saw any one of them.

A very interesting account has lately been given by
Captain Gabriel Lafond (of Lavey) of a tribe of these
Negroes inhabiting the island of Lasso, where they are
found in places of difﬁcult access. One of their mountain
villages was visited by M. Lafond, who represents the
inhabitants as living in the rudest manner. This writer
agrees with Le Gentil in describing them as nearly naked
savages, with ﬂat noses, and hair like wool-or cotton.
They precisely resemble the Negroes of the Isle of Luzon;
they were lean, of light and active form; their stature was
remarkably small, being little above four feet, and nearer
to four than to four and a half. In this extreme smallness
of stature the Inagta or Igolote resemble some of the
Samangs of the Malayan mountains, who are described by
Crawford as a very diminutive race. M. Lafond admits
that in other places their stature is greater.

The plate opposite gives probably a correct portrait of
a female of this race. It was taken from the collection of
the French artist, M: Choris, who accompanied the Russian
voyage of circumnavigation under Kotzebue.

It is very remarkable that M. Lafond, as well as all the
missionaries who have been acquainted with these Negro
tribes of the Philippines, agree in the statement, that they
Speak dialects of the Tagala and Bisaya languages. These
are the principal idioms of the Philippine islands, and are
known to be dialects of the Malayan language. The
Abbate Torres says, “ La lingua dell’ Isola detta de’ Negri

l

011. XX.] NEGRITOS or THE PHIDPPPINES. 463

0

is: e la Bisaya stessa, col miscuglio di moltissime parole fores-

tieri ;”* and by De la Fuente, who says, “ La loro lingua

V" e Bollalana, poiche in essa mi parlavano, sebbene adulte-
rata.”1L

0
[Much information in regard to the Negritos of the

Philippines is contained in Mallat’s splendid work on those
‘ Islands ; and P. de la Gironiere’s “Souvenirs de J ala—jala,’ ’i

the result of twenty years’ residence, affords some very

= amusing reading, which is no doubt authentic on the whole,

though somewhat coloured and heightened for the sake of
effect. Mons. Mallat describes the Igorrotes, Tinguianes,

 

or Itanegs, qugaos, Gaddanes, Ibilaos, Itetapanes, Gui-
naanes, and the Aetas or Itas. The last-named people, which

‘ are also called Aigtas or Ajetas, he names especially N egri-

tos, but apparently for no sufficient reason. He says they
speak different dialects, varying from tribe to tribe; but
gives no specimens which could lead us to infer the relation
of those languages to those of the Islands generally.§ He
is of opinion that these several tribes, and the other
unchristianized people in the islands, are all mixed races
between the aboriginal Negritos and the Malays, Chinese,
and Japanese, who have accidentally reached the islands,
a circumstance of not unfrequent occurrence.

“ The Negritos (p. 93) aresmall, well-made, and nimble;
the nose is not broad, [peu épaté], the hair is frizzled.
They are less black, and much less ugly than the negroes
of the African coasts, because, instead of living, like those
negroes, in the open air, exposed to the saline exhalations of
the sea, and burning heat of the sun, they take shelter,
during the violent heat of the day, under the shade of

 

* The language of the Isla de los Negros is the Bisayan, mixed with
very many foreign words.

1* Their language is Boholan, for they spoke to me in that language,
though corrupted.

j; J. Mallat: Les Philippines, &c. Paris, 1846, two volumes. P. de
la Gironiere, Vingt années aux Philippines, Paris, 1853.

§ Vol. ii. p. 170.

l'

l
4164: NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II;

forests which are so high and so thick that the sun’s rays
cannot pierce through.

‘ “ The Negritos dwell on the tops of the highest moun-
tains; their sole dress is a little wrapper of bark around
the body; they feed upon roots, wild fruits, and such game

as they kill With arrows, which they shoot with incredible .

skill .......... They are spread over the desert
places throughout the whole of the islands, and they are

i

 

far from being the most ferocious of the pagan tribes.”
The Plate opposite, from Mr. Mallat’s work, represents a
male and female of this race.

M. de la Gironiere (p. 273), compares them for their
form and colour to the New Zealanders. Afterwards (in
p. 297), he says the Ajetas or Negritos are of an ebon black
like the African negroes ; that their features are not un-
like, though the lips are less prominent ; their hair is
woolly, and forms an odd-looking sort of crown about the
head ; which we should suppose to be like the coiffure of
Dampier’s “ mop-headed Papuas ;” their eyes are yellow-
ish, but quick and brilliant like those of an eagle. When
young, they are well made, but their shelterless habits, and
very precarious life of alternate gluttony and starvation,
soon produces a large abdomen, and slender extremities.
“ The old women, especially, are hideous; their decrepit
limbs, protuberant abdomen, and very extraordinary hair,
give them the look of furies, or of old witches,” p. 299.
On the whole, he thought them more like monkeys than
human creatures,—their gestures were absolutely the same,
and their voices like the squeak of those animals. He
could not understand their language, but an old woman
among them who spoke Tagala was his interpreter. Mons.
de la Gironi‘ere was called upon to give names to all the
young children of the tribe with which he associated for a
day or two, because, as the old woman informed him, “ We
have but a very few words to talk with among ourselves,
and all our children are named from the place where they
are born, which causes great confusion ; we therefore bring

CH. xx.] NEGRITOS OF THE PHILIPPINES. 465

them to you to give them names.” This does not look
“very probable; the old lady’s language was perhaps not
very intelligible. They use poisoned arrows, and eat their
. game almost raw.
Marriage among the Ajetas is a voluntary contract, made
i Without. any ceremony, but is maintained inviolate, and
only one wife is allowed. They have a great respect for
: old age, and each tribe, amounting to about 60 or 80 per-
4 sons, is always governed by one of the oldest of the body
j (p. 303). They have also great veneration for the dead;
éthey place the bow and arrows of the deceased over the
grave, and for many years they continue to pay visits to
: the place of burial to deposit tobacco and betel, for the use
1 of the spirit of the departed. Mons. de la Gironiere gives
3 a good deal more information respecting this race, which,
; considering the short stay he made amongst them, is rather
l suspicious ; he could hardly have obtained his information
from the other people of the islands, who appear to shun
all intercourse with the Negritos.

Mons. Mallat gives further descriptions of the various
Wild tribes inhabiting the Philippines ; from which we make
a few extracts :—

“ The Igorrotes (p. 99) are tall; their colour is that of a

l roasted quince, called by some coppery; they have large
and black eyes“ turned upwards at the outer angle ; their
cheeks are large and salient ; hair smooth, but very hard,
and of a lustrous black.”

Mons. de la Gironiere’s account agrees with that of
Mons. Mallat; but he makes the colour a deep bronze, the
nose ﬂattish, and the head disproportionately large. _

The Itetapanes and Gaddanes (Mallat, vol. ii. pp. 102 and
110), are like the Negritos, but have round eyes, and large
and ﬂat noses. The Guinaanes and qugaos are savage
and cruel, and decidedly cannibals; they throw the lasso
With much skill, and, like some of the Borneo tribes, kill
their enemies for the sake of the head, with which they
ornament their huts; and they themselves wear an addi-

H H

 

P

4:66 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II. I ‘

tional ear-ring for every head they cut off. Colonel Galbey, a
in 1831, found one man with twenty-two such trophies. . 2
These races are not devoid of industry, and they cultivate ;

the land with some skill.
The Tinguianes, according to Mallat, (p. 104-7), are not

unlike the civilised Tagalas in colour, size, features, and -

temper; but, unlike them, they are indolent, and mostly
pagans. He believes them to be of Chinese descent.

M. de la Gironiere visited a Tinguiané village, (p. 113), i

and was surprised to ﬁnd a ﬁne race Of men, of a slightly
bronzed complexion, smooth hair, aquiline nose, and regu-l

lar proﬁle; and women really handsome and graceful. _

“I might have thought myself,” he says, “ among the

inhabitants of the South Of France, had it not been for the n

costume and language.’ The dress Of the men was a

mere girdle, the women had also a little apron, very nar- ,

row. The men covered their heads with a sort of turban
made Of ﬁg-tree bark, but the women ornamented their
hair with beads Of coral, pearls, and grains of gold : their

hands were painted blue, and on their arms they had a'x.
tight sleeve or bracelet, which is put on in youth, and never
taken off, so that the wrist is tightly compressed, and the .

hand horribly swollen, which is considered a great beauty.

They are clean in their persons, and they bathe frequently ; '
their habitations by day are little bamboo and straw huts, ,

but they pass their nights in a very small kind of straw
nest, which they build as high as they can in lofty trees,

sixty or eighty feet from the ground : a necessary precau- -

tion against their ferocious enemies, the Guinaanes. Their
religion appears to be a sort of fetishism. They have only
one wife, from whom divorce is rare, but they may have as
many concubines as they can afford to keep, having a sepa-
rate hut for each. At the death of any Of the tribe, the
body is laid out on a bench: all his friends meet to feast on
what he has left behind him, and to pronounce orations in
his praise; after which, the body is surrounded by ﬁre, and
slowly dried, an Operation which usually lasts ﬁfteen days;

[I
l.

i ,

I

Q

.l

 

CH. XL] PELAGIAN NEGROES. 4167

it is then deposited in a hole under his hut. M. de la
Gironiere (p. 148), considers the Tinguianes to be descen-
dants of the Japanese.

The several uncivilized tribes in the islands appear to
resemble either the Ajetas or Tinguianes, with slight dif-
ferences.]

From the southern extremity of New Britain and New
Ireland, tribes of Pelagian negroes are spread along the
chains of Louisiade and Solomon Isles to Santa Cruz, and
thence still farther to several of the New Hebrides and to
New Caledonia. The ethnography of these last countries
is, however, but imperfectly known ; and several voyagers
assert that, although the hair of the New Caledonians is
crisp and much curled, it is not like that of the African.
The island of Mallicollo appears to contain a particular
race of small slender negroes,
whose countenances are said by
Cook to be remarkably progna-
thous. Lastly, the Tasmanians,
or natives of Van Diemen’s
Land, now almost entirely eX-
terminated, are decidedly of the
Pelagian Negro stock. The
compressed, elongated form,
with prognathous jaws, may be
recognised in the outline of a
Tasmanian skull which is here annexed.axe

FIG. 85.

 

Skull of a Tasmanian.

 

* The people of Van Diemen’s land appear to be on the point of
becoming extinct, without leaving on record enough of the language to aid
the philologer in his estimate of the class it belongs to : the Editor has
made an attempt, by the kind assistance of Captain Erskine, to obtain some-
thing of it, but as yet unsuccessfully. From this gentleman he has learned
the curious fact that the few Tasmanians left, amounting to two or three
dozen, have nine distinct dialects among them, so different, that they have
found it expedient to adopt English as the medium of communication. In
his “ Journal of a Cruize among the Islands of the Western Paciﬁc,”
Captain Erskine, in p. 378, has a note upon the curious distinction between
the populations of the adjoining islands of New Holland and Van Diemen’s

‘ Land in physical characteristics generally, and particularly in the ﬂowing

”mmwmw

468 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK 11.

[Much has been added within these few years to our
knowledge of those groups of the Western Paciﬁc Islands,
which include New Caledonia, the Loyalty Islands, and
the New Hebrides, containing a population estimated
roughly at 80,000. Many missionary voyages have been
made among these groups under the auspices of the Bishop
of New Zealand, two of which, at least, were conducted by
that excellent prelate in person : youths have been brought
away from several of the islands, placed in the college
of Auckland for education, and have subsequently been
carried back again to serve as the heralds of Christianity,
and as aids to future missionaries. According to the last
intelligence we have received, published this year (1854),
in the Samoan Reporter, recording some details of the
tenth missionary voyage, there were 25 schools, with 1400
scholars, one-third of whom could read well, and many
write, in the single little island of Anaiteum, while cannie
balism, war, the strangling of widows, and infanticide, had
almost wholly ceased.

A very interesting narrative of a visit to the Papuan
Islands, (meaning those above mentioned) in 18419,at in
the course of which Captain Erskine, the conductor 3
and narrator of the Expedition, met the little vessel ,‘
of the Bishop of New Zealand, and had the beneﬁt of ,.
his previous acquaintance with the natives, forms the E
chief source of what is here stated; and a Report of the {i
missionary voyage of 1850, which included the Solomon’s f§
J?

silky hair of the former, and almost woolly hair of the latter, which justiﬁes gé
the separation made by Dr. Prichard between these and his Alforians. The E3
remarkable resemblance between the baskets manufactured by the natives g
of Van Diemen’s Land, and those of the Papuans of the Loyalty Islands,
is an evidence of consanguinity which the Editor estimates highly; he has
examined the articles which Capt. Erskine brought to England, and is satisﬁed ,'
that so perfect an identity of texture, different too from any thing made
by native tribes elsewhere, could not have been produced by other causes 5
than such as may be referred to afﬁnity of race. —-—ED.

9“ Journal of a Cruise among the Islands of the Western Paciﬁc, 850,
by John Elphinstone Erskine, Capt. R. N. SW. London, 1853.

 

 
 
   
 
  

 

  

9H xx.j NEW CALEDONIANS. 4.69

and Queen Charlotte’s islands,as well as those above named,
drawn up by the Rev. John Inglis, and printed in New
Zealand in 1851, affords valuable additions to Captain
Erskine’s observations. Both these gentlemen agree in
depicting the natives of all the islands as generally intel-
ligent, active, good-tempered, and industrious; inclined to
be perfectly friendly with the English, learning our lan-
guage readily, adopting our habits willingly, and polite
and even polished in their general behaviour; while at the
same time, by a revolting contrast, they eat their fellow
creatures, strangle widows, and even such of the children
of a deceased parent as are unable to support themselves,
put their aged relations to death, and exhibit a remorse-
less cruelty in war. Their languages vary remarkably,——
there are several mutually unintelligible dialects in New
Caledonia alone, and each of the smaller islands has at
least one of its own; it was estimated by the Bishop of
New Zealand, that, on the average, a language is spoken
by 5000 individuals only. The Rev. John Inglis (p. 22),
would call the whole of these islands Polyglottia, or the
Polyglot Islands; he contrasts the, Papuan and Polyne-
sian languages, and considers them wholly distinct, and
even opposed in words and structure: but if he had taken
into consideration all the languages of the Malayan family,
and compared them with that of Anaiteum, in which he
was conversant, we think he would have modiﬁed his
opinion: he does, in fact, subsequently (p. 25) admit the
probability of ﬁnding afﬁnities by further investigation, and
a fuller knowledge.

Capt. Erskine describes the New Caledonians as a ﬁne
and intelligent race of men, black, woolly-haired, and
resembling the Fr] is in general appearance. The ﬁgure
in the opposite plate, the portrait of a man of the district
of Balad, is from his portfolio. The women were much
under subjection to the men, but they were not restrained
in their intercourse with the whites, in the course of
which they conducted themselves with strict propriety...

 

l...

4,70 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

On the banks of the river up which the party proceeded,
they found “ neat trimly-kept houses, standing often in
very beautiful situations on its banks, with well-constructed
landing-places, and a few trees placed in regular order
on what appeared to be mown lawns ....... The
face of the hills above the river is covered with rec-
tangular ﬁelds, surrounded by channels for irrigation,
which, as far as can be seen from below, is conducted on a
careful and scientiﬁc system, levels being carried from the
streams, which, at this season of the year, afterwards ﬂow
into the river at intervals of a quarter of a mile” (p. 355).
In the course of the day, he saw some poles with heads
upon them, which he was informed were those of women
put to death for breaking the tabu,———a decided Polynesian
characteristic. The natives had scarcely any covering but
a mere girdle, though they appeared to suffer from cold and
wet, and were very probably restricted to this deﬁciency of
dress by want of means, for the chief and his brother
wore frocks; and one of the peOple was detected in the
attempt to steal a seaman’s shirt. Some of them wore a
sort of cylindrical hat, not unlike the paper cap used by_.=
carpenters at their work, and many frizzled their hair out?
behind into a globular queue. Mr. Inglis says (page 9):?!
they use a large mat, of a size sufﬁcient to cover them i
completely when it is cold or rainy: this was not seen by:
Captain Erskine, but in an island 240 miles long there
must be variety of usages. He further states that “ they
manufacture coarse earthen. pots for the cooking of food,
similar but inferior to the earthenware made by the natives
of the Fiji islands ; thus furnishing one proof of the rela-
tionship or common origin between the natives of the two.
groups” (p. 11.)

The New Hebrides are peopled by a race having a gene-
ral resemblance to the New Caledonians, though differing
considerably among themselves in particular characters,
so that each island is said to have a population which may
be recognised as peculiarly its own. The portraits of two

 

 

 

 

' on. xx] NEW HEBRIDEANS. 4,71

. Erumanga natives on the opposite plate, and the ﬁgure of
' a native of Anaiteum, facing page 469, all from the
portfolio of Captain Erskine, are characteristic of these
islanders. The people of Anaiteum* are shorter and
less athletic than the average; the little dress they have
is like that of the New Caledonians, but they wear the
hair tied up in small locks, and like strings, which are
brought together in a bunch behind, looking like a bundle
of whipcord,—a mode found besides only in Tana, and in
, a small part of Erumanga. The opposite plate-t gives a
good idea of this kind of head-dress. They sing beau-
tifully, according to Mr. Inglis, “ greatly surpassing any
thing I have heard among the New Zealanders (p. 15).”
In Tana, the people are short but athletic, with shining,
black, downy skin ; their features are not disagreeable, but
they smear themselves with black and red earths that give
them a very ugly appearance. Like the people of Anaiteum,
they are very fond of music ; two mouth-organs were
brought from Tana by Capt. Erskine, one of 14, the other
of 18 pipes, both in the key of Gr. These instruments were
‘out of tune when examined by the Editor, but both appeared
as though intended to have the common ‘chord in the
minor key, With an additional sixth. The Tanese are good
agriculturists. The inhabitants of Vate are tall and hand-
some, theyhave good foreheads and straight noses, approach-
ing the aquiline form; some of them are tattooed; the
women are tall and thin, they wear the hair close cropped,
have a broader waist-belt than the men, and a square mat
by way of an apron. They wear also a sort of tail of
matting, suspended from the waist-belt, with aloose fringe
at the end, 18 inches in length, and reaching to the calf of
the leg. The Vate people are better workmen than those of
Tana; their spears are beautiful, their bracelets are made

 

9“ This island is called Aneiteum, Anattom, Anatam, &c. The name in
the native language is Aiteum ; the an being a preposition meaning “ at.”
We have followed the orthography which is nearest to the real name—ED.

1’ From the portfolio of Captain Erskine.

472 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

of small rings ground out of shells, exactly resembling .
chain-armour, and so neatly strung together in alternate
black and white rows or ﬁgures, that the .inside resembled
a coarse woven cloth. Their houses are “ of tolerable di-
mensions, of an oblong form, with slightly curved roofs,
closed at the sides, but entirely open at one end.” The
village of Sema, to which Capt. Erskine and the Bishop
were “ conducted by a good path, bordered in parts by
enclosed provision grounds, apparently very productive,”
was composed of several such houses in no regular order,
and of one great common house, 100 feet long by 28 wide,
which was exhibited with evident pride” (p. 331). Their lan-
guage approached so near to the Samoan, that the general
meaning could be followed by one who spoke that tongue.
According to Mr. Hardie, who visited the Island shortly
after the departure of Captain Erskine, “the people are
most inveterate cannibals. Enemies slain in war are
eaten by them. They will go to other villages and exhume
bodies that have been buried two, three, or more days,
bring them home, cook' and eat them. It is their custom,
when they wish to make peace, to kill one or more of their
own peOple, and send the body to those with whom they
have been ﬁghting, to eat. On the death of chiefs, it is a
frequent custom to kill one, two, three, or more men, to
make a feast for the mourners. When parents are unwill-
ing to have the fatigue of rearing their children, or when
they ﬁnd them a hindrance to their work, they often bury
them alive” (p. 334).

This is quoted by Capt. Erskine from the Samoan Re-
porter for November 1849. A better character was given
by the Rev. Mr. Turner, who was there in 1845, though he
conﬁrms much of what is stated by Mr. Hardie; but at
the same time he says, “ Upon the whole, they are among
the most inviting heathens we have met with in these
seas.”

In the Loyalty Islands, between New Caledonia and
the New Hebrides, Capt. Erskine found similar characters,

CH. xx] LOYALTY ISLANDERS. 47 3

though he thought there was a Polynesian admixture dis-
cernible in features and language. In Uea, also called
Eningcha and Mondavi, the colour of the skin was less
dark than in Vate ; but there was much diversity in this
respect. The hair in some cases was long and ﬂowing, in
others crisp, in about equal proportions. In this little
island there are three tribes, speaking different dialects.
According to information received from an intelligent man
named Edwards, who had resided some months on the
islands, the men were honest and upright, the women
chaste and faithful. In Lifu, the colour of the skin was
lighter than in Uea, and the same diversity in the hair
was found as in that island (p. 367). A Lifu boy, since
dead, was brought to England some years ago, and exa-
mined by Dr. R. G. Latham, who noticed a reddish tinge,
clearly perceptible under a cross light, in his otherwise
black and frizzy hair.”* Dr. Latham was inclined to attri-
bute this to alkaline washes; but as an interval of ﬁve
years had elapsed since such application was made, it
would seem that new hair must have grown, unaffected by
any wash. According to the Samoan Reporter for Sep-
tember 1845, the people were inveterate cannibals, but
the efforts of the missionaries had induced many persons
to abandon the habit. “Bula, a chief . . . . has had as
many as sixteen cooked bodies laid before him at a meal.
Now, he not only abstains from it himself, but he declares
that death will be the penalty to any of his family who
ever again tastes human ﬂesh.” According to the same
authority, they believe in a Creator, and in a future state
of existence, a sort of Hades, which they call Locha ; they
preserve relics of the dead, and pay homage to them. They
are industrious, and they build good and large houses, of
circular shape. There are two tribes on this island, speak-
ing different languages. In Mare or Nengone, the remain-
ing island of the Loyalty group, the physical character
resembled that at Lifu, but the people generally had

"" Varieties of VlIIan, by Dr. Robert GorddnﬂLatham, p. 262.

 

474 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

remarkably ﬁne eyes, and high, well-formed foreheads.
No clothes were worn by the men, nor even by many
of the women, who were tattooed. The people on the
western coast of this island were nominally Christians ;
on the eastern coast still Pagans; but all were equally
peaceable and well-behaved. The social state of the island
may be inferred from the existence of a village of 300 or
400 inhabitants, to which the Bishop and Capt. Erskine
were invited, and which possessed a large circular house,
exactly resembling those of New Caledonia, the common
meeting-place of all the pepulation, in addition to the
smaller private habitations. The people make spears,
curiously carved clubs,.and very beautiful baskets of pecu-
liar manufacture. According to the last received intelli-
gence from Mare (Samoan Reporter for Jan. 1854), the
people of Mare are steadily improving ; hundreds can read
well, and the people have erected large six-roomed houses,
in the hopes of inducing missionaries to settle among them.
In all these islands, the characteristic Polynesian custom
of the taboo prevails; but the use of Kava does not appear
to reach west of the New Hebrides. All practise dancing
on a large scale, apparently more as a ceremony than an
amusement. Mr. Inglis met on one occasion a dancing
party of four or ﬁve hundred in Tana, assembled in an open
irregular space, to celebrate the removal of the taboo from
the bread-fruit trees; and he says that for two months in
the year the New Hebrideans meet daily at mid-afternoon,
and continue dancing till day-light next morning. After
visiting all the groups above mentioned, he comes to the
conclusion that the inhabitants are all of one race, much
the same in their physical, moral, and social features, but
quite distinct from the inhabitants of Eastern Polynesia.
In Sept. 1850, in the course of a second voyage among
the Eastern Papuans, Capt. Erskine visited some of the
Solomon islands : he has allowed the Editor to peruse his
MS. journal, which he may perhaps hereafter publish. Capt.
Erskine found the people of these islands strikingly like

 

 

(:11. xx] SOLOMON ISLANDERS. 475

those of the New Hebrides; they were perhaps lighter QTY-g
coloured genel ally than the latter, but not more so than
many individuals among these, and on the whole libsays ‘1';-
they looked like black Okinamen; they were well de,f“‘v-
though small, and they had curly, not woolly, hair.
resembled most nearly the people of Niue. He found the I i, ,
friendly, good-tempered, and perfectly honest in all their
dealings with the people of his ship, showing a complete
contrast to what former travellers had related of their
barbarity and ferocity; in fact, they were excessively timid
on board ship, and although they exhibited a little more
conﬁdence on shore, they were still never offensively
forward. In most of the islands the men had no clothing,
and the women very little; but they had shell armlets
well made, with the shells disposed so as to form a showy
pattern. The plate facing this page* represents a man of
the Solomon Islands with a pair of such armlets. Some
of them were a curious ornament on the nose like the
horn of a rhinoceios, and others had an appendage behind,
which would easily account for the stories of men with
tails. Capt. Erskine saw the peculiar nose-ornament
of mother-of-pearl, mentioned by Surville, whose account
was in general accurate Some few persons were tattooed.
They manufactured handsome bowls, skilfully inlaid with
pearl-shells, and their canoes were beautifully carved and
ornamented. I-Ie visited several large villages, the houses
of which were very good, and in some instances divided
into separate apartments, well arranged, though dirty.
In one village, he found a circular well, ten feet in
diameter, surrounded by a loose coral wall. Here he found
some of the inhabitants dancing. They were ready to barter
cocoa-nuts for anything useful, but they more especially
liked empty bottles; and in the course of this trade, aman
who was wounded rather severely by a bottle which a care-
less sailor threw from the ship, good-temperedly admitted
that it was an accident. In some cases, bits of printed

  

 

* From the portfolio of Captain Erskine.

476 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

paper were preferred to useful articles. Capt. Erskine
learned that the native name of the island called on our
maps St. Cristoval, is Toro ; Guadalcanar, the natives call
Gela or Kela; Surville’s Isle des Contrariétés is Utaqua.]

Notices of the Black Races in the Groups of Islands hear
the Samoan Archipelago, and of their Languages.

The Samoan Archipelago, as I have observed, is situ-
ated in that part of the Southern Ocean which approaches
the conﬁnes of Kelaanonesia. By this name I distinguish
that great region containing the abodes of the Papuas
and other black races. The great chains of Solomon’s
Isles and the New Hebrides, forming a vast semicircular
sweep, projecting towards the east, and fronting the central
Paciﬁc, seem to constitute the natural boundary of this
region. But a wide space intervenes between these islands
and the Samoans. In the midst arepthe insulated abodes
of two distinct races of people, who approximate, in many
characteristics, to the Papuan tribes, from whom, however,
they are distinguished in other particulars ; they are even
contrasted with those nations in some respects. Their
languages likewise differ from those of the Papuas, and
appear to be very peculiar dialects of the Polynesian
speech.

These races are the inhabitants of Rotuma and of the
Fiji or Viti Archipelago. The former are intermediate
between the Solomon’s Isles and the Samoan group; the
latter are between that group and the New Hebrides.
They were visited by Captain d’Urville, who has given
some new information respecting them and their inha-
bitants. They are called Viti by the inhabitants; and
it seems that Fiji is the corruption of the name in
the Tonga language. - The natives call themselves Kai
Viti, and their neighbours of the Friendly Isles, Kai
Tonga, or the people of Tonga, from the root Kat, which
means to eat or to live. M. d’Urville has given the
portrait of a Viti Islander named Tomboua Nakoro, “ who

011. XX.] FIJI ISLANDERS. 477

was,” as he says, “ a man of gentle manners, of an agreeable
physiognomy, and mild character ;” and appeared to M.
d’Urville much superior to all the savages Whom he had
seen. His general aspect and countenance, his complexion,
which could only be called swarthy (basmze’), his whole
conformation, recalled to M.’ d’Urville’s mind the type of
the Arab. “ Son intelligence ne cédait pas a celle de ces
hommes naguere si celebres dans les arts et les sciences.”
“ His conduct on board ever displayed an union of gravity,
propriety, reserve, and equanimity. He never abandoned
himself, like his countrymen, to immoderate transports of
joy or grief, of anger or delight, under any circumstances.”*
1 The physical characters of this man were equally remark-
l able. His hair, ample and frizzled, even resembled that
‘of the Papuas. What gave him a most strange appear-
: ance was, that the anterior part of it was a ﬁne black,
‘ while the back part was of adeep red, the effect, as M.
d’Urville supposed, of an art practised by these islanders.*
(See plate opposite.) ‘ ‘

M. d’Urville Coincides with the general opinion respect-
ing the origin of the Viti Islanders. He thinks that the
ablack race, having advanced thus far eastward, have re-
); isted in these islands the progress of the Polynesians in
n opposite direction. But I think there is no room to
y Ioubt but that the Malayan race spread from west to east;
Tiand it is very probable, as M. Lesson conjectured, that the

Polynesian race had peopled the distant groups in the
Great Paciﬁc before the progress of the Pelagian negroes
in a similar direction took place. We have not yet sufﬁ-
‘cient information respecting the Viti Islanders to afford
any conclusive evidence on this subject ; and W. v. Hum-
boldt has shown that there are strong grounds for doubting
the general opinion respecting them.

 

  

 

* A very good and comprehensive monograph relative to the Fiji Islands
and their inhabitants will be found in Captain Erskine’s “ Cruise ameng
the Islands of the Western Paciﬁc,” which also contains the curious nar-
rative of the English sailor Jackson, Who resided two years among the
natives, where he became almost like one of themselves—ED.

478 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

The sketch accompanying
these outlines represents the
cranium of a Viti Islander,
which. is in the College of
Surgeons. It is taken from
the work of Mr. Martin, who
observes that it resembles the
Tasmanian skull in the ample 1
size of the coronal ridge, from 1
which the head slopes down 3

Skull of a Viti Islander. on each side, in the convexity 1
of the parietal bones, and the narrowness and lateral com-
pression of the forehead.

The missionaries settled in the Samoan islands have
repeatedly visited, not only these intermediate islands, but
likewise many of the New Hebrides and of the more
distant isles adjacent on New Caledonia. Being well
aware of the importance of gaining a knowledge of the !
languages of these races, they seem to have availed them- i
selves of the opportunities which these visits have afforded l
them, and it is much to be regretted that the fruits of these
researches have not all been published?'6 The last num-
bers, however, of the periodical work which issues from the
Missionary Press, entitled the “ Samoan Reporter,” con-
tain some specimens of several languages of those nations;
and from these I have thought it worth while to select a
few, and compare them with words of the same signiﬁ-
cation in the Polynesian dialects. The words of these
last I have taken from Dumont d’Urville’s Vocabulary of
the Madecassian, Malayan, Mawian or Maorian, Tongan,
Tahitian, and Hawaiian. The words taken from the “ Sa-
moan Reporter” are from the following languages :—

 

 

* The Rev. Mr. Heath, a most enterprising and meritorious mission-
ary, now in the Samoan islands, put into my hands, some years since,
a grammar of the language of Tana, which he had composed While re-
sident in that island. It was his intention to publish it immediately;
but this was not done, and the author soon afterwards returned to the

Samoan Islands.

 

CH. xx] FIJI LANGUAGE. 479

1. The Samoan, which, as it will be seen, resembles
generally the other Polynesian languages. The most
striking peculiarity is the possession of a sibilant con-
sonant, which is wanting to all other known dialects of
the Polynesian, except the Fijian.

2. The language of the Rotumans, to whom I have
before alluded. The people of Rotuma are very peculiar
in their physical characters, which are but little known.
They are tall, ﬁnely-made people, of almost black colour,
with straight ﬂowing hair. Their skulls are massive and
heavy, almost approaching the weight and density of the
crania of African negroes, with the jaws considerably pro-
jecting.axe

3. Words in the language of the Fiji islands.

The grammatical structure of this language has been
investigated by Mr. Norris, who has availed himself for this
purpose of a translation of some parts of the New Testa-
ment made by missionariesi‘ The result to which he has
arrived is that the Fijian is really a Polynesian dialect,
though offering peculiarities not found in any other, and

having a vocabulary so peculiarly modiﬁed that it requires
some examination to perceive the resemblances, while the
other Polynesian idioms diSplay the proofs of their afﬁnity
at a glance. The Fijians are a very interesting people,
of almost black complexion, with frizzled but not woolly
hair, very rude and savage in their habits, but possessed
of greater physical and mental energy than any of the
fair Polynesians. In natural capabilities they seem to be
superior to any other tribe of the Paciﬁc, though. perhaps
descended from a mixture of the Tongan race with some

 

* I have only seen specimens of the skulls of the natives of Rotuma
‘ inthe collection of Dr. Busk, surgeon to the Seamen’s Hospital in the
Dreadnought. From that gentleman’s information, and from the inspec-
"tion of the skulls, I have derived the account above given of the physical
character of the Rotumans.

. 1‘ His analysis may be seen in the last volume of my “ Researches into
the Physical History of Mankind,” pp. 249—254.

 

 

480 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Papua tribe. This hypothesis, however, was rejected
by Baron William von Humboldt, who observed that the
Fijian language displays afﬁnity to the western forms of
the Malayo-Polynesian idiom, viz. the Madecassian and
Malayan, while receding from the peculiarities of the
Eastern or Oceanic idioms. The Fijians have a mytho-
logy and traditions of their own, differing from those of the
Tongans, Samoans, and Tahitians.*

41. Words in several languages of other Black
Races.

These are arranged in the “ Samoan Reporter” under
the two designations of—l. Group of the New Hebrides,
comprehending Naiea and Eotuna, Anaiteum, Tana, and
Vate Land. 2. Group of New Caledonia; including Lifu,
Nengone, and New Caledonia properly so termed.

I have selected the words in the following pagesi'

 

* The note on the Fiji language communicated by the Editor some years
ago to the Author, and inserted in his “ Physical History of Mankind,”
was founded on the ﬁrst printed pages in that language. A grammar and
dictionary have been since published, as well as a version of the New Tes-
tament ; showing some difference in dialect, or else increased knowledge of
the language. But the alteration does not in any way affect the conclusions
there arrived at. Mr. Hale, an opponent of those conclusions, admits that y
a ﬁfth part of the vocabulary and nearly all the grammar are Polynesian ; j
which is admitting every thing. See United States Exploring Expedition
vol. vi. p. NIL—En.

i” The following pages show that considerable modiﬁcations have now
to be made in the statements of these paragraphs ; but they are nearly all
in the way of development rather than correction. The list of languages .
is augmented, and freed from the many typographical errors of the former
edition; it is also ordered geographically, which is in this case tantamount .
to a philological arrangement. Most of the islands in the list are known, »
though some, perhaps, by other names. Vate is called in. some maps 1
Sandwich Island ; Lifu is Chabrol, and N engone is found under the name 4
of Mare or Britannia Island. Anaiteum should more properly be Aiteum, é
the initial syllable being a preposition, which is omitted when not wanted: 3
as in the plural form “ Ilpu Aiteum,” designating the people of the island.
The variety found in the ﬁve districts of New Caledonia show how much _
the languages differ within a very limited locality—ED.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Languages. Heaven or Sky. Earth or Land. Sun Moon. Star. Water. Rain. Mountain.
Malay Lz’mgit Tana11,Benua Matahari Bﬁlan Bintang Ayer Ujan Gunong
Madecass Lanitra Tany Masoandro Volana Kintvana, Rano Orana Tendrombohitra
Hawaii Lani Honua La Mahina Hoku Wai Ua Manna.
Tahiti Rai Fenua Mahana Marama Fetia. Pape Ua Moua
Polynesia New Zealand Rangi Whenua Ra Marama . W'hetu Wai Ua. Maunga
Tonga Langi Fonua Laa, Mahina Fetuu Uai Ulla Mounga
Samoa Langi Fa-nua La Masina Fetu Vai Ua. Maunga
Fiji Langi Vanna Singa. Vula Kalokalo VVai Utha. Maumi
Rotuma Langi, Oroit Hunua Asa Hula Hethu Vai Usa .Solo
-. Tobi — -—- Yz’u'o Mukum Uish Téru Ut —
Micronesia { Tarawa Kérawa Benua, Tan Aai, Téai Makainga Tuitui Ran Karu —
Mille Ling Ri’lrr‘ﬁn Al Allﬁng Edju Renuin Ut —-
Niua and Fotuna Rang Fanua Ra Marama Fatu Vai Ua Ora.
New Heb- gAnaiteum Nohotang Nobohtan Nangesenga Nmahouc Nmuiteu Nwai Nuopfa Neduon
rides Tana. Neai Lunha Meri Maukua Kumhao Nui Nesan Takua-r
Fate Insau Launa. A10 Atalang Masi Vai Usa Tof
Erumanga. Pakhop Maap Nitminen Tais Masi Nu M ampi Hua
Loyalty { Lifu. Thengnnra Lapa, Meak Thu Teﬁ Uatasith,Thint Tim Mani Hunsuet
Nengone Aue Nonte Tu Siakole Watiakole Ui Ele Petiti
Duauru Okua Nu Ni Mue Ve Ui Igi Ngwi
NOW Cale- Murare Kua. Ngweh Ngi Boe Vio Qui Uigi Undu-ngweh
donia Nikete Koe Hoa Ingarat Nuea Raamea Que N onduhe Bakwe
Yengin Lepodang Paatsh Ningat Pue Tanik Ue Kut Ungduat
Balad Koema Dilis Aat Malok Pidu Ue Ora. Yut

 

 

['10: ‘HO

'SEIIHV'IIIHVOOA

I817

 

 

 

Languages. Sea. Stone. Lightning. Thunder. Wind. Light. Darkness.
Malay Tassek Batu Kilat Tégar Anghin Tax-{mg Kalém
Madecass Ranomasina Vato Helatra Kotrokorana Rivotm Magava Maizina
Hawaii Kai Pohaku Uila Hekili Makani Malamalama Pouli
Tahiti Tai, Moana Ofai Uira Patiri Matai Maramarama Pouri
Polynesia New Zealand Moana Kowatu Uira. W'hatitiri Matangi Maramatanga Pouri
Tonga Tahi Maka Uhila Mana Matangi Mama Bouli
Samoa Moana Maa Uila Faititili Matangi Malamalama Pouliuli
Fiji Waitui Vatu Liva Kurukuru ‘ Thangi Rarama Butobuto
Rotuma Seas Hathu Onga Thui Langi Tafa. Mahsum
Tobi Tit V53 Vijik Ngepiz Yang — -
Micronesia { Tarawa Taari — Itet B5 — Mari-5m -
Mille Lﬁjeb R‘ﬁkkah Darri‘xm Dﬁru Gﬁtto Mainaina Marok
Niua and Fotuna Tai Fatu Vashiri Ngulungulu Matangi A0 Ouri
N Anaiteum Njop Nhat Nauainébit Inmunuka. Mtinjop Nadiat Manepven
6W Heb- . . . .
rides Tana Tam Kapulr Maruapen Karuarua. Matangi Maraven Pltau
Fate Ntasi Nemuka. Napila Tefa Nlang Nikapu Kapmat
Erumanga ﬁntak Navat Ame-taropis Tarapis Matang Nen Nelawakabat
Loyalty { Lifu Nagetha Eta Same]: Handling En Laihe Tiiiiit
Nengone Jere Et Uasisinet N me Iengo Lane thl
Duauru Injo Nu Iuea. Treo Kuie Ijaija Une
New Cale- Mill‘are Tyo Lu . Ives), Tio Kuia Ngi . Bidi
donia Niketa N apue, que Sankl Tonoho Nito Dewhang Kamia Ngare
Yengm Hal-ue Paik N iuk Niuk Dan Mala Wudan
Balad Koot Boai Ndan Ndyu Uru Aat Honbaat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

58‘?

'NVK .EIO KHOLSIH ’IVHILLVN

'I 310051]

CH. XXL] ALFORIAN RACE. 4:83

It will be perceived from the examination of the voca‘
bulary, that many of the languages spoken by the black
races contain numerous words which resemble the Poly-
nesian. Whether these words have been adopted by the
Papua tribes in their accidental intercourse with Poly-
nesians, or belong to both races from primeval times, is a
problem yet to be solved. The former opinion seems at
ﬁrst the more probable, but it is doubted much by those
who have most carefully studied the languages of these
nations.

CHAPTER XXI.
or THE ALFORIAN RACE.

THE Alforians are a people of peculiar physical cha-
racters, who are supposed to inhabit the interior of New
Guinea, and many of the larger islands to the southward
of the Indian Ocean. They are termed Haraforas, Al-
foérs, and Alfourous : the real name is uncertain. -
The Alforians of New Guinea are named Endaménes
by M. Lesson, who has given the following account of
them. He says, “ That they live in the most miserable
manner : continually at war with their neighbours, they
are solely occupied in endeavouring to preserve themselves
from attacks, and escape the snares laid for them. The
custom prevalent among the Papuas of the coast, of putting
their prisoners to death, and erecting their spoil as trophies,
accounts for the difﬁculty we ﬁnd of observing them even
in New Guinea; and two or three men reduced to slavery,
whom we saw at Doréry, are the only individuals we have
met with. The Papuas described them to us as of a fero- .
cious character, cruel and gloomy, possessed of no arts,
and passing their whole lives in seeking subsistence in the
forests. But we cannot regard this hideous picture, which
each people draw of its neighbouring tribe, as authentic.
The Endaménes, whom we saw, had a repulsive physiog-

4184s NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

nomy,——ﬂat noses, cheek-bones projecting, large eyes, pro-
minent teeth, long and slender legs, very black and thick
hair, rough and shining, without being woolly. Their
beards were very coarse and thick. An excessive stupidity
was stamped upon their countenances, probably the effect of
slavery. These savages, whose skin is of a very deep, dirty
brown or black colour, go naked. They make incisions upon
their arms and breasts, and wear in their noses pieces of
wood nearly six inches long. Their character is taciturn,
and their physiognomy ﬁerce; their motion is uncertain
and slow. The inhabitants of the coast gave us some
details of the Endaménes, but such as seemed to us dic-
tated by hatred; and 'as their accounts differed, whether
because the sense of what they told us was badly under-
stood, or they related to us statements which they did not
themselves credit, with the intention of inspiring us with
fear, we think it useless to make a race of men known by
false or inexact descriptions, whose history is still enveloped
in obscurity.We ’

Captain Forrest was, at least, one of the ﬁrst English
voyagers who described the Alforas ; but we derive more
information respecting them from Dr. Leyden, who con-
tributed very much to the ethnology of the Indian Archi-
pelago. According to Leyden, the Tirun, or Tedong, are
a people of Alforian origin. He says, “ These tribes live
chieﬂy on the north-east coast of Borneo, and are reckoned

 

* The two or three slaves seen by M. Lesson at Doréry were in all .

probability specimens of the normal man of New Guinea, but degraded by
misery and slavery ; the outcast tribe, as found in India and Ceylon; the
Fingo or Bushman of New Guinea, as described in the preceding chapter.
There can be no doubt that M. Lesson’s suspicions of the truth of his
informant were fully justiﬁed. We have also the direct testimony of M.
Macgillivray, the naturalist to the expedition which explored New Guinea
under Captain Stanley, in 1850. After speaking of the Harfours as
described by former voyagers, he says, “ I mention these Harfours for the
purpose of stating that no people answering to the description of them
given above were seen by us in New Guinea, or the Louisiade Archi-
pelago.” See Narrative of the Voyage of H. M. S. Rattlesnake, 850., vol. ii.
p. 7 7 .-—-ED.

CH. XXL] ALFORIAN RACE. 485

a savage and piratical race, addicted to eating the ﬂesh of
. their enemies. With their language I am totally unac-
quainted; but it is reckoned peculiar. It is very probable,
however, that they are only a tribe of Iddn, whom again I
imagine to be only a race of Ilamfoms, or Aéfoé‘rs, as
they are termed by the Dutch, who seem to be the most
original race of all the Eastern islands, excepting, perhaps,
the Papuas. The Idan are sometimes termed Marut ;
they are certainly the original inhabitants of Borneo, and
resemble the Haraforas equally in stature, agility, colour,
and manners. The Haraforas are indigenous in almost all
the Eastern isles, and are sometimes found on the same
island with the Papuas, or Oriental Negroes. They are often
lighter in colour than the Muhammedan races, and gene-
rally excel them in strength and activity. They are uni-
versally rude and unlettered ; and where they have not
been reduced to the state of slaves of the soil, their habits
have a general resemblance. In their manners the most
singular feature is, the necessity imposed on every person
of, some time in his life, embruing his hands in human
blood; and in general, among all their tribes, as well as
the Idan, no person is permitted to marry till he can shew
the skull of a man whom he has slaughtered. They eat
the ﬂesh of their enemies, like the Battas, and drink out of
their skulls ; and the ornaments of their houses are human
skulls and teeth, which are consequently in great request
among them, as formerly in Sumatra, the ancient inhabi-
tants of which are said to have had originally no other
money than the skulls of their enemies. The Haraforas are
found in all the Moluccas, in Celebes, the Philippines, and
Magindano, where they are termed Subano or Manubo;
and the ferocious race mentioned by Marsden, who live
inland from Samanka, in Sumatra, and are accustomed to
atone their own faults by offering the heads of strangers
to the chiefs of their villages, are probably of the same
description.3’*
* “ Asiatic Researches,” v01. 1:. p. 217. These Idan are Dayaks.—ED.

 

486 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

From later accounts given of the Dayaks, by Mr. Earle
and others, I think it very doubtful whether they belong to
the Alforian race. They appear more similar to the Malays ;
but until we have specimens of their language, it will be
impossible to form any opinion on sure grounds.ale

[The Australians. The aborigines of New Holland are
proved by their languages to have no afﬁnity with Pelagian
tribes of any class, and if the term Alforian is retained, it
will be convenient to restrict it to this race, who may be
termed a people apart. In the great insular continent to
which they appertain, and beyond whose shores they do
not pass, having an area equal to that of Europe, and
reaching from the middle of the temperate to far within
the torrid zones, diﬁ'erences of feature and habits may be
expected, but there is an unmistakeable physiognomy cha-
racteristic of them all. In languages the variety is much
greater, so that even neighbouring tribes are wholly unin-
telligible to each other ; but their grammatical structure, so
far as is known, and we have grammars more or less com-
plete of half a dozen tribes at least, divided by the whole
extent of the country, is remarkably like in all.+ We have

 

* The just suspicion of the Author is now fully conﬁrmed. A version
of the New Testament in the Dayak language, and an analytical Grammar
by Gabelentz, clearly show the close afﬁnity of these people to the proper
Malays ; the Malay language is much nearer to the Dayak than to
the Tagala, or Madecass, or Polynesian, where the afﬁnity is generally
admitted—ED.

1' In the ﬁfth volume of his “ Researches into the Physical History of
Mankind,” Dr. Prichard inserted (p. 27 7 et seq.) a few notes which the Editor
of the present work communicated to him on some striking analogies which
he believed he had discovered between the Australian languages and those
of the south of India. The Editor has no reason to withdraw from any
statements there made, but a variety of occupation has not allowed him to
make any attempt to add to the few facts mentioned. He would, however,
strengthen the philological evidence by a remark or two on other analogies
between the Australians and the Peninsular Indians. The peculiar usage
by which hereditary succession is drawn from the female parent instead of
the male, is noticed in page 268 of the volume of the Physical History

CH. XXL] AUSTRALIANS. 487

numerous descriptions of the people from all parts of the
island, beginning with Dampier in the 17th century, and
all agree in general characters. Two of the most recent we
select; one taken on the North-west by Captain Stokes, of

 

noticed above, as existing in Australia, and among the Nairs of Malabar;
and that singular weapon, the boomerang, as striking a characteristic of
Australia as the black swan or kangaroo, has its analogy or prototype in the
Colley stick of the Dekhan, a couple of which have been for several years
in the Museum of the Royal Asiatic Society, where they may be compared
with a genuine boomerang. In regard to other analogies, some notes,
written by George Windsor Earl, Esq., two years ago, in compliance
with a request of the Editor, may be found of interest. Mr. Earl’s
lengthened residence at different periods on the extreme points of Austra-
lia made him acquainted with the natives of the remotest tribes, but he
expressly alludes in these notes to the tribes about Port Essington in the
North, where he lived until the breaking up of that Establishment. The
analogies pointed out by Mr. Earl are not given as conclusive, but they
were spontaneously made by him, and not drawn out by leading questions:
the notes are merely the written expression of what had frequently been
stated verbally.

“ Complexion—Upon this point the Australians and Coromandels are
identical, being also many shades darker than the Malayo-Polynesians who
occupy the intermediate islands. Among the Coromandels, individuals are
often met with who are so much fairer than the others, as to be remarkable;
but this is also the case on the north and north-western coasts of Australia,
where nearly every traveller has observed individuals so much fairer than
others, as to lead to the supposition that they were of foreign origin (see
Captain King, Major Campbell in the Royal Geographical Society’s
Journal, Messrs. Grey and Lushington, &c.)

Features.—A great variety of features exists both among the Australians
and Coromandels, from an almost European regularity down to the very
coarsest development that I have met with in any race of mankind. This
coarse development is more common with the Australians than with the
Colromandels, among whom I have chieﬂy observed it in individuals of the
boatman caste, who are often so like Australians that they would pass
without remark if met with among the native tribes of the North Coast.
The resemblance, however, does not hold among the better-featured, for
although more European-like faces will be met with among the Australians
than the Coromandels, yet the former never have that steady thoughtful
cast of countenance which is so prevalent with the latter.

Stature and Proportions.—In point of stature, the Australians and Coro-
mandels correspond very closely, the average height being greater than
‘ that of the Malayo-Polynesians ; indeed, very little inferior to the European

488 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

H. M. S. Beagle, and the other drawn from the tribes at
no great distance from the East coast, by Dr. Thompson,
who also examined natives from various parts of the coun-
try, and communicated the result of his observations at a
meeting of the Ethnological Society of London, in January
1853. Dr. Thompson says the natives are of middle height,
with spare body, the hands and feet of good proportion,
arms and legs long, particularly the latter. Head inclined
to round rather than to oval, forehead somewhat broad but
low, cheek-bones rather high, eyes sunken, eyebrows arched,

 

standard. The Coromandels are better proportioned, and their limbs are
more rounded and muscular.

Physical Capacity.—The Australians can stand most fatigue in travelling
or hunting, but they are utterly incapable of continued labour, such as the
Coromandels habitually undergo. Both races are remarkable for their
powers of endurance under rough treatment; indeed, they are the only
people of the East who have shown themselves capable of contending suc-
cessfully with Europeans in wrestling-matches and prize-ﬁghts.

Mental Capacity.———Upon this point a fair comparison cannot be drawn
until the Australians have been domesticated. They are by no means deﬁ-
cient in quickness and intelligence, and readily acquire little handicrafts.
For example, an Australian who has once seen a gun-lock cleaned and put
together, can generally do it himself without assistance. The only steady
employment that the Australians have yet been put to is that of policemen,
for which they have shown themselves well adapted. This is also a favourite
occupation with the Coromandels, the police force of the Straits Settlements
being chieﬂy composed of them.

General Habits.—The Australians and the lower classes of Coromandels
agree exactly upon one point,—a love of indolence, which is indulged in
until aroused into active exertion by an appeal to the feelings, or by the
necessity of seeking subsistence, their better halves being generally the
monitors on these occasions. In their mode of conducting their quarrels,
there is also a resemblance which cannot fail to strike those who are ac-
quainted with both people. The Inutterings, spittings, frantic abuse, and
apparent struggles to get loose from their friends to annihilate their oppo-
nents, are acted with the same gestures, only the Australians are rather
more violent in their contortions, as they have no clothes to tear.

I have never yet met with any natives of. the Coromandel coast who are
scariﬁed with raised cicatrices like the Australians. If this was ever prac-
tised among the former, there ought to be some relics of it among the hill
tribes. I have seen many with the septum of the nose bored, but a ring
has always been worn, instead of the bone or feather of the Australians.”

CH. XXL] AUSTRALIANS. 489

whiskers very small in quantity,—occasionally, however,
there is a good deal of beard on the chin, which is rounded
and not very prognathous ; the lips are prominent and
thick, especially the upper one, the mouth is expressive of
determination ; the skin is dark brown, approaching to
black, and usually very smooth; the hair is inclined to be
long, soft, and silky,——it is usually quite glossy, but always
curly. The women, whilst young, are well proportioned;
the hands and feet of many of them are very small. Their
manners and speech are quick, lively, and animated; they
are easily excitable, and very revengeful. All the tribes
have distinct marks on the breast, back, shoulders, and arms,
produced by longitudinal or transverse gashes. The King-
bar tribe always have these markings transversely. All
the tribes about Moreton Bay speak one language, and have
the same characteristics. Dr. Thompson further stated
that the slight differences observable between the various
tribes scattered over the whole of that extensive region
might be easily accounted for by varieties in the climate,
or in the supply of food, and he concluded his notice by
expressing his opinion that many of the aborigines were,
occasionally at least, cannibals.

The observations of Capt. Stokes extended about 200
miles, from Port George IV. to Roebuck Bay. He says,
“ They agreed in having a common character of form, fea-
ture, hair, and physiognomy. The average height of the
males may be taken to be from ﬁve feet ﬁve inches to ﬁve
feet nine inches . . . . they are almost black . . . . Their
limbs are spare and light, but the muscle is ﬁnely developed
in the superior joint of the arm, which is probably owing
to their constant use of it in throwing the spear. Some
tribes are entirely naked, while others wear girdles of skin
and leaves, hardly sufﬁcient, however, to serve any purpose
of decency, much less of comfort. Their hair is always
dark, sometimes straight and sometimes curled, and not
unfrequently tied up behind; but we saw no instance of
a negro or woolly head among them. They wear the beard

490 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

upon the chin, but not upon the upper lip, and allow it to
grow to such a length as enables them to champ and chew
it when excited by rage,—an action which they accompany
with spitting it out against the object of their indignation
or contempt. They have very overhanging brows and
retreating foreheads, large noses,full lips, and wide mouths ;
in some cases they want the two fore teeth in the upper jaw,
and while in any one tribe in which the custom prevails it
seems to be unanimous, it does not appear to be by any
means universally diffused along the whole north-western
coast.

“ No instance of the use of a canoe or proa was seen or
heard of along the whole N.W. coast.*

For more extended details respecting the New Hollanders
we may refer to the 5th volume of Dr. Prichard’s Physical
History of Mankind. With reference to the complicated and
artfully contrived laws for marriage, and the constitution
of society, mentioned in p. 267 of that volume, we subjoin
an extract from a lecture delivered by the Rev. William
Ridley at Sidney, in November 1853, which explains those
curious regulations more fully than we have seen else-
where. This lecture, which is of exceeding interest in many
respects, relates to the Kamilaroi tribe, a numerous body
residing N. W. of Sidney. The language is spoken, ac-
cording to Mr. Ridley, “ along a hundred miles of the
Bundarra, on Mooni Creek, and at least eighty miles of the
Barwan ; all down the Peel and Namoi, over Liverpool
Plains, and even on this side of the great dividing range
about Murrurundi. It is also spoken on the Bolloon,
where the blacks are still very numerous.”+ Mr. Ridley

* Discoveries in Australia, vol. i. p. 88.

"I” Threlkeld’s grammar of an Australian language, printed at Sidney in
1834, is said by Hale,—who reprinted it in the great work so frequently
mentioned,—to be the Kamilaroi; but Mr Ridley, Whose evidence is decisive,
calls Threlkeld’s the Lake Macquarie language, and notices the very great
similarity of structure, and differing vocabulary. Mr. Hale also gives a

grammar of the Wiradurei language spoken in Wellington Valley, two
hundred miles west of Lake Macquarie, of which the same degree of resem-

CH. XXL] AUSTRALIANS. 491

: gives a grammatical sketch and some specimens of the
language, in which he proposes to print Scripture extracts,
and to teach the natives to ‘read them. He proceeds :
“ From the small but unquestionable success which I
have had in my ﬁrst few weeks’ attempt at speaking Ka-
milaroi, I expect in a few months, or a year at most, to
have a considerable amount of correct Bible translations.
There are [a] few Kimilaroi blacks who can read English,
and it is a common remark (of which Mr. Watson’s school
furnishes many illustrations), that when blacks are put
early to school, they learn very quickly.”

The following is Mr. Ridley’s account of the castes and
rules of descent of the Natives who are the subject of his
lecture :—

“ The castes are distinguished by peculiar names. There
are four names of men—éppai, murm’, Imbbi, and kumbo ;
and four of women—61919002500, mam, kapota, bum. Every
black has one of these names by birth. There is one varia-
tion :——In some tribes [mic is used instead of mum-2’, and it
is much more convenient, for 7122er5 is a general word for
black man ; and murm’ is apt to be confounded with it.

“ In one family all the sons are called ippai, the daughters
ippata ; so that if you ﬁnd a black man’s name is ippai,
you may be sure all his brothers are aﬂoat, and his sisters
‘ippata. In another family all the sons are murm’ or (Jada,
all the daughters mata. If you ask a maﬁa the names of
her brothers, you will ﬁnd they are all murm’ or (Jam, and
;all her sisters mata. In another family all the sons are
.kubbi, and the daughters kapota. In another family all
the sons are Immbo, the daughters (who. By the foregoing
names all the blacks are divided into four classes.

“ The following rules of intermarriage are most strictly
observed :—

 

‘blance may be predicated. Hale says that the name of Kamilaroi is
unknown to the people themselves, but it is applied to them by the
Wiradurei. He derived his grammar or its materials from Mr. Watson;
no doubt the gentleman mentioned by Mr. Ridley.

492 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

I. Imam) may marry an z'maata (of another family), or
any kapotw.
II. Murm’ may marry only bum.
III. Kubbi may marry only ippata.
IV. Kumbo may marry only mam.

“ Any attempt to infringe these rules would be unani-
mously resisted, even to bloodshed; but it seems they never
dream of attempting to transgress them.

“ Polygamy is allowed, and is common; but how many
soever a black man’s wives may be, they all have (and that
from their birth) the right name.

“ The following rules of descent prevail :—

I. The children of ippm' by ippata are all [rumba and
mm.
II. The children of imam} by Impota are all murm’ or [Jam
and meta.
III. The children of mmw’ or [mm are all mm and
ippata.
IV. The children of [rabbi are all lmmbo and 1mm.
V. The children of lcumbo are all kubbi and kapota.

“By tracing out the effect of these rules, you may perceive 1
that descendants of every family come, in the course of a 3
few generations, into the privileged class of imam ; while \
the sons of these aristocrats inherit not their father’s rank, ‘
but belong to the lcumbo or murm’ caste.

“ They have commonly distinctive names added to their
family titles: these distinctive names are often taken from 5
animals ; and when they associate with the whites they ;
adopt another name, by which they are known among them- i
Many blacks are much averse to letting white people know ‘
their peculiar names, although they at once tell their family
name. Simon of Kollemungul has the family name Ippm',
and the cognomen Nurmi, which means abrown snake.
Simon would not tell me his name Narrow}, but another
black, perhaps owing Simon a grudge, whispered it to me
as a grand secret. Another black, known among the whites

J
1
1

 

CH. XXL] AUSTRALIANS. 493

as Jacky of Goonal, has the names Kubbi Mute (mute
meaning opossum) ; his father was of course Kumba, also
called Dinoiin (emu).]
The subjoined portrait gives a good specimen of the Aus-
tralian physiognomy.
FIG. 87.

 

Australian.

The skull of an Australian is ﬁgured in the annexed
sketch. It bears a great resemblance to the Tasmanian
already described, especially in the ridge-like form of the

coronal arch, and the general FIG. 88.

contour of the head. This ,,/'/,J\‘\,
resemblance is a fact worthy /, j, A _‘ \
of remark in the natives of " 5') ‘ \

.two adjoining countries, dif-
fering as they do in other
particulars; the one a lank,
and the other a woolly-haired A ,.
race. Skull of an Austr;11:ni

The lean and half-starved form of the Australians, and
the disproportionate size of their limbs and head, are
strongly exempliﬁed by the plate representing two Austra-
lian ﬁgures, which is taken from the magniﬁcent Atlas of
M. d’UrVille.

    

4,94, NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

CHAPTER XXII.
or THE NATIVE RACES or AMERICA—COLLECTIVE SURVEY.

THE aboriginal peOple of America are generally con-
sidered as a department of the human family very distinct
from the inhabitants of the Old World. The insulated
situation of the continent, and the fact that it was so long
, unknown, and the tribes which it contains so long cut off
from intercourse with other nations, are among the circum-
stances Which have contributed to produce this impression.
The American nations, taken in the aggregate, are neither
among themselves so uniform and unvaried in their physi-
cal and moral qualities, nor is the line of distinction between
them and the rest of mankind so strongly marked and so
obvious, as most persons imagine. Yet it must be admitted
that certain characters are discoverable which are common,
or nearly so, to the whole of this department of nations ;
that there are strong indications, if not proofs, of a com-
munity of origin, or of very ancient relationship, among
them ; and that in surveying collectively the people of the
New World, we contemplate human nature under a pecu-
liar aspect. On comparing the American tribes together,
we ﬁnd reasons to believe that they must have subsisted
as a separate department of nations from the earliest ages
of the world. Hence, in attempting to trace relations
between them and the rest of mankind, we cannot expect ‘
to discover proofs of their derivation from any particular
tribe or nation in the Old Continent. The era of their
existence as a distinct and insulated race must probably be
dated as far back as that time which separated into nations '3
the inhabitants of the Old World, and gave to each branch of
the human family its primitive language and individuality.
The traits which serve to characterise the native {
Americans collectively, are, as I have said, not so obvious“
as by some they are supposed to be. These nations are I.
called “ Red Men ;” but there ale tribes equally 1ed, and i

 

OILXXIL] ‘ AMERICAN RACESCOLLECTIVELY. 495

perhaps more properly deserving that epithet, in Africa
and Polynesia. And the Americans are not all of the
hue denominated “ red,” that is, of a copper colour : some
tribes, as we shall see, are as white as many European
nations; others brown or yellow; others are black, or at
least they are, by travellers, described as very much resem-
bling in colour the Negroes of Africa. Anatomists have
distinguished what they have termed the American form
of the human skull; they were led into this mistake by
regarding the strongly marked characteristics of some par-
ticular tribes as universal. The American nations are
spread over a vast space, and live in different climates,
and the shape of their heads is diﬁf'erent in different parts.
Nor will any epithet derived from their habits of life apply
to all the tribes of this department : the native Americans
are not all hunters: there are many ﬁshing tribes among
them; some are nomadic ; others cultivate the earth, and
live in settled habitations ; and of these, a part were agri-
culturists before the arrival of the Europeans ; others have
learned of their conquerors to till the soil, and have changed
the ancient habits of their race, which, as we may hence
infer, were not the necessary result of organisation or con-
genital and instinctive propensity. If we wish to form a
correct idea of the characteristic qualities which really form
the bond of association between the American races, and
constitute their peculiar distinction, we must inquire some-
what more deeply into the subject.

The most decided and most clearly marked evidence of
relationship between these nations is to be found in the
characteristic structure of their languages. This is a
subject on which light has been thrown of late years, prin-
cipally through the labours of American philologers.
Hervas,ale indeed, collected some materials for this purpose;
but Dr. Smith Barton of Philadelphia was the ﬁrst who
made any notable attempt to classify the idioms of North

 

* “ Catalogo delle Lingue Conosciute,” &c., by Don Lorenzo Hervas,
4to. Cesena, 1784.

496 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

America. Humboldt and Vater pursued the work on a
more extended scale, and with much more ample resources ;
but it is to M. Du Ponceau that we owe the most impor-
tant elucidations.9K The history of American philology is
a subject far too extensive to be entered upon in the
present work, and I shall only adduce the general result,
which, as the celebrated traveller Humboldt observes, is a
fact of great importance to the history of mankind. “ In
America,” Humboldt says, “ from the country of the Esqui-
maux to the banks of the Orinoco, and again, from these
torrid banks to the frozen climate of the Straits of Magellan,
mother tongues entirely different with regard to their roots
have, if we may use the expression, the same physiognomy.
Striking analogies of grammatical construction have been
recognised, not only in the more perfect languages, as that
of the Incas, the Aymara, the Guarani, the Mexican, and
the Cora, but also in languages extremely rude. Idioms,
the roots of which do not resemble each other more than
the roots of the Sclavonian and Biscayan, have resemblances
of internal mechanism similar to those which are found in
the Sanskrit, the Persian, the Greek, and the German
languages.”

These observations were made many years since by M.
de Humboldt. They have been conﬁrmed by more exten-
sive research, and the conclusion is thus stated by Mr.
Gallatin :—

“ Amidst that great diversity of American languages,
considered only in reference to their vocabularies, the ;
similarity of their structure and grammatical forms has u
been observed and pointed out by the American philologists.
The result appears to conﬁrm the opinions already enter- .1
tained on that subject by Mr. Du Ponceau, Mr. Pickering, }
and others, and to prove that all the languages, not ;

* American ethnography has also derived important aids from the 4
learned works of Messrs. Pickering and Gallatin. We may expect to <
ﬁnd new elucidations of the subject when the posthumous work of the ‘5

greatest European philologer, W. von Humboldt, long promised by M. .
Buschmann, shall make its appearance.

 

CH. XXII.] AMERICAN RACES COLLECTIVELY. 497

only of our own Indians, but of the native inhabitants of
America, from the Arctic Ocean to Cape Horn, have, as
far as they have been investigated, a distinct character
; common to all, and apparently differing from any of those
of the other Continent with which we are most familiar.”ale

It must be observed that the idioms of 'the Esquimaux
are included among the American languages ; and this is
the mature opinion of Mr. Du Ponceau, and other writers
who have carefully examined the subject. We must, there-
fore, reckon the Esquimaux in the class of nations among
whom the ancient culture of language peculiar to the New
\Vorld was originally spread. They belong to the American
stock, though differing from many other tribes in some of
their most striking characters; but they are not the only
nations of the New World who thus differ.

There are, in the second place, many remarkable traits
in the moral and social state of the American nations
which indicate some near relation between them, and serve
to distinguish them from the races of' the Old World.
These phenomena have been differently accounted for by
writers who have contemplated the subject in different
points of view ; but whatever supposition may be adopted
as to their nature and origin, their tendency is to exalt
the antiquity of the American race, and to carry back to a
remote period the era of its separation from the rest of
mankind. A learned and ingenious writer, who has atten-
tively studied the character of the American aborigines,
and who has availed himself for that purpose of more ample
resources for acquiring accurate knowledge than have
fallen to the lot of many persons, has been led to adopt the
Opinion, that the nations of the New W'orld are not in a
state of primitive barbarism or living in the original sim-
plicity of uncultivated nature, but that they are, on the
contrary, the last remains of a people once high in the
scale of civilisation and mental improvement, now almost
worn out and perishing, and sunk into the lowest stage of

 

* “ Archaeologia Americana,” vol. ii.
K K

498 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. - [BOOK II.

decline and degradation. Among many of the American
tribes Dr. Martins has observed the remains of ancient in-
stitutions of a kind which seems to imply the existence of
much reﬁnement and of an artiﬁcial state of society. Of
this description are,——a complicated form of government,
regulated despotisms or monarchies, privileged orders,
hierarchical and sacerdotal ordinances, systematic laws the
results of reﬂection and a settled purpose connected with
marriage and inheritance and family relationships, and
other customs which are strongly contrasted with the
simple and unreﬂective habits of rude and uncivilised
nations.* ‘

The languages of these nations abound, as he says,
with words expressive of metaphysical views and abstract
conceptions. Their opinions respecting a future state, and
the nature and attributes of invisible agents, are strikingly
different from those of nations who have never emerged
from primitive barbarism. Another fact which tends, as
M. Martins observes, to conﬁrm the opinion that the
natives of the New World have fallen from a state of
greater reﬁnement, is their use, from immemorial ages, of
certain domesticated animals and cultivated plants, and the
notions which they entertain of the ﬁrst acquisition of
these possessions. Of such animals and plants the people
of the Old World have their peculiar stock, and the Ame-
rican nations have their own, entirely different. In the Old
World we know not whence our horses, our dogs, cattle,
and the various kinds of cerealian gramina, were obtained;
and the American nations are equally at a loss, when we .
inquire for the original stock of the dumb dog of the
Mexicans, the llama, the root of the mandioca, the Ameri-
can corn, and of the qninoa. In the ancient world there
were traditions of some mythical benefactors of mankind,
Ceres, Triptolemns, Bacchus, Pallas, and Poseidon, who
had contributed their gifts, corn and wine, the sacred olive,

 

* “Martins, ﬁber die Vergangenheit und die Zukunft der amerikani-
schen Menschheit.”

CH. xxrr.] AMERICAN RACES COLLECTIVELY. 499

and the horse, and we infer that all these had been known
from periods of remote antiquity. In America, likewise,
tradition refers the knowledge of cultivated plants and
domestic animals, and the art of tilling the earth, to some
fabulous person who descended from the gods, or suddenly
made his appearance among their ancestors, such as the
Manco-Capac of the Peruvians, and the Xolotl and Xiuh-
tlato of the Toltecas and Chichimecas.

The remains of ancient sculpture and architecture
spread over Mexico, and Yucatan, and Chiapa, as well as
over the high plain of Quito and other parts of South
America, and the extensive works of art, consisting of for-
tiﬁcations and other relics discovered in the Tenessee coun-
try as well as in the inland parts of New Mexico on the
Rio Gila, afford some further support to the hypothesis of
M. Martius.

The possession of arts and acquirements, the most
simple improvements of human life, and such as belong to
the very infancy of human society, distinctively appropriate,
and the origin of which is recorded by mythical legends
peculiar to each division of mankind, seems to carry back
the era of their separation to the ﬁrst ages the world.

Whether we adopt the opinion of M. Martins, that the
American nations, in general, have fallen from a higher
degree of mental culture into their present barbarism, or
attempt otherwise to account for the phenomena which
have led to that supposition, it must be admitted that many
traits are discoverable in the moral and intellectual history
of the native American tribes which serve to distinguish
them and give them a sort of national character common,
at least, to the great majority of the race. The structure
of their languages, to which we have adverted, indicates,
perhaps, more reﬂective habits, and a more accurate
observation of relations, than the rude idioms of many other
races. The national customs and institutions, and many
other traits which appeared so remarkable to M. Martins,
if they are not fully sufﬁcient to establish his hypothesis,

500 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

prove, at least, habits of thought and reﬂection, and a cul-
tivation of mind, very different from the state of savages in
general. We may also observe among the nations of Ame-
rica some moral characteristics which serve to distinguish
them: with a certain vigour and energy of character they
are said to combine a tendency to cruelty and revenge; the
social affections appear to have, in general, less inﬂuence
over them than over most other races of men. The Be-
douins of the Arabian desert are cruel and vindictive; but
their evil passions have a more transitory inﬂuence over ‘
them than the stern malice of the Americans. The con-
trast between the nomades of Asia and of America is in
many respects striking; it has been drawn by one of the
most eloquent of modern writers, who has himself had
opportunities of observing both races in their native Wil-
dernesses. I shall terminate these remarks by citing M.
Chateaubriand’s'ie description, and it will perhaps interest my
reader to observe, that in one particular very diﬁ‘erent con-
clusions have been drawn from a contemplation of similar
facts by the German philos0pher and the French poet :—

“ Ce qui distingue surtout les Arabes des peuples du
Nouveau-Monde, c’est qu’a travers la rudesse des premiers
on sent pourtant quelque chose de de'licat dans leurs moeurs;
on sent qu’ils sont ne’s dans cet Orient, d’ou sont sortis tous
les arts, toutes les sciences, toutes les religions. Caché
aux extrémités de l’Occident, dans un canton détourné de
l’univers, le Canadien habite des vallées ombragées par des
foréts éternelles et arrosées par des ﬂeuves immenses :
l’Arabe, pour ainsi dire, jeté sur le grand chemin du monde
entre l’Afrique et l’Asie, erre dans les brillantes regions
de l’aurore, sur un sol sans arbres et sans eau. Il faut,
parmi les tribus des descendants d’Ismael, des maitres, des
serviteurs, des animaux domestiques, une liberté soumise
a des lois. Chez les hordes Américaines l’homme est en-
core tout seul avec sa ﬁere et cruelle independance: au
lieu de la couverture de laine il a la peau d’ours; au lieu

 

3“ Chateaubriand, “ Itinéraire a J érusalem.”

CH. XXII.] AMERICAN RACES COLLECTIVELY. 501

de la lance, 1a ﬂeche ; au lieu du poignard, la massue : i1
ne connoit point et i1 dédaigneroit la datte, 1a pasteque, le
lait du chameau : il veut a ses festins de la chair et du sang.
Il n’a point tissu 1e poil de chevre pour se mettre a l’abri
sous des tentes : l’orme tombé de vétusté fournit l’écorce a
sa hutte. Il n’a point dompté 1e cheval pour poursuivre la
gazelle; i1 prend lui-méme l’original a la course. II no
tient point par son origine a de grandes nations civilisées ;
on ne rencontre point le nom de ses ancétres dans les fastes
des empires : les contemporains de ses aieuX sont de vieuX
chénes encore debout. Monuments de la nature et non de
l’histoire, les tombeaux de ses peres s’élevent inconnus dans
des foréts ignorées. En un mot, tout annonce chez I’Amé-
ricain 1e sauvage qui n’est point encore parvenu a l’état de
civilisation, tout indique chez l’Arabe l’homme civilisé
retombé dans l’etat sauvage.”

However different the conclusions at which these writers
have ultimately arrived, they appear to have participated
with all other reﬂecting persons who have contemplated the
same phenomena in one impression as to the leading traits
in the character of the American aborigines. Attentive
observers have been struck, as I have said, with manifesta-
tions of greater energy and mental vigour, of more intense
and deeper feeling, of a more reﬂective mind, of greater
fortitude, and more consistent perseverance in enterprises
and all pursuits, when they have compared the natives of
the New World with the sensual and volatile, and almost
animalised savages who are still to be found in some quar-
ters of the Old Continent. They have been equally impressed
by the sullen and unsocial character, by the proud apathe-
tic endurance, by the feeble inﬂuence of social affections,
by the intensity of hatred and revenge, and the deep ma-
lice- -concealing dissimulation so remarkable 1n the dwellers
amid the dark solitudes of the American forests, where
some have imagined that the descendants of the First Mur-
derer have sought to hide themselves from the eyes of men
and benev olent beings:

  
  
   
 

 
  
 

, NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.
I ,9

1335’?”ng e / 0:79? yelp 67? dcygib/w {how

. v ‘ ,5; ., , ‘1 021/0: 7" o’iw a and 7111' a (6 7066 o

wail/i", uéxsog (1.57359) #03) megabit): Q 5'

Few additions have been made of late, in a connected
and systematic form, to our previous acquaintance with the
native races of America. The magniﬁcent publication
of Dr. Morton, which far exceeds in its comprehensiveness
and in the number and beauty of its engravings any Euro-
pean work that has yet appeared on national varieties of
the skull, comprises nearly the sum of our information on
the distinctive characters of the head and skeleton in the
several tribes of the New World; and the Synopsis of Indian
tribes by the learned and Honourable Albert Gallatin is
still the chief work of authority on the ethnology of the
Northern Americans, and the only work in which these
races are classiﬁed according to the extent of knowledge as
yet acquired by the distinctions and aﬁinities of their lan-
guages. The only part of the North American continent
which lay beyond the professed scope of M. Gallatin’s
survey, was the region between the Rocky Mountains and
the Northern Paciﬁc. This chasm in North American eth-
nology has been in some measure supplied by an excellent
memoir of Professor Scouler on the tribes inhabiting the
country to the northward of Nootka Sound, which appeared
some time since in the “ Journal of the Royal Geographical
Society/”E

* A vast accession of materials has within a few years resulted from
Government enterprise in the United States. This can be little more than
referred to, the mass of matter being far too great for present limits in the
most meagre outline, and with the severest compression. The bulky vo-
lumes on the Indian Tribes of the United States, by Dr. Henry R. School-
craft, published in imperial quarto, at Philadelphia, by authority of Congress,
already amount to four, beautifully printed and splendidly illustrated ; and
the information they afford is immense on every subject connected with the
aboriginal tribes in the States, now including all the territories acquired
from Mexico. The Journals of Major Emory and of Lieut. J. W. Abert,
printed by order of Congress, have also furnished a considerable accession

of valuable matter; and the philological volume cf the American Exploring
Expedition may be consulted on the North-\Vestern Tribes, concerning

on. XXII.] AMERICAN RACES : CRANIA. 503

Dr. Morton has observed a number of important facts
which must be noticed with reference to the physical history
of particular races of Americans. But the types of organisa-
tion which prevail among these races are too comprehensive,
and the deviations, as far as they are yet known, too
evanescent or too feebly marked to afford a basis for dis-
criminating the native inhabitants of the New World into
ethnical groups. I shall, however, cite from Dr. Morton’s
work the general results of his comparison of American
skulls.

He says: “ After examining a great number of skulls
I ﬁnd that the nations east of the Alleghany Mountains,
together with the cognate tribes, have a head more elon-
gated than any other Alnericans. This remark applies
especially to the great Lenapé stock, the Iroquois, and the
Cherokees. To the west of the Mississippi we again meet
with the elongated head in the Mandans, Ricaras, Assini-
boins, and some other tribes. Yet, even in these instances,
the characteristic truncation of the occiput is more or less
obvious, while many nations east of the Rocky Mountains
have the rounded head so characteristic of the race: as the
Osages, Ottoes, Missouris, Dacotas, and numerous others.
The same conformation is common in Florida: but some
of these nations are evidently of the Tolteca family, as both
their characters and traditions testify. The heads of the
Caribs, as well of the Antilles as of Terra Firma, are also
naturally rounded: and we trace this character, as far as
we have had opportunity for examination, through the

 

whom the author laments his deﬁciency of means of knowledge. A good
deal of information on the tribes of the Southern border is furnished by .
J. R. Bartlett, who conducted the United States and Mexican Boundary
Commission from 1850 to 1853, and who in the course of his oﬂicial
labours collected materials for a work on American ethnology, including
carefully checked vocabularies of the native tribes, which he is preparing
for publication. The information which he has already communicated in his
“ Personal Narrative” is valuable, and will be noticed in its place. Some
of the volumes published by the Smithsonian Institution also contain
information of interest—ED.

504 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

nations east of the Andes, the Patagonians, and the tribes
of Chili. In fact, the ﬂatness of the occipital portion
of the cranium will probably be found to characterise a
greater or less number of individuals in every existing
tribe from Tierra del Fuego to the Canadas. If the skulls
be viewed from behind, we observe the occipital outline to
be moderately curved outwards, wide at the occipital pro-
tuberance, and full from these points to the opening of the
ear. From the parietal protuberances to the vertex there
is a slightly curved slope, producing a conical or rather a
wedge-shaped outline.

“ Humboldt has remarked that there is no race on the
globe in which the frontal bone is so much pressed back-
wards, and in which the forehead is so small. It must be
observed, however, that the lowness of the forehead is in
some measure compensated by its breadth, which is gene-
rally considerable. The ﬂat forehead was esteemed beautiful
among a great number of tribes; and this fancy has been
the principal incentive to the moulding of the head by art.

“ Although the orbital cavities are large, the eyes them-
selves are smaller than in Europeans ; and Frézier asserts
that the Puelche women whom he saw in Chili were abso-
lutely hideous from the smallness of their eyes. The latter
are also deeply set, or sunk, in the head—~an appearance
which is much increased by the low and prominent frontal
ridges.

“ Among the North American Indians, there is scarcely
any decided obliquity in the position of the eyes, which is
so universal among the Malays and Mongoles; but SpiX
and Martins have observed it in some Brazilian tribes, and
Humboldt in those of the Orinoco : and among the Pouris,
the Prince de Wied describes a man who bore in this and
other respects a marked resemblance to a Kalmuk.

“ What has been said of the bony orbits obtains with
surprising uniformity : thus the superior margin is but
slightly curved, while the inferior may be compared to an
inverted arch. The lateral margins form curves rather '

CH. XXII.] AMERICAN RACES : CRANIA. 505

mediate between the other two. This fact is the more
interesting on account of the contrast it presents to the
oblong orbit and parallel margins observable in the Malay.
The latter conformation, however, is sometimes seen in the
American, but chieﬂy in those skulls which have been
‘ altered by pressure on the frontal bone.

“ The nose constitutes one of the strongest and most
uniform features of the Indian countenance: it mostly
presents the decidedly arched form, without being aquiline,
and still more rarely ﬂat.

“The nasal cavities correspond to the size of the nose
itself; and the remarkable acuteness of smell possessed by
the American Indian has been attributed to the great
expansion of the olfactory membrane. But the perfection
of this sense, like that of hearing among the same people,
is perhaps chieﬂy to be attributed to its constant and
assiduous cultivation. The cheek-bones are large and
prominent, and incline rapidly towards the lower jaw,
giving the face an angular conformation; the upper jaw is -
often elongated, and much inclined outwards, but the teeth
are for the most part vertical; the lower jaw is broad and
ponderous, and connected in front. The teeth are also
very large, and seldom decay; few present marks of disu
ease, though the teeth are often worn by the mastication
of hard substances.”

Interesting and important as these observations are,
they yet do not afford us the means of separating the races
of America, and in arranging them according to affinity
between different tribes. We shall ﬁnd, as in the Old
Continent so in the New, that tribes of different physical
characters come into the same families of nations. Dr.
Morton’s remarks above cited afford an instance; since the
' Mandans, Minetaris, and Osages, placed in one class with
reference to their skulls, are known to be tribes of the
great family of the Sioux, to whom also belong the Dacotas,

' and other tribes characterised by a different conformation
of the head.

506 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The aﬂinity of languages affords the only secure ground
for ethnological arrangements ; and this method has been
followed by the great philologers of the American race,
Du Ponceau, Pickering, and Gallatin. We must pursue
it as far as it leads us, and when it fails, we must be con-
tent with such probabilities or approximations to historical
truth as geographical circumstances and all other obtain-
able lights may be found to furnish. On these foundations,
I shall now endeavour to enumerate in particular classes
the principal families or groups of nations into which the
aborigines of America divide themselves.

CHAPTER XXIII.

INHABITANTS OF CENTRAL AMERICA. 1. RAGE OF
TOLTECAS, CHICHIMECAS, AZTECAS.

IN many parts of the world are to be found tracts of great
elevation, where the climate and soil, and all the produc-
tions of the earth, are remarkably different from those of ‘
the adjacent lowlands; but nowhere else do we observe
contrasts so striking in all the forms of living and inanimate :
nature as when we compare the lofty plain of Anahuac:
with the low intertropical countries of America. The:
chain of the Cordillera, which, in Peru, is cleft into parallel.
ridges, supporting between them broad valleys, becomes, in J
the latitude of Mexico, a concentrated mass of mountains, ,
which itself constitutes the table-land, and over the surface:
of which peaks 16,000 and 17,700 feet in height are scat--
tered. The whole high region of Mexico is divided intm
four great uplands of different character and diﬁ'erenti
natural productions. The ﬁrst, comprehending the highl
valley, so termed, of Toluca, is raised 8530 feet aboves
the sea; the valley of Tenochtitlan, where the royal city
of Montezuma stood, 7460; that of Actopan, 6553; andl
the fourth, which is termed the valley of Istla, 334:3. Thee

CH. XXIII.] MEXICAN RACE. 507

rocks and mountains of Anahuac have the forms of ancient
towers, and buttresses, and cones, or pyramids : great
lakes, as those of Texcuco, Christobal, and Chalco, variegate
its surface, of which they occupy nearly one-fourth part.
In these treeless plains, various forms of the cactus,
the prickly manguey, or agave, and other plants of
singular shape, overspread the soil, where the dumb dog
and the bald wolf of Mexico or the xoloitzcuintli, and
various lacertine reptiles, wander. In such a country,
where the seasons have neither a proper summer nor
winter, and the climate is neither that of the temperate
nor of the torrid zone, the Spanish invaders found a people
equally singular, equally removed from the rudeness and
simplicity of savage life, and from the softer and more gentle
manners which civilisation has elsewhere produced, com-
bining great knowledge and skill in many useful and orna-
mental arts with the reckless cruelty of the ﬁercest bar-
barian. The Aztecas were diligent cultivators ; they had not
only the practice of working mines, and producing for use
all the metals which their soil concealed, but could set gems
in silver and gold, and perform ﬁne works of art, which,
as Clavigero says, astonished the workmen of Europe.
The natives of Mexico erected stupendous ediﬁces, which
rivalled those of Egypt, and although they could not yet
attain to the greatest of human inventions, perhaps only
once achieved by men under the most favourable auspices,
that of symbols representing the sounds of words, they had
long aspired after it, and had contrived a method of record-
ing events, and handing down to memory the passages of
their ancient history. The Mexicans had even made great
advancement in science, and had a solar year, with inter-
calations on the principle of the Roman calendar.ale They

 

* This is not quite accurate ; the Mexican estimate of the length of the
year was really nearer the truth than that of the Roman [Julian] Calendar;
but there were eighteen months of twenty days each, together with ﬁve odd
days in every year, and the intercalations were made at remote periods.
The most curious fact relating to Mexican astronomy, is its obvious analogy

508 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II. .

appear to have been inﬂuenced by a deep sentiment of 1
religion, though singularly perverted ; had orders of priests a
performing the rites of a stately ceremonial, and splendid!
pomps and processions in honour of the gods, whom they‘
worshipped through these mediators and with sacriﬁces of f
of the most appalling cruelty, connected, as it appears, with 1
the universally prevailing sentiment of mankind which calls I
for atonement and expiation. The accounts left by the!
“conquistadores” hardly sufﬁce to furnish an adequate:
idea of their social state; but, so far as we can form an,
opinion, it does not appear that the civilised Aztecas had I
derived from their cultivation of arts any moral improve- I
ment or mitigation of that sullen malignity which seems I
common to the native tribes of the New World. Their
gods had no attribute of clemency or mercy; they were
demons, unrelenting avengers of guilt, the creatures of an
evil conscience.

It 1s well known that the Mexicans professed to have:
records of considerable antiquity; these consisted of his--
torical paintings, of which the traditional explanation was ‘3
repeated orally by native Mexicans to some of their con-
querors, and to Spanish and Italian ecclesiastics. They“
had also calendars carrying back the notion of time, ‘
and marking the different passages of their history.axe Thee
authenticity of these documents, and of the interpretation 9
assigned to them, requires a more critical research than;
has yet been made. To the Abbe Clavigero, however,}
and Professor Vater, and M. de Humbolt, they have:

 

to that of Eastern Asia, the peculiar mode of grouping the years in cycles g
being similar to that which 1s in use to this day among the Chinese, J apa— ‘
nese, Mongols, Manchus, Tibetans, &c. , and if the symbols and characters I
of the Mexican astrology were ever in actual use as regulating the civill
calendar, which its connection with the practice prevailing at the epoch of i
the Spanish conquest renders probable, the systems are identical, and must ,
have been at some remote period the common property of Eastern Asiar
and Western America. —-ED. i
1‘ See the magniﬁcent collection of the historical paintings of the I
Mexicans by Lord Kingsborough, folio, London, 1830. i
l

l

CH. XXIII.] MEXICAN RACE. 509

appeared worthy of credit; and though the style of repre-
sentation in the earliests parts is evidently mythical, they
will continue to hold their place among the archives of
nations; and as they are the only records of the past ages
of the New World, to be objects of study to all those who
attempt to investigate its history. The principal events
recorded in these documents are the successive arrivals of
three migratory nations in Anahuac from distant rigions
in the north-west.axe These nations were the Toltecas, the
Chichimecas, and the Nahuatlacas. The latter were a
band of seven tribes, one of which were the Aztecas, or
proper Mexicans. The country whence the Toltecas issued
was named Huehuetlapallan. Thence their progress began
in the year 554 of our era; and this is the very oldest
epoch in the history of the New World. They arrived at
Tollantzinco, in the land of of Anahuac, in 648, and at Tula
in 670. In the reign of the Toltec king Ixtlicuechahuac,
in 708, the astrologer, Huematzin, composed the Divine
Book, or Teo-amoxtli, which contained in hieroglyphics
their history, their laws, their calendars, and their mytho-
logy. The Toltecas are said to have constructed the pyra-
; mid of Cholula, on the model of the pyramid of Teoti-
ihuacan. These are supposed to be the oldest of all the
pyramids of the New World; Siguenza believed them to
be the work of the Olmecas, more ancient inhabitants, of
. a different race from the Toltecas. It was under the
Toltec dynasty, or even more early, that the Mexican
Buddha, Quetzalcohuatl, appeared, a white man, bearded,
i

 

9“ The curious account of a voyage made to Foo-sang, a country which
,1 must have been the N. W. coast of America, in the 5th century, A.D., trans-
Ilated from the Chinese annals by Mons. De Gruignes in the 28th volume of
lthe Mé moires de l’Académie des Inscriptions (p. 503), proves, if genuine, a
3 degree of civilization in that region, at least equal to that of the Mexicans
iat the period of the Spanish conquest. The narrative attributes the civili-
i zation of Foo-sang to the effects of the Buddhist religion, preached there
by ﬁve bonzes from Samarkand, A.D. 458. The Mexican tradition and the
3 Chinese narrative certainly afford each other some degree of support, how.
5 ever slight it may be deemed—ED.

510 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II. ;

and accompanied by strangers in black garments. High- .
priest of Tula, he founded religious ceremonies, while his .
brother, Huemac, exercised secular authority, and a double :
dynasty arose like the temporal and ecclesiastical Dairis, ,
or Emperors of Japan. Pestilence destroyed the Toltecs ,
in 1051; they migrated southwards, but some remained ,
in Tula. The Chichimecas, a barbarous people, issued ;
from their unknown country, Amaquemecan, and arrived ;;
in Mexico in 1070. Lastly, the Nahuatlacas, or Seven.
Tribes, began their migration in 1170; they consisted,
of the Sochimilcas, the Chalcas, Tepanecas, Acolhuas,
Tlahuicas, Tlascaltecas, 0r Teo-chichimecas, and Aztecas, ;
or Mexicans, all of whom, as well as the Chichimecas,f
spoke the same language as the Toltecas. They issued
from a country far to the northward called Aztlan, in‘
1064, or in 1160, according to another account. Thei
Aztecs separated themselves from the other tribes; in;
1325 they built the city of Tenochtitlan, the ancienti
Mexico, on the banks of the lake Texcuco. 9*

Such 1s the outline of the history of the ancient Mexican i
race, as it seems to be portrayed in the historical paint-A,
ing of which the Spanish conquerors obtained possession,
and, as they supposed, the correct interpretation. We;
may, at least, infer from hence that tribes of the Mexican;
race, for the Toltecas and Aztecas, and the other tribesj
above mentioned were one race, since they all spoke thei
same language, had ascended the central plain of Anahuaci
from the countries lying somewhere towards the north, andi
that their arrivals had been successive, and had continued
for some centuries before the discovery of America. By
the writers before cited the substance of these accountsi
appears to have been fully credited.

 

* Among the most interesting, and probably the most authentic remains:
of the literature of this singular race, are the hymns composed by N eza-ri
hualcojotl, king of Texcuco, in honour of the Supreme Being, and his elegyi
on the instability of human greatness, as proved by the fate of the tyrant}

1
i
i

1
l
1

CH. xxrrr.] MEXICAN RACE. 511

The portraits of the ancient Aztecas, as Humboldt has
observed, and some of their divinities, are remarkable for
the depression of their forehead, giving a small facial angle ;
and this is a form which seems to have entered into the
beam idéal of the race, and which many other American
nations imitate by artiﬁcial compression of the head. The
characteristics of the present Mexicans are thus described
by Clavigero :—

“ The moral and physical qualities of the Mexicans,
their tempers and dispositions, were the same as those of
the Acolhuacans, the Tepanecans, the Tlascalans, and other
nations, with no other difference than what arose from their
different mode of education.

“ The Mexicans are of a good stature, generally rather
exceeding than falling short of the middle size, and well-
proportioned in all their limbs. They have good com-
plexions, narrow foreheads, black eyes, clean, ﬁrm, regular
white teeth; thick, black, coarse, glossy hair, thin beards,
and generally no hair upon their legs, thighs, and arms ;
their skin is of an olive colour.

“ There is scarcely a nation upon earth in which there
are fewer persons deformed; and it would be more difﬁcult
to ﬁnd a single hump-backed, lame, or squint-eyed man
among a thousand Mexicans than among a hundred of any
other nation. Among the young women of Mexico, there
are many very beautiful and fair ; whose beauty is rendered
more attractive by the sweetness and natural modesty of
their behaviour.

“Their senses are very acute, especially that of sight,
which they enjoy unimpaired to the greatest age. Their
minds are at bottom, in every respect, like those of the
other children of Adam, and endowed with the same
powers; nor did the Europeans ever do less credit to their
own reason than when they doubted of the rationality of

 

Tezozomoc; translated into Spanish by the great nephew of this king,
who was baptized by the name of Ferdinand Alva Ixtilxochitl.

512 ' NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [3001: II.

the Americans. Many persons allow the Mexicans to
‘possess a great talent of imitation, but deny them the praise
of invention,—a vulgar error, which is contradicted by
the ancient history of that people.”

2. Original Iiikabitcmts of Mexico, and other parts of
Central America.

We have seen that the Aztecas, or Mexicans, as well
as their kinsmen and predecessors, the Toltecas, were
foreigners in Anahuac, who entered that country from the
north, and that the ﬁrst body of this race entered Mexico
about 640, as it is supposed, after the Christian era.
Previously to that time, the same region had been inha-
bited by various races, some of whom had arts and civilisa-
tion, while others are said to have been barbarians. The
former were Spread far through Central America, as the
splendid buildings of Palenque, and other places which
have been lately described by Mr. Stephens, fully testify.
Among the most ancient tribes, according to Clavigero
and Humboldt, were the Olmecas, who are supposed by
Boturini, one of the great collectors of Mexican antiquities,

to have peopled the West India Islands and South America. ‘

They are known to have extended their migration to Leon
de Nicaragua. The Olmecas divided the land of Mexico

with the Xicalancas, the Coras, the Tepanecas, Tarascas, ,

Mixtecas, Tzapotecas, and the Othomi.

The Othomi and Totonacs were two barbarous races ‘
who inhabited the country about Lake Texcuco, before the
arrival of the Chichimecas, who were of the Mexican race.
The Othomi are a very remarkable people, from the cir-
cumstance that, while all the other known languages of

America are polysyllabic, and abounding with complicated
constructions, the Othomi, as it has been proved by a late

writer, a native of Mexico, Don E. Naxera, whose disco-
very has been particularly noticed by a great philologist,

Du Ponceau, was a monosyllabic dialect. It would seem

CH.'XXIII.] . MEXICAN RACE. 513

to belong to the same family of languages with the Chinese
and Indo-Chinese idioms.axe

Farther to the northward, and beyond the northern
boundary of the Mexican empire, dwelt the Huaxtecas.
, It was discovered by Professor Vater that the HuaXteca
idiom is nearly allied to the languages of Yucatan and
Guatemala ; and this conﬁrms the history of the Aztec
conquest of Anahuac. Huaxtecapan is separated from those
southern districts by the whole of Acolhuacan, and by a
great part of the Mexican empire. The people must have
been cut off from each other by the immigration of the
Mexicans. Between the Maya, which is the idiom of
Yucatan, the Poconchi of Guatemala, and the northern
Huaxteca, Vater has proved the existence of an extensive
analogy; and there is reason to believe that the Maya was
the common language of Cuba, Jamaica, and Hispaniola.
In the neighbouring Chiapa at least ten languages are
enumerated; the people of this country had hicroglyphical
paintings, and a computation of time analogous to that
of the Mexicans. They also, according to their tradition,
came from the north under a patriarch, Votan, and had
historical paintings. Between Chiapa and Mexico were the
Zapotecas and Mixtecas, who had peculiar languages and
systems of mythology.

The Tarascas, who inhabit the fertile and extensive
country of Mechoacan, to the north-west of Mexico, were
always independent of that kingdom. They had a sonorous
and harmonious language, distinct from all others. Their
country was very populous, and in arts and cultivation
they were equal to the Mexicans, who could never subdue
them; but their king submitted voluntarily to the Spaniards.

Before we leave the nations of Anahuac, it may be worth

 

 

 

* Dr. Latham shows reasons for doubting the alleged isolation, glossa-
rially, and even grammatically, of the Othomi among American languages ;
‘admitting at the same time that, of all the tongues of the New World, its
structure, from being either anaptotic or imperfectly agglutinate, is the
most remarkable.” See his “ Varieties of Man,” p. 408.—ED.

LL

514 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II. ,

while to remark, that although they differed so much in .
language, they generally considered themselves as descended
from the same race, and that they had even mythological
stories which accounted for the diversities of their lan-
guages. Acosta has preserved one of these tales, in which
the Tarascas are asserted to have spoken originally the
languages of the Aztecas, and to have emigrated with that
people from Atzlan. According to this tale, the Aztecas,
arriving after a long peregrination at Mechoacan, were
desirous of settling in so pleasant a country, which was,
however, too small for the whole nation. Their god,
l-Iuitzilopochtli, consented that a part might remain, and,
while they were bathing in the lake of Pazcuaro, advised
the others to steal their clothes, and pursue their journey.
The former party were so incensed on being thus robbed,
that they resolved to separate themselves for ever from
their thievish brethren, and accordingly adopted a new
language, the Tarasca.

Gomara relates that an allegory was current among
the Mexicans, of a more extensive meaning. An old man,
named Iztac-Mixcoatl, and his wife Itancueitl, had six
children, each of Whom came to speak a different language,
called Xolhua, Tenoch, Clmecatl, Xicallancatl, Mixtecatl,
and Otomotl, the names appropriated to six of the principal
nations of Anahuac.

3. Traces of the Aztec Migration.

In the countries lying to the eastward of the Gulf of
California, between the sea-coast and the highest ridges of
the Cordillera, and reaching northward as far as the great
rivers Gila and Colorado, many traces are found of the
temporary abodes of the Aztecas during their migratory
march,which probably took place through this region. Ruins
have been found in various places in the countries above
mentioned, lying to the south of the Gila, which, connected
with local traditions remaining among the inhabitants,
are supposed to mark the different stations of the Aztccas .

on. XXIII.] MEXICAN HISTORY. 515

in their journey towards Anahuac : these vestiges are said

to coincide with and conﬁrm the accounts transmitted by

the Mexican historians. Near vNayarit are seen earthen
mounds and trenches, which tradition assigns to the Cora.

These people are said to have raised them as a defence

against the Aztecas, when in their way from Hue’colhuacan

to Chicomoztoc, where the Seven Tribes separated. Stations
of the Aztecas are supposed to have been recognised by
some extensive remains; the most celebrated of these is
near the river Gila, where there are ruins of ediﬁces built
like those of Mexico, and manifestly the work of a people
advanced in arts; they are termed the Casas Grandes.
Nations speaking various languages inhabit the provinces
of Sinaloa, and Sonora, and in the missions of New Biscay,
which lie between Mexico and the river Gila. According
to Ribas, all the languages of Sinaloa contain numerous
words resembling the Mexican: of such, he says that he
could furnish a long catalogue, which appears to prove

'jhat some ancient connexion subsisted between the people

i I these countries and the Mexigcans their languages are

aid, however, to differ from the Mexican 1n grammatical

trmcture.

' The mountains of Tarahumara and of Pimeria Alta,
extending from New Biscay into Sonora, give name to the
missions of those countries. The natives of Tarahumara
have a peculiar language. The Eudeve and Opata, in
Pimeria, are said by Clavigero to resemble the Tarahumara

, so closely, that they must all have sprung from the same

\ root. But the language of; the Cora, a nation inhabiting
the missions of Nayarit, and that of Tarahumara above
mentioned, have long been known to bear a decided relation
to the Mexican. The Cora agrees with the Mexican,
according to the result of Vater’s researches, not only in

. its vocabulary, but very remarkably in its grammatical

: structure. This resemblance is of such a description as

rto prove that the Cora nation are descended, at least in

; great part, from the same stock as the ancient Aztecas.

   
   

516 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

The farthest vestige of what may be considered as
Mexican civilization toward the north is in the neighbour-
hood of the Yaquesila, which ﬂows into the Rio Colorado.
The Moqui, and other tribes who inhabit this region, are
said by the missionaries who visited those countries in their
journey from the missions of Pimeria, to reside in towns,
or villages, containing two or three thousand inhabitants.

They are clothed, and their houses have several stories 7

and terrasses, and are constructed in the same manner as
the Casas Grandes, and the houses of ancient Mexico.*

 

CHAPTER XXIV.

OF THE ESQUIMAUX, OR KARALIT.

THERE are two races among the aborigines of North
America, and only two, who may be traced nearly across

the whole continent, from the Paciﬁc to the Atlantic
Ocean. These are the two northern races of the Esqui-

maux and Athapascas. There are several dialects among

them, but the proximity of these to each other is astonish-
ing, if the extent of space over which they are spread is
considered.

The Esquimaux, though they hunt during their short
summer, are obliged to draw their principal sustenance
from the sea, and consequently they are rarely found more
than 100 miles from the sea-coast. The name of Esqui-
mauX is derived, according to M. Charlevoix, from an
Algonquin or Abenaqui word, and means “ Eaters of raw
ﬁsh.” They call themselves by different names in different
places, but their most prevalent designation is Karalit.
The Esquimaux inhabit the shores of all the seas, bays,
inlets, and islands of America, north of the 60° of north

latitude; from the eastern coast of Greenland, in longitude l

20°, to the Straits of Behring, in longitude 167° west. On
the Atlantic, they reach eastward along the coast of Labrador
9'“ See an account of these people in Chapter XXIX.

 

CH. XXIV.] - ESQUIMAUX. 517

to the Straits of Belle-isle, and within the Gulf of the River
St. Lawrence. Towards the west, they may be traced along
the shores of the Paciﬁc to the extremity of the Peninsula
of Alaska, and thence to the neighbourhood of Mount St.
Elias, Where they border on the Kolushi. The Konaeges and
Tschugazzi are the southernmost tribes of Esquimaux that
are known in this directionﬁ“ as reaching the western side
of North America, along the shores of the Paciﬁc. The whole
length of the coast of the Esquimaux is computed by Mr.
Gallatin to be not less than 5400 miles, without reckoning
the inlets of the sea.

I have already described the form of the skull peculiar
to the Es‘quimaux. The description given by Crantz of
the Greenlanders may well apply to the whole race. He
says that they are for the most part under ﬁve feet in
stature. He adds, “ That they have well-shaped and pro-
portioned limbs; their face is commonly broad and ﬂat,
with high cheek-bones, but round and plump cheeks; their
eyes are little and black, but devoid of sparkling ﬁre ;
their nose is not ﬂat, but small, and projecting but little;
their mouth is little and round, and the under lip some-
what thicker than the other.” “ They have universally
coal-black, straight, strong, and long hair on their heads,
but no beard, because they root it out. Their hands and
feet are little and soft, but their head and the rest of their
limbs are large. They have high breasts and broad
shoulders: their whole body is fat.”

M. Charlevoix, in his history of New France, has given
a very good description of the Esquimaux, and there are
some remarkable particulars in his account. He says, “ Il
est certain que de tous les peuples connus de l’Amérique,
il n’en est point qui remplisse mieux que celui-ci la pre-
miere idée que l’on a eue en Europe des sauvages. Il est
presque le seul ou les hommes ayent de la barbe, et ils
l’ont si épaisse jusqu’auX yeuX, qu’on a peine a découvrir

 

”“ “ Synopsis of the Indian Tribes of North America,” by the Honourable
Albert Gallatin. “Arcllaaologia Americana,” Vol. ii. p. 10.

518 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

quelques traits de leur visage. Ils ont d’ailleurs je ne
sgai quoi d’aﬁ'reux dans l’air, de petits yeux eﬂ’arés, des
dents larges et fort sales, des cheveux ordinairement noirs,
quelquefois blonds, forts en désordre, et tout l’extérieur fort
brut. Leurs moeurs et leur caractere ne démentent point
cette mauvaise physionomie. Ils sont féroces, farouches,
déﬁants, inquiets, toujours portés a faire du mal aux
étrangers.

“ Leurs cheveux blonds, leurs barbes, la blancheur de
leur peau, le peu de ressemblance et de commerce qu’ils
ont avec leurs plus proches voisins, ne laissent aucun lieu
de douter qu’ils n’ayent une origine diﬁ'érente de celle des
autres Amériquains.” [The plate opposite is the portrait
of a young Esquimaux, now a student at S. Augustin’s
College in Canterbury. It is copied from an excellent
photograph which was taken for this work]

_..__—.._.

CHAPTER XXV.
ATHAPASCAS, on CHEPEWYANS.

THE name of Athapascas has been given by Mr. Gal-
latin to a widely-spread nation in North America, termed
Chepewyans by Mackenzie, who had a very imperfect idea
of their extension. This designation is derived from the
original name of the Lake of the Hills and the adjoining
country, which is in the centre of the territory possessed
by the tribes of this race.

The country of the Athapascas reaches from the western
shore of Hudson’s Bay, across the whole American Conti-
nent, to the conﬁnes of the Kolushian tribes, immediately
on the coast of the Paciﬁc. Its southern boundary is the
river Missinippi, or the Churchill river, which falls into
Hudson’s Bay. This boundary line ascends from the

. mouth of that river to its source, and is thence continued
in a direction nearly due west; the country of the Atha-

 

 

CH. XXV.) ‘ ATHAPASCAS. 519

pasca race reaches from this line northward to that of the
Esquimaux. The Athapascas may thus be considered as
occupying the whole interior of North America to the
northward of the latitude of the Missinippi, behind the
coast of the Kolushians, or to the eastward of them, and
to the southward of the Esquimaux, whose enemies and
neighbours they are through the whole frontier of that
race to the westward of Hudson’s Bay. The Northern
Indians, the Beaver Indians, the Mountain Indians, the
Tacallas, or Carriers, the Sussees, are all tribes of Atha-
pascas, in the midst of whose territory is the whole chain
of the Rocky Mountains to the northward of the 52° north
latitude.

Mackenzie has described the Chepewyans, or Athapas-
cas. He is unwilling to include them under the name of
native Americans. He says, “ Their progress is easterly,
and, according to their own traditions, they came from
Siberia; agreeing in dress and manners with the Eastern
Asiatics. They have a tradition among them that they
came originally from another country inhabited by very
wicked people, and had traversed a great lake, which was
narrow, shallow, and full of islands, where they suffered
great misery, it being always winter, with ice and deep
snow. At the Copper Mine River, where they made the
ﬁrst land, the ground was covered with copper, over which
a body of earth has since been collected to the depth of a
man’s height. They believe, also, that in ancient times
their ancestors lived till their feet were worn out with
walking, and their throats with eating. They describe a
deluge, when the waters spread over the whole earth,
except the highest mountains, on the tops of which they
preserved themselves.”*

 

4“ On the authority of Professor W. W. Turner, who read a paper on
the subject before the American Ethnological Society, “a close analogy ex-
ists between the languages of theApaches [in Texas] and the Athapascans.”
See J. R. Bartlett’s Explorations and Incidents in Texas, 850., New York,
1854:, Vol. i. p.326. The statement is given by a trustworthy writer, though

520 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK 11-.

CHAPTER XXVI.
THE GREAT ALGONQUIN-LENAPE AND IROQUOIS RACES.

THE greater part of Canada, and of the country now
belonging to the United States, which lies to the eastward
of the Mississippi, was inhabited at the era of its discovery
by tribes belonging to two principal races. The Algon-
quins and the Lenni-Lenape, or Delaware Indians, were
two of the most powerful and celebrated tribes in one
Of these races; to the other belonged the people who
were termed by French writers Iroquois. These names,
as above set down, may be made to comprehend the two
races respectively, though neither was a general appella-
tion. Both races were subdivided into a great number of
tribes, who formed individually distinct nations, though
they respectively recognised their kindred to each other.
The Algonquin-Lenape were the most extensively spread
people in all Northern America. The territory of the
Iroquois was nearly surrounded by lands belonging to
that race; for that reason, and because the two nations
have ever been nearly connected in history, I shall describe
them, as Mr. Gallatin has done, in one section.

The limits of the Algonquin-Lenapian territory towards
the north is the river Missinippi, which separates them
from the Athepascas, or Chepewyans. The whole course
of that river, from its source in the Rocky Mountains to
its mouth in the Hudson’s Bay, divides the Athapascas on
its left bank from -the Algonquin nations on the right.
The latter, however, are also found on the east side Of
Hudson’s Bay, and a continuation of nearly the same line
forms their northern limit through the land of Labrador,
where, there being no Athapascas, they border immediately
on the EsquimauX. On the east, they were extended along

 

not of his own knowledge : the fact appears very unlikely, except in so far
as there is a close analogy between the structures Of nearly all American
languages—ED.

 

on. XXVI.] ALGONQUIN-LENAPE. 521

the coast of the Atlantic, from the mouth of the River St.
Lawrence to the vicinity of Cape Hatteras; this is the
eastern boundary of the country occupied by the Algon-
quins and Iroquois. The southern limit is as follows :—

An irregular line drawn from Cape Hatteras to the con-
, ﬂuence of the Ohio and the Mississippi separates the Iro-
quois and the Algonquin nations on one side from the
territories of the southern people on the other, who will
‘ be mentioned in the following chapter. On the western
A side, the Algonquin race is generally limited by the river
1 Mississippi, from the point before mentioned up to its
‘ source. Farther northward, the tribes of this race are
1 separated from the Sioux by the Red River, which falls into
;’ Lake Winnipeg. Thence northward to the Missinippi the
t line is unknown.

The Iroquois, a peOple distinct from the Algonquins
but similar to them, and waging almost perpetual warfare

.- with them, consisted formerly of two separate bodies.

The northern Iroquois were entirely surrounded by Algon-
; quin-Lenapian tribes ; they occupied countries difﬁcult to

deﬁne, extending from the neighbourhood of Lake Huron

V to the Ohio. The southern Iroquois were the Tuscasoras
: in Virginia and North Carolina.

History of the Algonquin-Lendpe.
From the Atlantic to the Mississippi the names of

; rivers and mountains are, as Dr. Barton observes, chieﬂy

Algonquin words; examples are those of Massachusetts,
Connecticut, Monongahela, Alleghany, Muskingum, Sa-
vannah, and Mississippi. One great branch of the race
were the Delaware Indians, or Lenni-Lenape. Their tra-
ditionary history, as collected by Heckewelder, is as follows.
The Lenni-Lenape, or Original People, as their ancestors
have handed down, dwelt long ago in a very distant country,
in the western part of the American Continent. For some
reason, now forgotten, they determined on migrating to the
eastward, and accordingly set out together in a body. After

522 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

a long journey, and many nights’ encampment—by which
they mean the halt of a year in one place—they at
length arrived on the Namzesi-Sipu, River of Fish, or
Mississippi, where they fell in with the Mengwe, or Iro-
quois, who had likewise emigrated from a distant country,
and had struck upon the river somewhat higher up. Their
object was the same as that of the Lenape; they were pro-
ceeding to the eastward, until they should ﬁnd a country
that pleased them. With this nation, destined to be their
future enemies and destroyers, the Lenape formed a con-
federacy, and both united their forces against a common
foe. This was a powerful nation, whom their spies had dis-
covered in the country eastward of the Mississippi, termed
Talligewi, or more pr0perly Alligewi, who had built many
large towns on the rivers ﬂowing through their land.
These people were a remarkably tall and stout race, higher
in stature than the tallest of the Lenape; they were ﬁnally
overcome by the latter, and being expelled from their ter-
ritory, ﬂed down the Mississippi,whencetheyneverreturned.
The Alleghany river, or Ohio, is still called after them by
the Delawares, Alligewi-Sipu, or River of the Alligewi;
and the chain of mountains also preserves their name.
The conquering nations divided the country eastward of
the Namaesi-Sipu among themselves. The Lena-pe took
possession of, and gradually migrated into, the country to
the south, and settled on the four great rivers,-—Delaware,
Hudson, Susquehannah, and Potomac; and the Mengwe,
or Iroquois, occupied the lands farther northward, in the
vicinity of the great lakes, and on their tributary streams.
This migration, according to the tradition of the Lenape,
was the cause of the division of their race into several
bodies. Some remained beyond the Mississippi, and
another body near that river on the eastern side ; but the
larger number settled on the Atlantic. This vast body of
the Lenape on the Atlantic became divided into three
tribes, termed the Unamis, Unalachtigo, or Turtle and
Turkey, who settled near the sea, from the Hudson River

CH. XXVI.] ALGONQUIN-LENAPE. 523

to beyond the Potomac, and the Minsi, or Wolf tribe,
farther westward: these people were commonly called
Monseys.

From these three tribes, comprising the nation termed
Delawares by the Anglo-Americans, have gradually de-
scended many other divisions of the same race, who con-
tinued to acknowledge the Lenape as their parent stock,
or as their grandfather.

Northern Tribes of the Algonqam-Lehdpe Race.

The northern tribes belonging to this family of nations are
r the Knisteneaux, or Crees, who border towards the north on
i the Athapascas, and reach from Hudson’s Bay to the Rocky
Mountains, the Algonquins and Chippeways, or Ojibways,
the Ottawas, and the Potowatomis and the Mississagues.
The north-eastern division, in Mr. Gallatin’s enumeration,
are the Algonquins of Labrador, the Micmacs, the Etche-
mens, and the Abenaquis. These nations have been de-
scribed by Charlevoix, La Hontan, and other French writers
on the history of Canada.
Individuals belonging to several northern tribes have
i" been brought, within a few years, to London, and have
t furnished specimens of the physiognomy of the native
. American race. The most remarkable are the Ioways, from
r the Rocky Mountains, and the Ojibways.
The Ojibways, also called Chippeways, are reckoned
I by M. Gallatin a tribe of the northern branch of the great
iAlgonquin-Lenape family, to which are likewise referred
ithe Knistenaux, or Killistenos, or Crees, the Algonquins
1proper, or Nippisings of Charlevoix, the Ottawas, the
[Potowatomies, and the Mississagues. All these nations
a speak dialects which are nearly allied, and are more or less
a easily intelligible to each other, while the idioms belonging
d to other branches of the same great family, as those of the
ILenape, or Delaware Indians, the Mohicans, the Nan-
idticoks, and the Illinois, are much more remote. The
ilKnistenaux and Algonquins arc the most northern of tho

. 524 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

northern branch: they inhabit Canada and the country
on the river St. Lawrence. The Chippeways, or Ojibways,
are intimately connected with the Ottawas; these were
considered by the French Catholic Missionaries as the
same people. The original position of these people is said
to have been on the Ottawa River, where they dwelt chieﬂy
on an island, and exacted tribute from all canoes passing
into the country of the Hurons. After the almost total
destruction of the Hurons by the, Five nations, in 1649,
the people of the Algonquin-Lenape race, who had lived
on that river, abandoned their ancient abodes; and a part
of them passed to the south-western extremity of Lake
Superior. The Chippeways are now situated around Lake
Superior, extending north-west towards Lake Winnipeg,
and west to Red River.

A very interesting account was given long ago of the
Chippeways by Carver, who resided some time among
them; and they have been described lately by Professor
Keating and by Mr. Catlin. The following account has
been given by this last writer of the tribe and of the party ‘
0f Ojibways who have lately been exhibited in London.

“ The tribe amounts in number at this time to about
25,000 persons. They occupy the eastern and north- .
eastern and northern shores of Lake Huron, also the whole ‘
northern and southern shores of Lake Superior, the head- j
waters of the Mississippi, and even extend over an immense
tract of country to the north and west of the Lake of the
Woods, reaching nearly to Lake Winnipeg and Hudson’s v
Bay. In a political point of View the Ojibways are more
important to Great Britain than any other American tribe
residing within the territory claimed by that kingdom. The
Ojibways are composed of about thirty bands, each having
at its head a chief, and they are all subservient to one
supreme head. The party now in England consist of nine
individuals, six of whom are men and three females: they
came from the eastern shore of Lake Huron. Of the men,
one is a war-chief, ﬁfty-one years of age, who is said to have

 

CH. XXVI.] CHIPPEWAYS. 525

distinguished himself, like the 01d chief, in the year 1812,
by the side of the great warrior Ticumak. There are also
three young men denominated warriors, and an interpreter,
a half-bred Indian, who is named N ot-een-a-akm, or the
Strong Wind. This young man, who is dressed in a semi-
civilised costume, speaks French and English as well as
the Ojibway language. He is twenty-two years of age.
He is the son of a French Canadian named Candotte,
who rendered the British Government some essential service
during the last war in the capacity of Government inter-
preter. His mother is an Ojibway woman.

“ The principal man of the party is Ah-quee-we-zaints,
‘the Boy,’ an old chief, now seventy-ﬁve years of age. His
stature is six feet one and a half inches, and his counte-
nance intellectual and benevolent.

“ Of the three females, two are wives of young men
belonging to the party, and the third, a little girl ten years
of age, and daughter of one of the band. They are all
dressed in skins, and their dresses are ornamented with a
profusion of beads of various colours, and with rows of
elks’ teeth.”*

[Of all these tribes the Crees have made the greatest
advances towards civilization ; the accounts received from
time to time by the Church Missionary Society in London,
and made known in their publications, are evidence of this,
and a notice of a geological workJr inserted in the Literary
Gazette of July 1853, gives a striking instance of the pro-

* A perfectly civilized and well-educated Chippeway, named Kah-ge-ga-
gab—bowh, who was in London a few years ago, (1851), excited a good deal
of attention by his agreeable manners, and the interesting nature of his
discussions on the condition and prospects of his countrymen. He gave
some public lectures on these subjects, in which he expressed himself with
1 an ease and propriety quite unexpected 111 a man who had for the greatest

part of his life lived wholly 1n the forests with his countrymen, and who
did not know any language but his own, until he was above 12 years of age.
Kah -ge- ga-gah-bowh was born 1n 1818, on the river Trent, near Rice Lake,
in Upper Canada. ——ED.
‘ 1' David Dale Owen’s Geological Survey of Wisconsin, Iowa, and Min-
5 nosota. Philadelphia, 1853.

 

 

, ‘ ': -§26 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

gress made by one body of the nation. The Reviewer
. quptes the author as speaking of a settlement of ﬁve hun-
dred Crees at a place called Prince Rupert’s Landing, near

. , the Fort Garry Colony, and not far from where the Red

River joinsLakeWinnipeg. The author says, ‘TheseIndians
support themselves mainly by the produce of their farms,
which they cultivate with their own hands. They dwell
in comfortably squared log buildings, erected, thatched,
and whitewashed by themselves. They are acquainted
with the use of the simpler farming utensils, and the mecha-
nical operations necessary to keep their farms and houses
in order. Each family cultivates from ﬁve to ten acres of
land, which is kept well fenced. They mow their own hay,
and feed their cattle on it in the winter. A few occasion-
ally hunt during a month or more in the summer, when
their crops do not require much attention; but this is more
for recreation than for support. Some of the men occa-
sionally contract with the Hudson’s Bay Company to trans-
port their goods to and from York Factory on Hudson’s
Bay.” The author informs us that this extraordinary
change in Indian habits and character has been wrought
by the example of a judicious missionary named Smith-
hurst, who thoroughly understands their language. The
care with which this excellent man cultivated his own farm
and garden ﬁrst drew their attention, and the example
given by a teacher whom they reverenced, showed them
palpably the superior certainty of support derivable from
agriculture, over anything they could obtain from their
old source of livelihood, the chase; and this has induced
them gradually to fall into habits leading to results which
they could feelingly appreciate. In spite of the ridicule of ‘
their neighbours the Chippeways, who contemptuously
style them grubs and earth-worms, they have persevered,
and “have gathered around their permanent homes the
implements and appurtenances, and even some of the com-
forts and luxuries, belonging to the establishment of the
thrifty farmer.”]

  
  
  
 
 
  
  
   
 
    
 
   
 
  
   
 
   
  
   
 
   
   
    
    
 
   

i H. xxvr.] LENNI-LENAPE RACE. 527 l: -
I .

The eastern division comprises all the tribes of New
ngland. The Delaware, or Lenni-Lenape, were acknow- l.
edged, according to La Hontan, by a long list of nations, as ‘
heir primitive ancestors, or, in the Indian phrase, as theirﬁ " '
,randfather. The Minsi, and the Mohicans, or Mohegans, . _
he Nachitoches of Maryland, the Susquehannahs, the i
ohatans of Virginia, and the Pamlicos of North Carolina,
jiielong to this division of the Algonquin race. The lan-
’ ages of these nations have been grammatically examined,
nd grammars and dictionaries of some of them have been,
i: a ade by various writers of the United States, among whom:
re the celebrated Jonathan Edwards, Eliot, Heckewelder,
eisberger, Pickering, and the great philologer of the New
orld, the venerable Du Ponceau.ale

a. * The history of these nations presents many curious and interesting ,

assages; particularly the accounts of the wars of Uncas, chief of the

A ohicans, and the wars of‘ King Philip, Sachem of the Wampanoags.

hey are detailed with great clearness in the classical work of Mr.

allatin.—DR. PRICHARD.

A copious grammar of the Cree language, combined with an analysis

f the Chippeway dialect, from the pen of Joseph Howse, Esq., who was

'wenty years a resident in Prince Rupert's Land, was printed in London

j. the year 1844. This is a valuable contribution to American philology ;

ut it is a fact of greater interest in the history of the aboriginal American,

1: at the Crees have recently learned to read and write for themselves, not

f 'th the Roman alphabet, like the Cherokees, but by the aid of a syllabarium

'vised for their use a few years ago by the Rev. James Evans, a Wesleyan

; ‘giissionary, who became almost an Indian himself, and who was “ skilful in

y 1 departments of Indian exertion ; so that he may be said to have become 1

i i naturalized denizén of the woods and lakes” (Ch. Miss. Intell. vol. iv.

i .F 68). Mr. Evans’s syllabary is 'composed of simple forms representing ;
,‘ﬁ'crent consonants, which receive different vowel sounds by a change in

’n‘sition ; so that, for instance, *1 stands for ma, r me, .1 mo, L. mu ;

odiﬁcations are made by (lots and small lines. Portions of the New ,

estament have been printed in this character at Rossville, near N orway-

: use on Lake \Vinnipeg, and St. John’s Gospel has been received in

gland. It is said that the Crees learn to read rapidly in this character, ‘

ough it is fair to state that someof our missionaries who speak the lan-

. age object to it, though they admit that it is “ valuable for the old In-

:j__ ns ;” no doubt because it is more easily acquired: an important admis- f i

.. on in its favour. According to anotice in the“ Albany Evening J ournal,”

i r. Evans died in November 1846.—ED.

 

 

 

 

 

 

   
 
  
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN.)

_, Was with the Lenni-Lenape, or Delawares, th 1
, am Penn made his celebrated treaty. In his time the
elawares had been subjugated and “ made women” by’
the Iroquois, so that Penn and his followers were obliged
to purchase the right of possession from the Del-awares, and
that of sovereignty from the Five nations. ~-
The western branch of the Algonquin race are the
Menomonies, called by the French “ Folles Avoines,” or;
“, Wild Oats,” the Miami, or Illinois tribes, the Sauks,”
‘Foxes, and Kickapoos, and, lastly, the Shawnees. Along
list of inferior names might be enumerated: I have con-
ﬁned myself to the prominent tribes. '

§

The Iroquois Tribes.

, The Iroquois, entirely distinct from the Algonquin race,
have been singularly associated with that family of nations
I, in the various passages of their history. The northern 1
_ Iroquois consist of two divisions, ——-the eastern, who are the
‘. famous Confederacy of the Five nations, and the western, or 1
Four nations, of which the Wyandots, termed by the French
J Hurons, are the principal tribe. When the Five nations 1
11' 1 were engaged 1n deadly feud with the Algonquin tribes, the q
1/ Wyandots were the head and principal support of the-
» Algonquin confederacy, and even the Delawares, who 1
1* claim to be the elder branch of the Lenape race, recognise 1

I - the superiOrity of the Wyandots, whom they still call them 1

Uncles. - the right of ancient sovereignty is conceded t1,
_ . them. Their real name is probably Yendots , they concen
. 'ltrated themselves near Lake Huron, and have cultivate: .

l

   
 

 

 
 
    
 
 
 
 
 

l1

     
  
  

 
 

diseases, and the vices introduced among them by Eur
, fpeans. The French Catholic missionaries were indefc’

  

CH. xxv1.] ALGONQUIN-LENAPE RACE. 529

tigable in their attempts to convert them to Christianity,
and eight or ten Jesuits suffered death among the Hurons
in the pursuit of this work of piety.

Physical Characters of the Algonquin and Iroquois.

It does not appear that there are any very strongly
marked differences in physical character between the
nations belonging to these two races.

The descriptions given by Mackenzie of the Kniste-
neaux, and Professor Keating’s account of the Potowatomis
near Lake Michigan, may serve for a general portrait of
the Algonquin-Lenape. They are as follows 2——

“ The Knisteneaux are of moderate stature, well pro-
portioned, and of great activity; their complexion is of a
copper colour, and their hair black, which is common to
all the natives of America.” To this observation some
exceptions are afterwards mentioned by the writer himself.
“ It is cut in various forms, according to the fancy of the
several tribes; and by some is left in the long, lank ﬂow
of nature. They very generally extract their beards, and
both sexes manifest a disposition to pluck the hair from
every part of the body and limbs. Their eyes are black,
keen, and penetrating; their countenance open and agree-
able; and it is a principal object of their vanity to give
every possible decoration to their persons. A material
article in their toilets is vermilion, which they contrast
with their native ochre, white and brown earths, to which
charcoal is frequently added. Of all the nations I have
seen on this continent, the Knisteneaux women are the
most comely; their ﬁgure is generally well proportioned,
and the regularity of their features would be acknowledged
by the most civilised people of Europe; their complexion
has less of that dark tinge which is common to those
savages who have less cleanly habits.

“ The Potowatomi are for the most part well-propor-
tioned, about ﬁve feet eight inches in height, possessed of
much muscular strength in the arm, but rather weak in

M M

530 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

the back, with a strong neck, and endowed with consider-
able agility; their voice is feeble and low, but when
excited, very shrill; their teeth are sound and clean, but
not remarkable for regularity. In persons of feeble habit
or of a scrofulous tendency, the teeth are found to decay
much faster than in others. Dentition is said to be a
painful process among Indian childrenr—a circumstance
which we had not expected. Their complexion is very
much darkened by exposure to the sun and wind, while
those parts which are kept covered are observed to retain
their native brightness. Children are red when new-born ;'
after a few years they assume a yellow colour.” Some other
observations areadded, tending to prove that all the organs
of sense are very perfect in these tribes, as well as the
physical powers in general. Kalm has described the
Hurons, and some other tribes of the Iroquois nation.
From his account, it appears that they do not differ
remarkably in person from the Algonquin race. He says, ’
“ The Hurons are tall, robust people, well-shaped, and of T
a copper colour; they have short black hair, which is;
shaved on the forehead from one ear to the other. The:
Anies, another Iroquois tribe, speaking the Huron lan- -
guage, are equally tall. The Hurons seem to have a1
longer, and the Anies a rounder face; the Anies have:
something cruel in their looks ; both the Hurons and the 1‘
Anies are taller than the Mickmacks; the latter speak a1
different language.” They have already been mentioned!
as an Abenaqui tribe, and therefore of the Algonquin race. .‘
Kalm says, “ I have not seen any Indians whose hair wasé
so long and straight as theirs. Almost all the Indians'a
have black, straight hair: however, I have met a fewv
whose hair was pretty much curled but the Indians ofif
Canada have been somewhat intermixed with the French. ”1*

The Mohawks me a tribe of the race of Iroquois. Ail
portrait of the Mohawk chief, hayendaneega, may g1» e;
some idea of their type of countenance.

I have selected from Mr. Catlin’ s admiiable collection1

.wm

w~r

 

CH. XXYI.] ALGONQUIN-LENAPE RACE. 531

of original paintings two portraits of warriors of the tribe of
Sauks and Foxes, more properly termed, according to Mr.

FIG. 89.

 

Thayendaneeg‘a, a Mohawk Chief.

‘Gallatin, the Musquakiﬁk, or “ Red Clays.”* They belong
to a western branch of the Algonquins, and may serve as
specimens of the Lenapian 'races. One of them is the
celebrated Chieftain Black Hawk, the other Nah-pope, a
‘Warrior of the same tribe. (See Coloured PlateshL

 

4" “ Archaeologia Americana,” Vol. ii. p. 61.

1' “The Iroquois and Algonkins exhibit in the most typical form the
characteristics of the North American Indians, as exhibited in the earliest
“descriptions, and are the two families upon which the current notions
respecting the physiognomy, habits, and moral and intellectual powers of

the so-called Red Race are chieﬂy founded” (“Varieties of Man,” by
,Dr. R. G.§Latham, p. 333).—ED.

532 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK IT.

CHAPTER XXVII.

OF THE ALLEGIIANIAN RACES, OR NATIONS LIVING TO THE
SOUTHWARD OF THE LENAPE AND IROQUOIS.

IN the southern parts of the territory of the United
States, there were formerly a multitude of distinct races ;
that is, of races speaking distinct and wholly unconnected
languages. Most of these have become extinct : those who
survive are some remnants of the Catawhas, the Cherokees,
the Choctaws, and the Chickasas, and the tribes partly or
Wholly included in what is termed the Creek confederacy:
these are the Muskhogees, of the race of the Seminoles,
the Uchees, and the Natchez, and some others. As all
these nations live on the Southern parts of the Alleghany
Mountains, or in the neighbourhood of rivers which take
their rise in that chain, I shall adopt, in describing them,
the collective term above expressed, not because it is a
very good one, but because it is the best I can ﬁnd.

The. Cherokees.

The history of the Cherokees has been admirably '
sketched by Mr. Gallatin, to whom I must refer the :
reader for more extended. information. Their name, .
rightly pronounced, is Chilakees, or more properly Tsala- -
.kies. Their territory was to the north and south of the g
south-westerly continuation of the Appalachian Mountains. ,
In the time of Adair, who lived in their country, the .
number of their warriors was estimated at 2300: they are e
now 15, 000, including about 1200 Negroes in their pos-s
i session; so that, as Mr. Gallatin observes, they appear to (i
have increased.

It is probable that the Cherokees are originally as
branch of the race of Iroquois. Dr. Barton and Mr.ll ,3,
Gallatin agree in the opinion that there is an essential, 3
though remote afﬁnity, between the languages of these 3
races Their idiom 1s now a written language; a nativeE

ll

CH. xxv11.] ALLEGHANIAN NATIONS. 533

Cherokee, Sequoyah, termed by the Anglo-Americans
Guess, has invented for writing it a syllabic system of
letters, which, according to Mr. Gallatin, is better adapted
for expressing the words belonging to it than our alphabetic
characters. The Cherokees have now written laws, and
seem likely to improve in civilisation, and to preserve their
name to future ages, and to prove to the world, what some
prejudiced persons have denied, that the native races of
America are capable of receiving and appropriating the

* blessings of Christianity. We are informed by Mr. Catlin,

who visited the settlement of the Cherokees, and Owahs
or Muskhogees, on the river Arkansas, in Lousiana, that
they have ﬁne farms and immense ﬁelds of wheat, and live
in good houses. He adds, “The Creeks, as well as the
Cherokees and Choctaws, have good schools and churches
established amongst them, conducted by excellent and
pious men, from whose example they are drawing great
and lasting beneﬁts.”*

2. The Catawhas, akin to the Woccons, the Cheraws,
and Congarees, are feeble remains of a distinct nation who
occupied the country on the Cheraw and other districts to
the eastward of the Cherokee territory. Their language
has some afﬁnities to the Muskhogee.

3. The Muskhogees form seven—eighths of what is termed

 

3“ Several small books printed by the Cherokees in their own language
and peculiar syllabary have passed through the Editor’s hands; among

, them, portions of Scripture, amounting to nearly the whole of the New
? Testament, and some religious tracts; all neatly and carefully executed.

An almanack printed also in this language contains a detailed notice of the
native executive government, a list of their district courts, and an account
of their religious associations and educational establishments. The number
of free schools for primary education was stated at twenty-two, and the
institution of two high schools, one for each sex, was then ([851) in con-
templation. for applicants who could sustain a good examination in the
ordinary subjects of instruction, and affordng board and education free for

1, four years at least. “Thus,” concludes this account, “the Cherokee

Nation is better provided for, in respect to schools, than many portions of
the United States, and we are happy to say that a large proportion. of the

* people are disposed to avail themselves of their privilege.~”—ED.

534 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

the Creek confederacy. The Seminoles, or properly,
Isty-Semole, that is “Wild Men,” speak the same lan-
guage, but are not included in the confederacy. Several
other small tribes of distinct races are included in this
league, among whom are reckoned the remains of the once
celebrated Natchez, who came from the Mississippi, and
the Uchees, ancient inhabitants of the country on the
Coosa river.

4. The Chickasas and Choctaws, properly Chahtas,
which means “ Flat Heads,” different nations, but of one ‘
race, formerly inhabited most of the country on the Mis-
sissippi, as far upwards, or nearly so, as the Ohio. Mr. l
Gallatin is of opinion that the language of this race is l
remotely allied to the‘Muskhogee. 5

The numbers of these southern nations, according to t
the estimate of the American War Department, are as }
follows :— i

 

The Cherokees ................................ 15,000

TheChoktaws 18,500 ‘

The Chikasas .................. 5,500} """" 24’000 ‘

The Muskhogees, Seminoles, and Hilchitees . . . . . . . . 26,000

The Uchees, Alibamons, Coosadas, and Natchez ...... 2 000
67,000

The Alleghanian races preserve among them many ‘
remarkable customs, once common, more or less, to many '
American nations, which indicate a cultivation of mind, .
and even a reﬁnement in political institutions, wonderful .
when compared with their general habits. These were a
the people among whom Adair fancied that he recognised l
the institutions of Judaism. The Cherokees had a city of ‘l
refuge or peace, Echotahﬁe where even murderers found a ,4

 

9‘“ The name of the Cherokee town in Georgia, Where a neWspaper in the 5
language was printed in the year 1828, was New Echotah. ‘ A copy of that 3
paper, seen by the Editor, contained a deprecatory but desponding article a
on the dreaded compulsory banishment of the nation beyond the Mississippi; ;
which was soon after carried into effect by the American government with n‘
‘a deplorable loss of life, and a serious check to the commencing civilization r
of the Cherokees—ED. J

3&mr. , 1

CH. XXVII.] ALLEGHAN IAN RACES. 035

temporary asylum. A perpetual ﬁre was there kept up, and
it was the residence of the “ beloved men,” in Whose pre-
sence no act of violence could be committed; these were
different persons from the war-Chieftains of tribes. V Char-
levoix and Du Pratz sarir the temple, and the sacred and
perpetual ﬁre of the Natchez. They worshipped the sun
and ﬁre. According to Charlevoix, most Indian nations are
divided into three tribes, or clans, each of which is named
after some animal, as the Wolf, the Turtle, and the Bear,
of the Hurons. No man was allowed to marry in his own
clan, or a woman who had the same “Totem,” or clan-
name, as his own; and according to Loskiel, the division
into clans originated in the intention to prevent the pos-
sibility of marriages among blood-relations. These insti-
tutions were not peculiar to the southern tribes, as they
prevailed extensively among the Lenape, and among the
Sioux, a great family of nations to the westward of the
Mississippi.

Physical Characters.

The following account of the Cherokee and Muskhogee,
or, as he terms them, Muscogulges, is from Mr. Bartram’s
travels in America. “ The males of the Cherokees, Mus-
cogulges, Seminoles, Chicasaws, Choctaws, and confederate
tribes of the Creeks,” says Bartram, “ are tall, erect, and
moderately robust; their limbs well-shaped, so as generally
to form a perfect human ﬁgure; their features regular,
and countenance open, digniﬁed, and placid; yet the fore-
head and brow, so formed, will strike you instantly with
heroism and bravery; the eye, though rather small, yet
active and full of ﬁre, the iris .. always black, and the nose
commonly inclining to the aquiline. Their countenance
and actions exhibit an air of magnanimity, superiority, and.
independence. Their complexion is of a reddish brown,
or copper colour, their hair long, lank, coarse, and black
as a raven, and reﬂecting the like lustre at different ex-
posures to the light. The women of the Cherokees are

536 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K IL

tall, slender, erect, and of delicate frame; their features
formed with perfect symmetry; the countenance cheerful
and friendly ; and they move with a becoming grace and
dignity.

“ The Muscogulge women, though remarkably short
of stature, are well formed; the visage round; features
regular and beautiful; the brow high and arched; the
eye large, black, and languishing, expressive of modesty,
difﬁdence, and bashfulness ; they are, perhaps, the smallest
race of women yet known, seldom above ﬁve feet high,
and I believe that the greater number never arrive to
that stature; their hands and feet not larger than those

of Europeans of nine and ten years of age; yet the men ‘

are of gigantic stature, a full size larger than Europeans ;

many of them above, and few under, six feet, or ﬁve feet ,

eight or ten inches. Their complexion is much darker
than any of the tribes to the north of them that I have
seen. This description will, I believe, comprehend the
Muscogulges, their confederates, the Choctaws and the
Chicasaws, excepting, however, some bands of the Semi-
noles, Uchees, and Savannaws, who are rather taller and
slenderer, and their complexion brighter.

“ The Cherokees are yet taller and more robust than
the Muscogulges, and by far the largest race of men I have
seen; their complexion brighter, and somewhat of an olive
cast, especially the adults ; and some of their young women
are nearly as fair and blooming as European women.”

Mr. Catlin has given a very interesting account of the
settlement of the Cherokees and Muskhogees in Louisiana,
whither they have been removed by treaty with the

United States government. He says, “ They occupy a K
country in the states of Mississippi and Alabama ; but by ‘
a similar arrangement, and for a similar purpose, with. the c

government, have exchanged their possessions there for a
country adjoining to the Cherokees, on the south side of
the Arkansas, to which they have already removed, and on
which, like the Cherokees, they are laying out ﬁne farms,

H32.

I-

CH. xxv11.] ALLEGHANIAN RACES. 537

and building good houses, in which they live, in many
instances surrounded by immense ﬁelds of corn and wheat-
There is scarcely a ﬁner country on earth than that now
owned by the Creeks; and, in North America, certainly
no Indian tribe is more advanced in the arts and agriculture
than they are. It is no uncommon thing to see a Creek
with twenty or thirty slaves at work on his plantation.”*

The annexed coloured Plate of Tuch-ee, a Cherokee
warrior, from an original painting by Mr. Catlin, affords a
specimen of the race, and is interesting as the portrait of
a very remarkable person. He was the leader of a colony
of his kindred into the remote interior of America. An
account of him will be seen in page 121 of the second
volume of Mr. Catlin’s work.

 

* The country appropriated to the Indians beyond the Mississippi is
said to be fertile and healthy. About 100,000 persons now dwell within
it, principally Cherokees, Choctaws, Chickasas, and Muskhogees, all pretty
nearly equal in point of civilisation; there are also remnants of fourteen
other tribes within the territory, the chief of whom are the Senecas, Shaw-
nees, Delawares, and Kikapoos. They are apparently advancing, and if
not checked by a nation boasting higher principles, they will continue to
do so. But the danger which menaces them on the part of the United
States government is candidly stated by Schoolcraft, a not unpatriotic
American, who views with much apprehension the course of emigration to
the Gold Regions precisely through the Indian territory. He says,
“ Whether this new tide of emigration be successful or unsuccessful, will
these who compose it spare to trample on the red man? will they sud-
denly become kind to him to, whom they have been unkind? will they
cease to desire the lands which their children want P will they consent to
see the nation separated by an Indian State? will they award honours—nay
justice, to that State ? Twenty years will answer that question” (“American
Indians,” p. 389). It is to be feared that the words of the Forty-third
Annual Report of the American Board of Missions (1852), speaking of the
last removal of the Cherokees, may give the only answer :——“ The ancient
and cherished fatherland of this interesting people was wanted for another
race. They made their appeal to natural right, to solemn treaties and in-
ternational law; but it was all in vain. An iron purpose demanded their
removal, and go they must” (quoted from the “ Church Missionary Intelli-
gencer” for March, 18541).-——ED.

538 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.’

Tribes between the Mobile River and the Jilississippi, omd
thence to the Red River. .f

A number of small tribes formerly inhabited the country i
between the Mobile and thel Mississippi. ,_

The Chitimachas were a distinct tribe, who, according ‘
to their own traditions, had come from the west; they are
now reduced to 300 souls, and live incorporated with the
Creeks, but preserve their language. In the third and fol-
lowing plates of this volume, facing page 111, there is an
engraving of a skull of a Chitimacha chief, brought from
a tumulus near the Mississippi by Dr. Daubeny, to whose
kindness I am indebted for it. It bears, as may be seen,
a striking resemblance to a Chinese cranium, represented
in the same plate. The Chinese face is somewhat ﬂatter,
but the difference is triﬂing.
. The most complete account of the small tribes still
existing to the westward of the Mississippi, and thence to '
the Red River, has been drawn out, as Mr. Gallatin says,
by Dr. Sibley, of Natchitoches ; they consist of tribes who
have crossed the Mississippi within memory, and of others
considered as native. The ﬁrst class embraces the Appa-
laches, the Alabamas, and many others; the second, the ;
Caddoes and other tribes less celebrated. It is remarked
of the Caddoes, that they formerly lived 300 miles up the .
Red River, on a prairie near an eminence, on which they a
say, that after all the world had been drowned in a ﬂood,
the Good Spirit placed one family of Caddoes, from which
all the Indians have originated.

w..-

.1.

 

CHAPTER XXVIII.

OF THE NATIVE AMERICAN RACES TO THE WESTWARD 01,“ ‘3'
THE MISSISSIPPI. ,7

1. 0f the Sioux omd Pawnees.

THE Sioux, and the tribes belonging to the same stock, are 9
one of the most widely extended families of nations among g

 

.3
J

 

3,011. xxv111.] RACES on THE SIOUX. 539

tithe aboriginal races of North America. The history of
1 this people is interesting in many points of view, and par-
1 ticularly on account of the physical varieties displayed in
asome of their tribes. The whole family of the Sioux is
1 divided by Mr. Gallatin into four departments, or separate
a-stems. These are—~1. The Winibagoes ; 2. The Sioux
[prOper, or Dahcotas, and the Assiniboins ; 3. The Mine-
ltari and tribes allied to them; 4. The Osages, and other
{ kindred tribes in Southern Louisiana.
1. The Winibagoes, known by that name among the '
i English, who derived it from the Algonquins, are the
.Puants of the French : among themselves they are called
.Hockmagomla, or the Trout Nation. Their abode is on the
the Fox river of Lake Michigan, and thence northward to
the Winconsin. They are about 4600 souls.

2. The Sioux proper, or N audowesies, who call them-
selves Dahcota, and sometimes the “ Seven Fires,”Ie are
divided into seven tribes. They occupy extensive tracts on
the Upper Mississippi, and on St. Peter’s river ; and some
extending as far to the westward as the Missouri. The
four most eastern tribes of the Dahcotas are called “ Gens
du Lac,” and “ People of the Leaves.” The ﬁrst of these
cultivate the land in a country eastward of the Mississippi,
extending from the Prairie du Chien to the Spirit Lake, a
.tract extending through three degrees of north latitude,

 

* This appellation is “ ocheti shakowing,” the seven council ﬁres: these
are named in the introduction to the Dahcota Dictionary, mentioned in the
_note on page 5411 :—1.Mdewakang, village of the Holy Lake, 2000 1n
number; 2. Wahpekute, leaf shooters, 500 to 600; 3. Wahpetongwang,
village 1n the leaves, 1000 to 1200; 41. Sibitongwang, village 1n the marsh,
2500; these four eastern bands are called by the Missouri Dahcotas, Isangti,
'as a general name: 5.1hanktongwangna, 4000, subdivided into four
branches, 6. Ihanktongwang, 2400, both terms meaning End village;
7. Titongwang, Prairie village, 12,500, subdivided into eleven branches.
The usual names for ﬁve of those bands are given in the text. The de-
tached Sioux of Red River, known as the Assiniboins or Stone Indians, are
said to have sprung from the Wazikute, one of the subdivisions of the
Ihanktongwangna, o1 Yanktoana: the Dahcotas call them Hohe.—ED.

540 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

viz. from 43° to 416°. The western tribes are the Yank-
tons, Yanktoanas, and the Tetons. It is believed that the
whole Sioux nation amounts to about 20,000 souls. The
Assiniboins, or Stone Indians, are a detached body of the
Sioux who live on the Red River of Lake Winnipeg. The
Shyennes have also been taken for Sioux; but it is re-
ported that they have a peculiar language.*

The Sioux are a people of singular and interesting
character, and they preserve the original habits of the
North American aborigines much more than the eastern
races. Carver, who travelled in their country 100 years
ago, drew a lively picture of their manners. The mis-
sionary Heckewelder supposed their language to be dis-
tantly allied to the Iroquois; but in this he is not sup-
ported by later writers. “ The Dahcotas,” says Professor
Keating, who travelled in their country some years since,
“ are a large and powerful nation of Indians, and distinct
in their manners, language, habits, and opinions from the
Chippeways, Sauks, Foxes, and Nahiawah, or Kilisteno,
as well as from all other nations of the Algonquin stock.
They are likewise unlike the Pawnees and the Minitaris,
or Gros Ventres.” Major Pike says, “ Their guttural
pronunciation, high cheek-bones, thin visages, and distinct
manners, together with their own traditions, supported by
the testimony of neighbouring nations, put it, in my mind,
beyond the shadow of a doubt that they have emigrated
from the north-west point of America, to which they had
come across the narrow straits which in that quarter divide
the two continents, and are absolutely descendants of a
Tartar tribe.” Pike, however, must have been mistaken
in one respect; for we are assured by Professor Keating
that the Dahcotas have no tradition of ever having emi-
grated from any other place : they believe that they were

 

* The Sbyenne vocabulary, communicated by Lieut. J. W. Abert, shows
that they are Algonquins; which was also stated by Dr. Latham at the
meeting of the British Association held at Oxford in 18417, from a com-
parison of the numerals. See his “Varieties of Man,” I). 331.—En.

a CH. xxvm.] SIOUX RACES. 541

§created by the Supreme Being upon the lands which they
i at present occupyﬁ“
‘ 3. The third branch of this family of nations are the
lMinetari; their language is of the same stock, though
i remotely connected with the Dahcota.
f‘ Among the Minetari nation are included three tribes,—
lthe Mandans, a small tribe, the stationary 'Minetari, and
f the tribe called Crow Indians. The proof that these three
: are of one kindred, and that allied to the race of Sioux, is
rto be found in the afﬁnity of their languages, of which
ifull evidence has been adduced by Mr. Gallatin. The
‘ moral and physical history of these several tribes presents
some most curious traits. The Mandans, being of lighter
complexion than their neighbours, are supposed by many
to have given rise to the story of Welsh Indians in North
America. They have among them a singular tradition as
to their origin: they say that they came from under
ground by means of a great vine, which, breaking under
the weight of some of them, has left behind a part of their
nation, whom they expect to join after death. Of the
Mandans and Minetaris, we have some striking and
remarkable details in the graphic description of Mr.
Catlin.

4. The fourth division of the Sioux race comprehends
several nations spread through the southern parts of the
great Missourian valley, and inhabiting the banks of rivers
which ﬂow into its channel. They are the Osages, or
Wausashe, on the river Osage, the Kansas, the Ioways,
the Missouris, the Ottoes, the Omahaws, or Mahaws, and
the Puncas. The afﬁnity of these nations to the Sioux

 

’1‘ There is a good and extensive grammar and dictionary of the Dahcota
language edited by the Rev. S. R. Riggs, and printed at Washington in
1852. It constitutes the 4th volume of the Smithsonian “ Contributions
to Knowledge.” It contains a catalogue of printed books in this language,
mostly portions of Scripture, catechisms, hymns, and religious tracts. The
Book of Genesis, and almost all the New Testament, is included among
these publications. The learned Conon von der Gabelentz also published
a small Dahcota Grammar at Leipzig in 1852.—ED.

542 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

has long been known.* The Osages consider themselves
as indigenous; but the tradition of the last ﬁve tribes is
that they came from the north together with the Sioux
Winibagoes, who remained near Lake Michigan, while
they proceeded further south.

The Pawnees, of whom there are two nations, the
Pawnees proper and the Ricaras, or Black Pawnees, settled
at the ground on the river Platte, to the westward of the
Ottoes. They have a distinct language from all others in
America; unless, as Mr. Gallatin observes, it' should ”be
found that the Panis of the Red River have a kindred
dialect.

0f the Physical and Moral Character of the Stem: and
other Nations on the Msseari.

We are informed by Mr. Gallatin that the only agri- ‘
cultural tribes to the westward of the Mississippi are the
Sauks and Foxes of the Algonquin race, to the northward
of the Red River the Pawnees, and among the nations of
the Sioux family, only those which belong to the southern
group, besides the Mandans and the Stationary Mine-
taris. “ The six western tribes of the Dahcotas, the
Assiniboins, the Crows, and all the other tribes not yet
enumerated, whether east or west of the Rocky Mountains,
cultivate nothing whatever, and those east of the Rocky
Mountains subsist principally on the meat of the buffalo.
But whether erratic or agricultural, there is a marked
difference between the habits and character of all the
Indians who dwell amidst the dense forest which extends
from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, and those of the
inhabitants of the western prairie. These are every where
less ferocious than those on the eastern side of the Missis-
sippi. Like all savages, they put to death the prisoners
taken in battle; but the horrid practice of inﬂicting on
them the most excruciating torture for days together, does
not appear to have prevailed any Where beyond the Missis-

 

* Pike’s “Exploratory Travels,” p. 172.

1 CH. xxv1I1.] SIOUX NATIONS. 543

sippi. These observations seem, however, to apply more
forcibly to the southern cultivating tribes of the Sioux
family and to the Pawnees. Dr. Say, during his residence
‘ among the Omahaws, collected some important facts, which
are equally applicable to their neighbours on the south of
. the Missouri, of either of those two families.
. “ They reside 1n thei1 villages at most ﬁve months of
l the year, principally for the purpose of planting, cultivat-
: ing, and gathering maize, and few other vegetables. Two
winter months are employed by the men in hunting beaver
and other fur animals. During the rest of the year the
‘r whole population remove to the buffalo-grounds, subsist on
its meat, and preserve a portion of it.
“They address prayers to W'alzconda, the Creator and
, Preserver of the world, to whom they ascribe inﬁnite power
and omnipresence. But, although they believe in a future
‘life, it cannot be said that this vague belief has any im-
portant inﬂuence over their conduct. Like all the other
Indians, they put more faith in their dreams, omens, and
jugg lers, in the power of imaginary deities of their own
creation, and of those consecrated relics to which the
Canadians have given the singular appellation of medicine.”
The Missouri Indians of the male sex exceed 1n height
the ordinary average of the Europeans, but the women
are in proportion shorter and thicke1. The average facial
angle 1s 78°, that of the Cherokees being 75° ,the transverse
line of dii ection of the eyes is rectilinear; the nose aquiline;
the lips thicker than those of the Euiopeans; the cheek-
bones prominent, but not angula1. The 1ecently born
infants are of a reddish brown colour, which after a while
becomes whiter, and then gradually assumes that tint,
which is not perfectly uniform amongst all the Indians,
and which, for want of a bette1 approximation, we call
copper- c-olour. They designate that of the Europeans by
words which mean white or pale. Theirs is not the effect
of exposure, as all parts of the body present the same
appearance. The women marry very young, bear children

 

5441 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

from the age of thirteen to forty, and have generally from
four to six.

The Mandans are a branch of the same stock as the
Dahcotas; but there is much difference between these
nations with respect to their physical characters. The fol-
lowing is Mr. Catlin’s account of the last-mentioned tribe
of the Sioux family of nations, whom he takes for the de-
scendants of Prince Madoc’s Welsh Army. The account of
their physical characters is very remarkable. They differ
considerably from those of the Sioux and other tribes of
the same race, and display some of the most singular varia-
tions of colour that are to be found among the American
nations. Mr. Catlin says, “ In the Mandan village a
stranger is struck at once by the different shades of com-
plexion and various colours of hair which he sees around
about him, and is at once almost disposed to exclaim, ‘ that
these are not Indians.’

“There are a great many of these people whose com-
plexions appear as light as half-breeds; and amongst the
women particularly there are many whose skins are almost
White, with the most pleasing symmetry and proportion of
features; with hazel, with grey, and with blue eyes ; with
mildness and sweetness of expression, and excessive modesty
of demeanour,, which render them exceedingly pleasing and
beautiful.

“ Why this diversity of complexion I cannot tell, nor can
they themselves account for it; their traditions, so far as
I have learned them, afford us no information of their
having had any knowledge of white men before the visit of
Lewis and Clarke, made to their village thirty-three years
ago. Since that time there have been but very few visits
from white men to this place, and surely not enough to
have changed the complexions and customs of a nation.
And I recollect perfectly well that Governor Clarke told
me, before I started from this place, that I would ﬁnd the
Mandans a strange people and half white.

“ The diversity in the colour of hair is also equally as

9

 

on. XXVIII.] BLACK-FEET. 547

i" beyond the Rocky Mountains. I learned, however, from
r repeated inquiries, that no such custom is practised among

them; but their heads, such as they are, are the results of
a national growth, and therefore may well be offered as
the basis of a national character.”

Mr. Catlin has likewise described the Osages, Konzas,
Mahas, and Ottoes, whom he recognised as constituting
one nation. The annexed portrait of a Konza warrior,
Meach-o-shin-gaw, or “ The Little White Bear,” Plate 52,
was engraved from Mr. Catlin’s original painting. The
broad and square conformation of countenance is exempli-
ﬁed bythe portrait of Wah-ro-nee-sah, or “The Surrounder,”

3 an Ottoe warrior, likewise painted by Mr. Catlin. Plate 53.

2. Tribes on the Sides of the Rocky Mountains :
Blackfeet.

In the country lying to the westward of the Minetaris,
and between that people and the Rocky Mountains, traversed
by the southern branch of the Saskatchawan river, which
descends from that chain towards Lake Winnipeg, and by
the upper channel of the Missouri and Yellow-Stone rivers,
are the buffalo-plains, inhabited by two Indian nations of
distinct language, the Black-feet, and the Rapid or Fall
Indians. The Black-feet are a very powerful and numerous
people ; they are estimated at 30,000 souls.*

Mr. Catlin says that the Black-feet are one of the most

 

* Mr. Gallatin has had the kindness to communicate to me vocabularies
of the languages of the Black-feet Indians, of the Crows or Upsarokas,
,and of the Grros Ventres, or Rapid or Fall Indians, who call themselves
'Ahnenin. These vocabularies are in manuscript; they were collected since
the publication of Mr. Gallatin’s work by M r. Mackenzie, a very intelli-
gent man, who resides at the juncture of the Yellow-Stone and the
.Missouri rivers, as principal agent of the St. Louis American Fur Com-
pany, and who trades principally with these three nations. They appear
to belong to three distinct families; but the Crows speak a dialect
decidedly cognate to that of the Sedentary Minetaris and Mandans,
conﬁrming the opinion of Mr. Gallatin, that this tribe belongs to the
great Sioux family.

548 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK IL

numerous tribes. They occupy the whole country above
the sources of the Missouri, from the mouth of the Yellow-
Stone river to the Rocky Mountains. They are ﬁerce and
warlike, and carry war amongst their enemies in every
part of the Rocky Mountains. The Black-feet proper are
divided into four bands, or families, as follows :——The
Pa-e-guns of 500 lodges ; the Black-foot Band, of 450
lodges ; the Blood Band, of 450 lodges; and the Small
Rover, of 250 lodges. These four bands, constituting
about 2500 lodges, averaging more than ten to the lodge,
amount to about 30,000 souls.*

The Shoshonees, or Snake Indians, in the high tracts
on both sides of the Cordillera of North America, are in
perpetual warfare with the Black-feet, who prevent them
from hunting in the buffalo-grounds. They are described
by Lewis and Clarke as remarkable for lean and squat
bodies and high cheek-bones. [Some of the Shoshonees
have horses and ﬁre-arms, and derive their subsistence from
the chase and from ﬁsh. Others, to the north, have no
horses, are armed with bows only, and live on acorns and
roots ; these the hunters call Diggers, and consider the
most miserable of the Indiansj]L

Farther southward, on the Arkansas and the Platte, are
the Paducas, consisting of several nations, viz. the Ietans,
termed by the Spaniards Cumanches,1 and the Kiawas and .

* Gallatin, “ Archzeologia Americana,” p. 133. According to Hale, the
numbers and power of these tribes are very much diminished. He says, p.
220, “A few years since, the number and warlike spirit of the Black-foot tribes .
made them the terror of all the western Indians on both sides of the moun- 4
tains. They were reckoned at not less than thirty thousand souls, and it ;
was not uncommon to hear of thirty or forty war-parties out at once against ‘;
the Flathead [Salish], the Upsarokas [or Crows], the Shoshonees, and the a
Northern Crees. But in the year 1836 the small-pox carried off two-thirds :
of their whole number, and at present they count not more than ﬁfteen J
hundred tents, or about ten thousand people. Their enemies are now re- -
covering their spirits, and retaliating upon the weakened tribes the ravages t
which they formerly committed.”—ED.

1" Hale, page 219.
I The Cumanches are called in their own language Na-uni; signifying ;

 

CH. XXVIII.] » PADUCAS z—APACHEs. 549

Utahs, who, according to Pike, speak the language of the
Paducas. These three tribes form one nation of consider-
able extent. The name of Paducas belongs to the whole
\ race; it is the term given them by their neighbours the
Pawnees.

Their chief positions are indicated by Pike. The
Kiawas wander about the sources of the river Platte;
., they possess immense herds of horses, and are at war with
the Pawnees and Ietans, as well as with the Sioux. The
Utahs wander on the sources of the Rio del Norte. The
Ietans are a powerful nation, entirely erratic, without any
attempt at cultivation, subsisting solely by the chase.
Their wanderings are conﬁned to the frontiers of New
Mexico on the west, the nations of the lower Red River
on the south, the Pawnees and Osages on the east, and
the Utahs, Kiawas, and various unknown nations, towards
the north. Pike says, “ the Utahs and Kyaways reside in
the mountains of North America, and the Ietans on the _
borders of the Upper Red River, Arkansas, and Rio del
Norte.”*

The Apaches are a nation of Indians who extend from
the Black Mountains of New Mexico to the borders of
Cogquilla, keeping the frontiers of three provinces in a
continual state of alarm. They formerly extended from
- the entrance of the Rio Grande to the Gulf of California.
The Nanahaws are situated to the north-west of Santa Fé;
they are supposed to be 2000 warriors strong. “ This
nation,” adds Pike, “ as well as all the others to the west
of them, bordering on California, speak the languages of
the Apaches and Lee Panis, who are in a line with them
to the Atlantic.”

From the name of this last nation, Lee Panis, Vater
conjectures them to be related to the Pawnees; but this
does not appear to have been Pike’s opinion.

 

 

“live people.” Schoolcraft says their language is cognate with that of the
Shoshoni group. See Indian Tribes, vol. ii. p. 126 and 134:.
* “ Exploratory Travels,” pp. 214 and 194:.

550 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

The natives of the high regions on the sides of the Rocky
Mountains, like the people of elevated countries in the
Old Continent, have a lighter complexion than those of
the low plains. Mr. James declares that the Kiawa and
Kaskaia Indians have often, during early youth, hair of a
much lighter colour than that of the nations on the Mis-
souri. He says, “ A young man, of perhaps ﬁfteen years
of age, Who visited us to-day, had hair decidedly of a ﬁaxen
hue, with a tint of dusky yellow.”*

It appears that a deviation of a similar kind from the
more common complexion of the American nations, exists
in the race of the Apaches, who have been mentioned in
the last chapter as OCCupying the mountainous regions of
Northern and New Mexico. To this kindred belong the
Lee Panis, who, according to Pike, roved from the Rio
Grande to some distance into the province of Texas.
“ Their former residence,” he says, “ was in the Rio
Grande, on the sea shore.” The mountainous region ap-
proaches near to the coast. “ The Lee Panis,” adds the
same traveller, “ are divided into three bands ; they have
fair hair, and are generally handsome; they are armed
with bows, arrows, and lances.”

In the northern districts of the great chain of Rocky
Mountains which were visited by Sir Alexander Mackenzie,
there are several nations of unknown language and origin.
The Atnaht nation is one of them. Their dialect appears,
from the short vocabulary given by that traveller, to be
one of these languages which, in the frequent recurrence of ‘
peculiar consonants, bears a certain resemblance to the
Mexican. Some of the tribes which were found on the
heights, and on the western borders of the great mountain-
chain, recede considerably in their physical character from
the general traits of the North American aborigines. A

 

* Keating, vol. iii. p. 417.
”i” This tribe must not be confounded with the Shushwaps, to Whom the a
name of Atnah is given by their northern neighbours, the Tahkali. The 4
Shushwaps belong to the next chapter—ED.

CH. XXIX.] WESTERN AMERICANS. 551

/ peOple, whom Mackenzie terms Rocky Mountains Indians,
- are said to have a complexion of a swarthy yellow. The
natives of Friendly Village to the westward have round
faces, with round cheek-bones, and a complexion between
the olive and copper colour. They have small grey eyes
with a tinge of red and hair of a dark brown colour in-
clining to black. They are a distinct people. Another
tribe nearer to the mountains is described in similar terms.
“ The colour of their hair is grey, with a tinge of red ;
. they have all high cheek-bones, more remarkably the
women.” There are considerable deviations from the sup-
posed uniformity in the physical characters of the American
aborigines. The varieties of colour tending towards a lighter
tint in the hair, eyes, and skin, in the elevated region, are
phenomena similar to those which appear in other divisions
of mankind. The hair is brown in these nations.

CHAPTER XXIX.

on THE NATIVE AMERICAN RACES ON THE COAST or THE
PACIFIC OCEAN. 1. BLACK TRIBES OF CALIFORNIA. 2.
TRIBES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 3. WHITE RACE OF
THE NORTHERN COAST.

THE American coast which borders on the Paciﬁc, traced
from Mexico northwards to the land of the Esquimaux,
is divided into two nearly equal parts by the channel
of the Columbia river. That river is the only great Stream
that is known to take its rise in the Rocky Mountains, or
Cordillera of North America, and discharges its waters into
the Paciﬁc. It ﬂows through the whole western lowland,
the region intercepted between the Rocky Mountains and the
sea. The breadth of that lower region varies : in the 35°
and 40° north latitude, it is supposed to be about 900 miles
wide ; the inland part of it, lying nearer to the foot of the
Rocky Mountains, is separated from the narrow . stripe

552 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II'.

which runs along the coast by a long chain of inferior ‘
mountains. These inferior hills appear to take their rise
to the northward from the cluster of hills named Mount St.
Elias, which may be seen marked on all late maps near the
Paciﬁc in latitude 60°. Thence they take their course
about 100 miles from the sea, and pass southwards in a
line almost parallel to the coast : from these hills all the
rivers take their rise which fall into the Paciﬁc between the
above limits, with the exception of the Columbia, a greater
stream, which comes, as I have said, from the Rocky
Mountains. The maritime country, to the westward of the
lower chain, is inhabited by people who differ from the
tribes in the interior;

In the present chapter I shall brieﬂy survey the natives
of the coast from Mount St. Elias southwards, including
the Californian nations. They may be divided into three
sections : 1. Tribes inhabiting the peninsula, or projecting
land, of California, and a part of the coast farther north-
ward termed New California. 2. Tribes on the coast of ‘
Nootka Sound, and the adjacent islands, and the shores
of the Columbia River, who have lately been designated as
the Nootka—Columbian race. 3. Races of the northern
coast who reach from Vancouver’s Island northward as far ‘
as Mount St. Elias, and the countries of the Esquimaux.

1. Caly’ornian Nations, including theTm'bes of New
California.
< We are assured by a late writer that there are fre- .
jquently in the Spanish mission of California not less than .
/ ten different races of native people, each speaking a peculiar f
nguage.ale But the most correct accounts we have of this I

 

* Kotzebue’s “Voyage to California.” Remarks by the naturalist of "1
the Expedition, vol. ii. page 51.-—DR. PRICHARD.

It would appear from the observations of Hale (p. 223), that this coast :
exceeds the Caucasus in the number of its languages. “ It is a remarkable :
fact,” he says, “ that while the interior of the country west of the Rocky 1
Mountains is occupied by a few extensive families, the whole coast, from the <
neighbourhood of Behring’s Straits to Cape St. Lucas, is lined with a I

on. xx1x.] CALIFORNIAN NATIONS. 553

country, drawn from the information of missionaries who
have resided among the natives, reduce their languages to
four, and ultimately to three, which are the mother tongues
of all the remainder.'* These are the Cochimi, Pericu,
and Loretto languages; the former is the same as the
Laymon, for the Laymones are the northern Cochimies;
the Loretto has two dialects, that of the Guaycuru and the
Uchiti ; the three nations and languages are nearly equal in
extent in California. A long list of barbarous names, the de-
signations of peculiar tribes, may be found in the histories
of this country, which it would be useless to extract.

The climate of California is hot and dry to an excessive
degree : the earth is barren, abounding in rocky and sandy
districts, and deﬁcient in water. The circumstances of the
climate are, in short, in every respect, opposite to those of
the north-western tracts, which abound in hills, covered
with snow and with verdant forests. It was long ago well
known that the Californians are of much deeper hue than
the natives of America in general. La Pérouse compares
them to the Negroes in the West Indies.* He says, “ The
colour of these Indians, which is the same as that of
Negroes, a variety of circumstances, and, indeed, every
thing that we observed, presented the appearance of a
plantation in the island of St. Domingo.” In another
passage the same writer expresses himself more positively
and minutely. He says, “ The complexion of the Cali-
fornians very nearly resembles that of those Negroes
whose hair is not woolly: the hair of this nation is long

 

multitude of small tribes, speaking distinct idioms. A few of these ......
are allied to the families of the interior, but the greater number are entirely
unconnected with these and with one another. In Oregon. . . . the variety
of idioms has been found to be much greater than was anticipated; probably
no other part of the world offers an example of so many tribes with
distinct languages, crowded together within a space so limited.”—ED.

9* “ A National and Civil History of California,” by Father Miguel
Venegas. Translated. London, 1759. Vol. I. —— Also Mithridates,
part iv. p. 183.

i” “ Voyage de La Pérouse auteur de Monde.”

554., NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

and very strong, and they cut it four or ﬁve inches from
the root.” (Plate 54.)

M. Rollin, a naturalist and an able writer, who accom-
panied La Pérouse, says, “ that the Californians have little
resemblance to the natives of Chili; they are taller, and
their muscles are more strongly marked ; but they are not so
courageous or intelligent. They have low foreheads, black
and thick eye-brows, black and hollow eyes, a short nose
depressed at the root, and projecting cheek-bones ; they
have rather large mouths, thick lips, strong and ﬁne teeth,
and a chin and ears of the common form. They are very
indolent, incurious, and almost stupid. In walking they
turn in their toes, and their step is tottering and inﬁrm.”
The Californians have their chins more covered with hair
than the Chilians.

It seems, from this description, that colour is not the
only circumstance in which the Californians make an ap-
proximation to the characters of person prevalent in some
other tropical countries; as among the Negroes of Guinea,
New Guinea, and the New Hebrides. The shape of their
heads and features may be compared with those of the
nations last mentioned. [A similar account is given in the
narrative of the American Exploring Expedition. “ The
natives of this class are chieﬂy distinguished by their dark
colour. Those of Northern or Upper California are a shade
browner than the Oregon Indians, while some tribes in the
peninsula are said to be nearly black. In other respects
they have the physiognomy of their race,——broad faces, a
low forehead, and long, coarse hair. They are the lowest in
intellect of all the North American tribes, approaching
to the stupidity (P) of the Australians. They are dull,
indolent, phlegmatic, timid, and of a gentle submissive
temper.”~—Vol. vi. p. 199].

To the northward of California the coast is termed New
California. In the countries here claimed of old by the :
Spaniards, the indigenous inhabitants are little known.
M. Choris has given some representations and portraits of ‘

CH. XXIx.] NEW CALIFORNIAN RACE. 555

the natives of Port San Francisco within this region. They
‘ appear to be a ﬁne race of people, and to resemble in their
? complexion, which is very dark, the proper Californians.
‘ The portraits ofCalifornians engraved for this work, as well
as the ﬁgures of natives of Port San Francisco, are taken
from Choris’s “Voyage Pittoresque.” (Plate 55.)

[The personal narrative of Mr. J. R. Bartlett,’* who
conducted the United States and Mexican Boundary Com- 3
mission a few years ago, contains incidental notices of
several of these Californian tribes, which have hitherto
been described chieﬂy from the accounts, evidently exag-
gerated, brought by chance travellers on their way to the
Gold-diggings. The industrious habits of these tribes,
their agriculture, their domestic manufactures, their ﬁxed
habitations congregated in villages of considerable size,
together with their courage, pleasing manners, and intel-
ligence, all concur to make them the most interesting of
the aboriginal populations of America. Their social condi-
tion appears to be not much unlike that of the Mexicans at
the epoch of the Spanish conquest ; certainly not so high
in its actual degree, but of a similar kind. The remains of
large well-built stone ediﬁces, called locally Casas Grandes,
well-deﬁned traces of canals for irrigation, and immense
remains of very ﬁne old pottery, show that the people have ,
'1 suffered a declension from a higher position in civilization, g,
such as probablywill always accompany a state of separationt
from the masses of humanity who constitute the civilised \
world; and, in the case under consideration, the inroads /
of surrounding tribes of more warlike character and far
inferior cultivation must have tended to the same melan- \
choly result; and this is a cause of deterioration still visibly )

l

 

9“ Personal Narrative of Explorations and Incidents in Texas, New
Mexico, California, Sonora, and Chihuahua, connected with the United
States and Mexican Boundary Commission during the years 1850, 51, 52,
and 53. By John Russell Bartlett, United States Commissioner during
that period. 2 vols. 8m. New York, 1854. I

556 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

in Operation, and unhappily not likely to be diminished by
the now constant access of an European and American
population, confessedly hostile to the aborigines everywhere.
The locality of these semi-civilised tribes may be roughly
stated as extending from 27° to 37° of North latitude, in
a line running SE. to NW., including the province of
Sonora on the eastern shore of the Gulf of California, the
valleys of the Colorado and Gila rivers which fall into the
Gulf in a united stream, and the country between the C010-
rado and the Paciﬁc. The Pimos and the Coco-Maricopas,*
who live together on the Gila, with whom Mr. Bartlett
was in constant intercourse for nearly a fortnight,—two
tribes so like each other that he was for some time unable
to distinguish between them,——may be described here as
typical of the whole familyﬂr The languages of these united
tribes, to which we shall add brief notices of the most im-
portant of the others, are different, that of the Pimos being
soft and melodious, while the Coco-Maricopa is harsh and
guttural: the only other distinction is, that the Pimos
bury their dead, while the Coco-Maricopas burn theirs.
The tribes live together without any division between their
villages. Mr. Bartlett believes that the civilisation of the
Coco-Maricopas is derived from that of the Pimos, following
in this the observations of Major Emory (p. 132), who
compared their condition with what it was when seen by
his guide, Carson, in 1826.

The Pimos and Coco-Maricopas are of clear-brown com-
' pleXion, different from the red-skins east of the Rocky
Mountains, and from the olive colour of the South Cali-
fornians. The women have good ﬁgures, full chests, and
ﬁnely formed limbs ; owing, in a great measure, to their
erect carriage under the burdens they are in the habit of

 

* The “ Notes of a Military Reconnaissance from Fort Leavenworth in
Missouri, to Van Diego in California,” 850., by Major W. H. Emory,
printed at Washington in 1848, contains some good incidental notices of
the Pimos and Coco-Maricopas.

1‘ Collected from Chapters 30, 31, and 32 of his Personal Narrative.

.CH. XXIX.] PIMOS AND COCO-MARICOPAS. 557

conveying on their heads: many of them are models of
beauty. The men have small and slender limbs, and are
physically quite inferior to the tribes between the Mississippi
and the Rocky Mountains ; “ readily accounted for by their
different modes of life.” The dress of both sexes is chieﬂy
a sort of blanket or cloth, which the women wrap round
their loins, letting it fall to the knees, while with the men
it is the mere body-cloth common to many of the aboriginal
tribes. The women sometimes fasten their cloth with a
belt, which is manufactured by themselves in handsome
patterns, consisting of a variety of ﬁgures in brilliant red,
blue, and buff wools on a white ground, like the ancient
pottery found so extensively over their country, though
more commonly they keep it in place by merely tucking
in one end. The women wear nothing on the head, nor
‘ FIG. 90.

    

    

7 " , 3‘1?
wifhtlf

\| \t' 1/; A” v i;
h mm W
A,» , ’7, ,

I/
, \‘// I , \ '
W}, “(QMWM

‘/
”£1 r'. /’/"'7,/,

 

' n . t’ I“
l, l/vw/w/A 1 w'
u

 
 
    
   
 

Pimo Man and Woman.
do they tie up their hair, but let it hang loosely over the
back and shoulders as a protection from the sun, merely
cutting it over the eyebrows in front. The men have a
head-band like the belt just mentioned, which they twine
‘ gracefully round the head in several folds, allowing the

558 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

braided ends to hang down to their shoulders. They have
also a woollen cord of different colours, nearly an inch in
diameter, which they use as a hair-ornament. Their hair
when loose hangs down to their knees, but they usually
club it in a large mass on their backs.

Their houses are built of stakes and rushes; they are
of a circular form, from ﬁfteen to twenty-ﬁve feet in dia-
meter, and from ﬁve to seven feet high, so that in some
of them a man cannot stand upright: they are in fact used
chieﬂy to sit and sleep in : the doorway is about three feet
high; many of them are plastered all over with mud. They
have outside a kind of shed, or bower, a mere roof open
on all sides, where they pass most of their time. The
villages consist of from twenty to ﬁfty houses, surrounded
by gardens or cultivated ﬁelds, which are intersected by
small canals of irrigation, leading water from the Gila:
these ﬁelds are fenced in with crooked stakes, wattled with
prickly brushwood.

FIG. 91. FIG. 92. FIG. 93.

 

They possess considerable numbers of horses and cattle,
which are left to graze near the village during the day,
and at night are brought into the corrals, or yards, for
safety. Some of them have recently obtained a few carts
and waggons from passing emigrants, which they use
with oxen for agricultural purposes : they occasionally
plough with oxen, but more commonly they turn up the
ground with hoes. Their agriculture is more systematically
pursued than by other tribes ; their lands are better irri-
gated, their crops are larger, and the ﬂour they make from
their wheat and maize is quite as good as the Mexicans
make, except in their grist-mills, their own means of grinding

 

CH. XXIX] PIMOS AND COCO-MARICOPAS. 559

being limited, by the account of Major Emory (p. 133), to
a large stone slightly concave, surmounted by another
slightly convex, intended to ﬁt into it; the corn placed
between the two is crushed by the pressure of the hand.
Similar implements are found among the ancient ruins
before mentioned, called the Casas Grandes. The cotton
raised by them is excellent; specimens carried home by
Mr. Bartlett were pronounced by the merchants to be
equal to the best Sea-Island cotton.

The machinery for spinning and weaving their cotton
is of a very primitive order. The spinner uses a spindle
of thin wood, two feet in length, passing through a block
of thicker dimensions, like a child’s teetotum, but of larger
size, which is twirled round with one end resting in a
wooden cup held between the toes of the workman. The
supply of cotton is rolled upon the left arm, from which it
is drawn out by the left hand, and conducted to the spindle
which is twirled round by the right hand. The loom for
weaving is still ruder: the threads of the warp are rolled
upon two sticks, and stretched on the ground by means of
upright stakes; and the alternate threads are lifted by a
piece of cane to afford passage to the shuttle, which is
nothing more than a pointed stick with the thread wound
round it. The action of the reed of our looms is produced
by a smooth sharp-edged ruler of hard wood, which is
inserted after the passage of each thread, to beat it up close.
This is but slow work, but the implement is not much ruder
than that with which much of the ﬁne Indian muslin was
made by the natives of India at no very distant period.
The weaving is generally done by the old men, who sit in
the manner of our tailors.

The pottery is all red or dark brown, the latter colour
made by a mixture of black and red. The articles manu-
factured are identical with those made and used by the
Mexicans; consisting of vases of different sizes, the largest
holding two pailfulls, the smallest half a pint; jars With
small mouths, resembling bottles ; basins of all shapes

._\

J

560 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K 11-.

and dimensions from a milk-pan to a saucer, and oblong
vessels of small size, used as dippers. ﬁzA‘ll these vessels are
painted or ornamented with black lines forming geometrical
ﬁgures, showing much taste, of a character resembling
those on the head-bands.

The basket-work is remarkably well made of willow twigs,
so closely woven as to hold water ; it is ornamented with
geometrical ﬁgures in the same colours and patterns as the
pottery. The baskets are of various sizes and shapes: they
are most frequently made of a form like basins, and are
carried on the head ﬁlled with corn or other articles.

    
    
     

      

FIG. 94..
x. 3,9“ 3. {31 // 33/ 3 , MK.
\ 3 t. . ‘\\\\\h‘3\33 “3333/

373. 3

The moral character of these races is decidedly good; no

* tribes of the whole continent excel them in virtue and
y? _, honesty. Bartlett assures us that, although from the ﬁrst

day of his arrival among them they thronged the American .
camp day and night, he is not aware that they ever took
an article that did not belong to them ; and the same tes- j
timony is borne by Major Emory (pp. 84:, 85). They were
perfectly docile and inoffensive in their intercourse with
the whites, fond of peace, and disliking war ; though they
do not hesitate to march against the ferocious Apaches 3%

 

\

‘XIX.] NEW CALIFORNIAN RACE. 561

  

‘ years old hitting a little piece of coin three times out 01

: ﬁve at a distance of ﬁfteen yards. It is a not uncommon
contradiction in their character that theydelight in torturing
their prisoners taken in war, equally with the Apaches.

Their ideas of a Supreme Being and future state are
vague; their souls after death are supposed to return to,“

, the banks of the Colorado where their ancestors lived, and

there to be changed into the forms of various animals ;1\\
their enemies, the Yumas, will also be found there, and, i
like the Northmen, they believe that the same wars will be ,
continued between them after death as during life. They 1‘
marry only one wife, and always with the consent of the
lady, whose good graces are romantically sought by means
of music, the suitor playing his ﬂute in some retired spot J
near her but daily for some hours, until she makes known
her assent, or he is wearied out by want of success. The
wife is well treated, although she has the greater share of .
hard work, being employed in the domestic labours of ,
grinding corn and fetching water, besides making baskets
and taking care of the children, while the husbands do
little more than plant and gather the crops and attend to _
their cattle, which leaves much idle time on their hands.
These labours, especially the carrying of water in vessels
on their heads, tend to develope the forms of the women,
and add greatly to their general beauty, while the men
are slender and less muscular.

The number of the Pimos and Coco-Maricopas is sup-
posed by Emory to be decidedly above 3000; but Bartlett,
with better means of information, would hardly place
them above 2000.

The Yumas, who are also called Cuchans, live on the
Colorado near where the Gila joins it, 200 miles westward
of the Pimos; they speak a language intelligible to the
Coco-Maricopas, though often engaged in deadly warfare
with them. They differ from the people above described

0 o

562 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. ,. [BOOK II. .

by being very much attached to warlike pursuits, though .
they cultivate maize extensively, and raise some patches of ‘:
melons and squashes. The journal of Lieut. Whipple, an .
ofﬁcer of the Expedition who had much intercourse with
the Yumas, describes them as large, muscular, and well- .
formed, with pleasing and intellectual countenances: he :
says, “they are exquisite horsemen, and carry their bow '
and lance with inimitable grace.”*

The Opates are the ﬁrst large tribe to the south, in lat.
30° and long. 110% W. They live in villages, are quiet ;
and well-disposed, but also noted for their bravery, being ‘
the only tribe who can successfullyresistthe savage Apaches.
Their chief is in the pay of the government, and always .
ready to fall upon the common enemy; they have been
often called out, and on each occasion are said to have :
performed extraordinary acts of valour, one man success-
fully contending with eight or ten Apaches. The chief ‘1
was “ full six feet high and well-proportioned, with a light
complexion for an Indian; large piercing eyes, prominent .
and high cheek-bones, and a most determined expression .
of countenance.” “ His wife, who always accompanied.
him, was quite small, with a delicate complexion for an .
Indian, though strongly marked with the characteristics 2
of her race.” The artist of the expedition took their por- .
traits, and Mr. Bartlett obtained a full vocabulary of their ‘
language.t

The Yaquis, a little further south, were among the ﬁrst ;
converts 0f the Jesuits. They are invariably honest, .
faithful and industrious, and “ ﬁll the same place, and
perform the same duties, as the lower class of Irish do in .
the United States”: They wear no dress but a bit of ':
cloth round the loins, while the Opates are now never‘
without “ a clean white shirt and pantaloons.”

 

* See Lieutenant Whipple’s Journal, in Vol. ii. p. 110 of Schoolcraft’s ;
“ Indian Tribes.”

1” Bartlett, Vol. i. p. 446.

I Ibid.‘ p. 442.

CH. XXIX.] ZUNIS : MOQUIS. 563

Of the tribes north of the Pimos little has been seen.
The Mohavis in lat. 341° “ are said to be a ﬁne athletic
people, exceedingly warlike, and superior to the other tribes
on the river.”‘*

To the NE on the Little Colorado, about lat. 35°, are
the Zunis, not mentioned by Mr. Bartlett. Major Emory,
who calls them Soonees, says, “ They cultivate the soil,
and live in peace with their more numerous and savage
' neighbours.” He adds that most of them are said to be.
Albinos; a very curious statement, which it would be
worth while to inquire into (p. 99). In another place he
says, “ They resemble the Pimos, except that they live in
houses scooped from the solid rock: many of them are
Albinos, which may be in consequence of their cavernous
dwellings” (p. 133).

The most civilised of all this aboriginal family would
seem to be the Moquis ; but we have unfortunately no ac-
count of these from an authoritative source. Mr. Bartlett
says that they are “one of the semi-civilised tribes with
which we have had some intercourse. This people culti-
vate the soil, raise numbers of sheep, live in large villages,
and manufacture a superior blanket both of cotton and
wool.’”r The most detailed notice we have, rests on the
authority of the San Francisco Herald, which quotes the
account of a Captain Walker, who professes to have passed
several days in one of these villages. He places them
north-east of the Zunis, midway between the Little Colorado
and San Juan rivers. His statement informs us that they
live on the top of a table mountain, the sides of which are
almost perpendicular, only to be reached by a steep ﬂight
of steps out in the solid rock. Here they have built three
' large villages, where they sleep; by day they cultivate
the arable land at the foot of their mountain, raising all
kinds of grain, melons, peaches, and vegetables ; and tending
their large ﬂocks of sheep and goats. They are kind and

* Bartlett, Vol. ii. p. 178.
1‘ Ibid. p. 178.

 

564$ NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

hospitable to strangers, but they are timid, and 'oﬁ'er no
resistance to their warlike neighbours the Navajos, who
make periodical incursions on them, sweeping off all their
stock. Their houses are built of stone, many of them two
and even" three stories high, all snug and comfortable.
Captain Walker saw three Albinos among them. The
rest of his account is very similar to what Mr. Bartlett
relates of the Pimos and Coco-lVIaricopasfK

These statements are illustrated by the accounts of
Lieut. J. W. Abert, .who, in 1846, visited the so-called
Christianised tribes dwelling on the Rio del Norte, the
western Rio Puerco, which falls into the Norte about
34° 20’ N. lat., and-the San José, which falls into the
Rio Puerco. On the upper branches of the San J osé, about
3° east of the position assigned to the Moquis, he visited
the “ Indian Cities” seen by Vasquez Coronado in 1541,)L
named Cibolleta, Moquino, Pojuate, Rito, Covero, Acoma,
and Laguna, all Indian towns of 350 to 1000 inhabi-
tants, placed upon lofty terraces with steep sides; the

 

9“ The statements of Captain “Talker are conﬁrmed by Dr. Ten Broeck,
a surgeon in the United States Army, who visited the Moquis in 1852 ;
extracts from his Journal are printed in the 4th volume of Schoolcraft’s
Indian Tribes, which had not reached this country when the above was
written. Dr. Ten Broeck speaks in high terms of the moral qualities of
these Moquis, who are characterised by him as “ a simple, happy, and most
hospitable people.” He mentions a curious fact, that the people of one of
the towns called Harno, “ within 150 yards of the middle town,” speak a
different language among themselves from those of the other towns, all of
whom have the same language; “ the other Moquis say the inhabitants of
this town have a great advantage over them, as they perfectly understand
the common language, and none but the people of Harno understand their '
dialect.” (p. 88).

i” Coronado visited the interior of this country, with 150 European cows
and a large ﬂock of sheep. Schoolcraft is of opinion that the immense
ﬂocks now possessed by these tribes derive their origin from these. See
the Indian Tribes, Vol. ii. p. 309. See also Gallatin’s interesting paper on
the “Ancient Semi-civilisation of New Mexico,” in the Introduction to
the second volume of the “ Transactions of the American Ethnological
Society,” New York, 1848.—ED.

CH. xxrx.] PUEBLO INDIANS. 565

houses comfortable, of two or three stories in height, built
of stone plastered with mud, and accessible generally by
ladders only, which may be drawn up at will. Lieut.
Abert does not usually distinguish his Indians by their
tribal names, but calls them simply Pueblo (or village)
Indians,—a term used by the Spaniards to designate those
of the Aboriginal tribes who have submitted to Spanish
rule ; but the name of Moquino is suggestive of the
Moquis in this case. He has furnished engravings of
some of the towns : of Acoma, the largest, three views are
given, showing the town itself, and its singular and difﬁ-
cult approaches. Some extracts of his notice of this town
and its inhabitants, depicted by him with more minute—
ness than the others, will afford a good notion of all (see
his Report, p. 470, LL71). After describing some huge rocky
masses with horizontal tops and perpendicular sides, which
rise 300 or 400 feet above the plain he was traversing, he
says, “ High on a lofty rock of sandstone, such as I have
described, sits the city of Acoma. On the northern
side of the rock the rude boreal blasts have heaped up the
sand, so as to form a practicable ascent for some distance ;
the rest of the way is through solid rock. At one place, a
singular opening, or narrow way, is formed between a huge
square tower and the perpendicular face of the cliff. Then
the road winds round like a spiral stairway, and the Indians
have, in some way, ﬁxed logs of wood in the rock, radiating
from a vertical axis, like steps; these afford foot-hold to
man and beast in clambering up. We were constantly
meeting and passing Indians, who had their burros (asses)
laden with peaches. At last we reached the t0p of the
rock, which was nearly level, and contains about sixty
acres. Here we saw alarge church and several continuous
blocks of buildings, containing sixty or seventy houses in
each block; the wall at the side that faces outwards was
unbroken, and had no windows until near the top. The
houses were three stories high; in front, each story re-
treated as it ascended, so as to. leave a platform along the

566 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Whole front of the story; these platforms are guarded by
parapet walls about three feet high. In order to gain
admittance, you ascend to the second story by means of
ladders; the next story is gained by the same means, but
to reach the azotea or roof, the partition walls on the plat-
form that separates the quarters of different families have
been formed into steps. This makes quite a narrow stair-
case, as the walls are not more than one foot in width.
Lieutenant Peck and myself ascended to the azoteas, and
saw there great quantities of peaches, that had been cut in
half and spread out to dry in the sun.

“ We entered some of the houses, and the peOple received
us with great gladness ....... Each family occupies
those rooms that are situated vertically over each other;
the lower story is used as a store-room, in which they put
their corn, pumpkins, melons, and other eatables. The
fronts of their houses are covered with festoons of bright
red peppers, and strings of pumpkins and musk-melons,
that have been cut into ropes, and twisted into bunches to
dry for winter use.

“ These people appeared to be well provided with all the
necessaries and luxuries that New Mexico can afford.
They are quiet, and seem to be happy and generous.
....... Whenever we approached, they would cry out
to us, ‘ coma I coma !’~—‘ eat I eat I’ and point to the
peaches. They generally wear the Navajoe blanket, marked
with broad stripes, alternately black and white. Their
pantaloons are very wide and bag-like, but are conﬁned at
the knees by long woollen stockings, and sometimes buck-
skin leggins and moccasins. The women stuff their
leggins with wool, which makes their ankles look like the
legs of an elephant.”

The Lieutenant further says that these people scarcely
know a word of Spanish, but that they have “ a smattering
of the Roman Catholic religion.” In the plain below, they
had “large ﬂocks of sheep, herds of cattle, and droves of
horses,” and in many places they had dug holes to supply

CH. xx1x.] NAVAJOS. 567

themselves and their cattle with water; and in these holes
the water never failed.

It is impossible to read this account without being struck
with the resemblance of the “ Casas Grandes” to the
architecture above described, which extends to the towns
on the banks of the Rio del Norte, and even still further
East. The analogy also to the Aztec towns, as found in
the mountainous districts of Mexico bythe Spanish invaders,
is obvious, and Lieut. Abert cites the account given by
Antonio de Solis of the town of Capistlan [Quiabislan],
which he describes as “ a town strong by nature, seated
on the top of a great rock, difﬁcult of access, the way so
steep that the Spaniards could not use their hands for fear
of their feet slipping.”*

The Navajos are probably to be included among this
family, as industrious manufacturers and cultivators ; they
differ from the other tribes by having no permanent villages,
but roaming over the country between the San Juan and
the Gila. According to the report of Governor Bent,
printed in the ﬁrst volume of Schoolcraft’s “Indian Tribes,”
p. 243-4, they “ raise sufﬁcient grain and fruits of various
kinds for their own consumption. They are the owners of
large ﬂocks and herds of cattle, sheep, horses, mules, and
asses. It is estimated that the tribe possesses 30,000 head
of horned cattle, 500,000 head of sheep, and 10,000 head
of horses, mules, and asses; it is not a rare instance for
one individual to possess 5,000 to 10,000 sheep, and 400 to
500 head of other stock. Their horses and sheep are said
to be greatly superior to those reared by the New Mexicans.
A large portion of their stock has been acquired by maraud-
ing expeditions against the settlements of this territory.
They manufacture excellent coarse blankets, and coarse
woollen goods for wearing apparel.

“ Their numbers are variously estimated at from 1,000 to
2,000 families, or from 7,000 to 141,000 souls. The Nabajos,

* Report of Lieut. J. W. Abert, of his Examination of New Mexico in
the years 1846-47. In papers printed by order of Congress in 1848.

 

568 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11. .

so far as I am informed, are the only Indians on the con-4 -
tinent, having intercourse with white men, that are in-

creasing in numbers. They have in their possession many

prisoners—men, women, and children,—taken from the

settlements of this territory, whom they hold and treat

as slaves.”

Several branches of this interesting aboriginal family
have been noticed by Spanish writers, deriving their in-
formation from the Jesuits and other Catholic missionaries ;
but the accounts have not excited much attention, and
have in fact been suspected of exaggeration, if not in-
vention.*

Until vocabularies of their languages shall be obtained
and carefully examined, it is useless to speculate much on
their past history. Missionaries acquainted with the Aztec
language have testiﬁed to the essential difference between
that tongue and the dialects of these tribesﬁ- and would
thus seem to separate them entirely from the Mexicans ;
but the difﬁculty of estimating the afﬁnities of language is
too great to inspire full conﬁdence without much more
evidence than we possess; while the similarity of archi-
tecture, which is almost as positive a test of afﬁnity of race
as language itself, such as we see it exhibited in the Casas
Grandes, in the early accounts of the Aztecs handed down
by the Spaniards, and in the existing dwellings of the
tribes under consideration, induce a strong inclination to
believe in an ancient connection between them ; possibly,
as suggested by Gallatin, a simple importation of superior
culture among these races by colonists from Mexico, but
more probably, we think, a real afﬁnity of blood. Gallatin
compares these races with the Mexicans, points out the
inferiority of their arts and sciences, but enumerates many
particulars of their social, moral, and even intellectual
superiority over the more renowned race ; and after
- adverting to the almost universally afﬂicting results of his

3“ Schoolcraft’s Indian Tribes, Vol. iii. p. 296, et seq.
‘1‘ Gallatin’s Semi-civilisation of New Mexico, before mentioned, p. lxxxv.

 

l

1‘

CH. XXIX] NORTHWESTERN RACES. 569

inquiries into the state of the aboriginal man of the new

3 world, he concludes with the following words :——“ If I

have dwelt longer on the history of these people than
consisted with the limits of this essay, it is because it has
been almost the only refreshing episode in the course of
my researches.”

2. Tribes of the North-west Coast and the Columbia River.

The latest and the most accurate accounts that we
have obtained of the native tribes of the north-western
coast of America, from the neighbourhood of New Cali-
fornia to Mount St. Elias and the country of the Esqui-
maux Tchugazzi, is from the ethnographical memoir con-
tributed by Professor Scouler to the eleventh volume of
the “ Journal of the Royal Geographical Society.” The
author, who has visited the country, has collected exten-
sive vocabularies of the native languages, which furnish
him with the principal guide for the distribution of the
people into groups; and he has made some important
observations on the apparent connection of their natural
peculiarities with the physical circumstances under which

' the several tribes exist. “ The people of the north-western

coast in general,” as he remarks, “ exhibit characters and
manners which strongly distinguish them from the hunt-
ing races who wander over the plains of the Missouri.
Westerly winds generally prevail on the shores of the
North Paciﬁc, and render the climate extremely moist and
mild: hence the winters are mild in comparison with those
in other corre8ponding regions of America.” At the mouth
of the Columbia river, nearly in the latitude of Quebec,
snow seldom lies upon the ground more than a few hours,
and the natives go about, even in winter, with very slight
clothing. The coasts abound in islands, and are broken up
into numerous inlets ; the natives obtain their food chieﬂy
by ﬁshing, and are become more settled than the hunting
nations. Even the inland tribes of North-west America
are less exclusively hunters than those who live near the

570 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Missouri; and many of them, living on rivers and fresh-
water lakes, obtain great part of their sustenance from the
abundant supply of salmon. “ It is at least in part,” says
Dr. Scouler, “ owing to these peculiarities in their physical
condition that the habits of the Indians of the opposite
sides of the mountains present so remarkable a contrast.”
The coast tribes have made considerable progress in the
rude arts. From their settled life, they are more accus-
tomed to continuous labour, and even show considerable
aptitude for passing into the agricultural state.

We shall ﬁnd that the physical characters, and espe-
cially the complexion of these tribes, differ at least as
much as their moral qualities from those of the inland.
nations of America.

The same writer has given some valuable information:
respecting the tribes of several groups in this region ; but _
his remarks chieﬂy refer to the insular or maritime races. .
These are divided by him into two families,—the northern
and the southern. I shall compare his account of each I
with the observations of some former writers.

1. The northern family consists, of tribes extending;
along the shores of the Paciﬁc, from. the arctic circle andl
the settlements of the Esquimaux to the northern extremity K
of Quadra and Vancouver’s Island. This tract includesa
the tribes in the Russian territory, many of whom have:
been enumerated by Vater, and more recently by Wrangel, .
under a variety of names,——Kolushi, Ugalyachmutzi, ,
Kinaitzi. According to the researches of Dr. Scouler, .
these tribes are all connected more or less by afﬁnity in!
their dialects, and probably have originally one language..
Nearly the same conclusion might be collected from thee
evidence brought forward by Vater, which he derived from r
the manuscript grammars and vocabularies of Von Resanoﬂ', ;
made in the Russian settlements. To this race Dr. Scouler I
refers the Haidah tribes of Queen Charlotte’s Island, who c
cultivate potatoes, which they export in ﬂeets of forty or I
ﬁfty canoes to the different villages of the Chemesyan n

CH. XXIx.] NORTH-WESTERN RACES. 571

nation, where potato fairs are held. It seems that there
is a competition among the different Haidah tribes who
shall carry the earliest potatoes to the main-land. All the
tribes of this family resemble each other in physical fea-
tures and. intellectual character : they are bold, industrious,
and ingenious, when compared with the southern family.-
One custom is common to the northern tribes, which has
already been observed by all the voyagers who have visited
this coast : it is that practised by females, of perforating
the lower lip, and wearing in it a wooden ornament. On
the other hand, the habit of ﬂattening the skulls of infants
is peculiar to the southern, or Columbian tribes, and is not
known among the northern.

2. The southern tribes are termed, by Dr. Scouler,
Nootka-Columbians. They include the various hordes
who inhabit Nootka Sound and the lower tracts of the
Columbia River, and extend thence southward along the
coast. They differ from the northern tribes: they are fatter
and more muscular; their cheek-bones are prominent ;
and their complexion, though light, has more of a copper
hue. The limbs of both sexes are ill formed. The prac-
tice of ﬂattening the head is universal among the Nootka-
Columbians, and prevails along the coast from Salmon
River, in latitude 53° 30’ north, to Umqua River, in lati-
tude 46° north. Dr. Scouler has described the process
used in this operation, which is performed on the heads of
new-born infants. The skulls of these peOple are quite as
ﬂat as the remarkable crania brought by Mr. Pentland
from Titicaca. It seems to have no effect on the intellect;
but Dr. Scouler informs me that the people by whom it is
practised are particularly subject to apoplexy.

To the Nootka-Columbian family belong the tribes
known by the names of Chenooks, Flat-head Indiansf‘ Clat-

 

as The proper name of this tribe is Selish, and in spite of the appellation
by which we know them, they do not ﬂatten their heads, as observed by
the Author in the following page. Hale, p. 205, says that they scarcely
diﬁ'er from the Shushwaps, their immediate northern neighbours ; he con-

572 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

sops, C lamooths, Multnomahs, and many others, as well as
the tribe called Wacash, who inhabit the island in Nootka
Sound bearing the same designation. The most northern
tribe of the Nootka-Columbian family are the Haeeltzuk,
who are said to be very dirty in their habits, and of
' eﬂ'eminate appearance. The following traits, given by Dr.
Scouler from the report of M. Tolmac, may serve as a
specimen of the moral history of this race :—

“ The Haeeltzuk live at peace among themselves, and
are the most northern tribe who ﬂatten the cranium. Their
chiefs have but little inﬂuence except as conjurers. When
the salmon season is past, provisions for the winter having
been laid in, the feasting and conjuring begin. The con-
jurer is called Tzeet-tzaiak. The chief retires to the
forest, where he secludes himself, pretending to fast, but
is secretly supplied with food by a conﬁdant. While there,
he is called Taamish, and is supposed to hold communica-
tion with the Nawlok. Unexpectedly he makes his appear-
ance in the village, dressed in a robe of black-hair skin,
his head bound with a chaplet and a collar of wrought
alder bark, which is of a bright red colour. The women,
children, and many of the men, ﬂy at his approach; but
some one desirous of distinction boldly awaits and presents
his bare arm, and from its outward surface the Taamish
bites, and swallows one or more large mouthfuls ; and.
whoever meets him is obliged to submit to this ordeal.
The biter acquires renown by being able to seize a huge:
morsel between his incisors, and to remove it with dexterity '
without the aid of a knife, and the person bitten, by endur- .
ing with fortitude. The Indians are as proud of these :
soars as a soldier can be of wounds acquired in the defence :
of his country. I have often inquired the reason of this 4
practice, but could only learn that it is wemak, or valuable. .
With respect to the Nawlok, VVacash, the chief Taamish 1

 

siders them as “ intermediate between the Chenooks and the Sahaptin l
[Nez-percés] ; their features not so regular nor their skins so clear as those 5
of the latter, while they fall far short of the grossness of the former.”—,-ED. .

CH. XXIX] NOOTKA-COLUMBIAN RACE. 573

and most successful biter among the Haeeltzuk, informed
me, rather reluctantly, as he did not see them, but Only
heard their cries, that they lived in the mountains, and
were not human beings. During the Tzeet-tzaiak, it
was. improper to meet or travel for any purpose. The
Haeeltzuk are commonly reputed to practise cannibalism ;
but it is only the Taamish who tastes human ﬂesh, and
that in the manner I have mentioned.”

The portrait of a Chenook youth (P1. 56), whose head had
never undergone the process of ﬂattening, is taken from a
painting by Mr. Catlin. Probably the complexion is darker
than that of the race in general: it is much darker and
redder than the people of Nootka Sound are said to be.
Yet they must be the same race, since the people of the
Columbia understood those of Nootka with little difﬁcultyﬁ"
Of this fact I have heen assured by Dr. Scouler. From
Captain Cook and Mr. Anderson we have the following

account of the people of Nootka :—

“ The persons of the natives are in general under the
common stature, but not slender in proportion, being com-
monly pretty full or plump, though not muscular: neither
are they corpulent, but many of the older people are rather
spare or lean. The visage of most of them is rather
round and full, and sometimes also broad, with high pro-
minent cheek-bones ; and above these, the face is often
much depressed, or seems fallen in quite across between
the temples; the nose also ﬂattening at its base, with
pretty wide nostrils and rounded point. The forehead is
rather low: the eyes small, black, and rather languishing
than sparkling ; the mouth round, with large round thickish
lips; the teeth tolerably equal and well set, but not re-
markably white. They have either no beards at all, which
was most commonly the case, or a small thin one on the

 

* The portrait of a full-grown warrior, belonging to the tribe called

.Flat-heads, who, however, do not uniformly observe the custom which

once gave them a name, is likewise taken from Mr. Catlin’s original
paintings.

574 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K II.

point of the chin, which does not arise from any want of hair
upon that part, but from plucking it out; for. some of them,~
particularly the old men, have not only considerable beards
on their chin, but whiskers or mustachios. Their eye-
brows are always scanty and always narrow ; but the hair
of the head is in great abundance, very coarse and strong,
and, without a single exception, black, straight, and lank,
or hanging down over the shoulders; the neck is short;
the arms and body rather clumsy; the limbs in all very
small in proportion to other parts, with large feet, badly
shaped and projecting ankles. Their celour was difﬁcult
to determine, their skins being incrusted with dirt or paint :
in particular cases when these were rubbed off, the white-
ness of the skin appeared almost equal to that of Europeans,
though rather of the pale eifete cast which distinguishes
those of our northern nations. Their children, whose
skins had never been stained, also equalled ours in white-
ness. A very remarkable sameness seems to characterise
the whole nation; a dull phlegmatic want of expression
being common to all of them. The women strongly re-
semble the men, and have no pretension to beauty”
(Plate 57).

One trait which distinguishes these people from the
native Americans in general is their fondness for music.
They display, as Captain Cook informs us, much skill in
the composition of their songs. He says, “ Their music is
not of that conﬁned sort found among many rude nations;
for the variations are very numerous and expressive, and
the cadence and melody powerfully soothing.”

[Mn Hale pronounces the natives of the region west of
the Rocky Mountains to be “ on the whole inferior to those
east of that chain. In stature, strength, and activity, they
are much below them. Their social organisation is more
imperfect; the two classes of chiefs, those who preside
in time of peace, and those who direct the operation of
war,—the ceremony of initiation for the young men, the.
distinction of clans or totems,——and the various important

on. XXIX.] WHITE AMERICAN NATIONS. 575

‘ festivals which exist among the eastern tribes, are unknown
to those of Oregon. Their conceptions on religious subjects
are of a lower caste : it is doubtful if they have any idea
) of a Supreme Being.”

i Mr. Hale proceeds to give certain doubtful analogies and
points of similarity between these races and the Australians,
‘ "and goes on to give an account of their singular mode of
life, which is not either strictly nomadic or sedentary. He
says, “ They have no ﬁxed habitations, and yet they are
not, properly speaking, a wandering people. Nearly every
month in the year they change their place of residence,—
but the same month of every year ﬁnds them regularly in
the same place.” He accounts for this very properly by
the fact that the food of these people being chieﬂy es-
culent roots, fruits and berries, and ﬁsh, their dwelling-
place is necessarily determined by the locality in which
these necessaries are to be found. At certain seasons ﬁsh
are in plenty, and the river banks then become their habi-
tations. The various edible roots on which they subsist
grow in very different regions, and come to maturity at
different times, and this demands further changes of
abode. Added to this, many of their chief men go perio-
dically towards the Rocky Mountains to obtain for their
tribes, either by hunting or barter, the buffalo skins which
are required for clothing; though this does not usually
demand a general move of the whole body.*]

3. White Race of the Northern Coast.

The northern family are a race more interesting than
the Nootka-Columbians in many respects, but more par-
ticularly because they furnish an instance of a white
American nation, whose complexion, if we compare these
people with the black Californians, would seem to bear a
relation to climate similar to that which we trace in the
Eastern Continent of the world, when we compare the
white Europeans with the black Africans. Dr. Scouler in

9“ Exploring Expedition, Vol. vi. page 200. -

 

576 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.;

forms us that these people are as white as the natives of 1
Southern Europe, and some of our voyagers have described]
them as even of lighter hue. Captain Dixon says, “ That?
the natives of Port Mulgrave are so covered with paint
that it is difﬁcult to determine what is their complexion.” ‘
He adds, “ We prevailed on one woman to wash her face .
and hands, and the alteration in her appearance surprised

us : her countenance had all the cheerful glow of an

English milk-maid, and the healthy red which ﬂushed her

cheek was even beautiftu contrasted with the whiteness of ‘
her neck: her forehead was so remarkably clear that the :
translucent veins were seen meandering even in their ;
minutest branches.” 'From Von Langsdorff and M. Rollin,

the latter of whom accompanied the unfortunate La Pérouse 1
as medical ofﬁcer and naturalist, we have a similar account. ;
M. Rollin says, “ That their hair is often of a chestnut.
colour.”

The following passage of La Pérouse gives the impor-
tant information, that these races are not 'Esquimaux, but 1
allied to the hunting tribes of North America.

La Pérouse says, “ My voyages have enabled me to
compare various nations, and I am certain that the Indians
of Port des Frangais are not Esquimaux ; they have evi- ,
dently a common origin with the inhabitants of the interior i
of Canada and the northern parts of America.” He adds,
“ Customs entirely peculiar to themselves, and a very
singular countenance, distinguish the Esquimaux from all 3
other Americans.” They are a people who delight more;
in ﬁshing than the chase, and, preferring oil to blood, nay, :
perhaps to everything else, commonly eat their ﬁsh raw.
The framing of their canoes is always covered with the
skin of the sea-wolf very tightly stretched. Nimble and
active in all their movements, they diifer little from sea- .
calves, and wanton in the water with as much agility as if '
they were amphibious; their face is almost square; their ‘
eyes and breast large ; their ﬁgure short. Of all these
characteristics not one agrees with the natives of Port des .

'CH. XXIX.] WHITE AMERICAN NATIONS. 577

Francais, who are much larger, meagre, far from robust,
and very unskilful in the construction of their boats, which
are formed of an excavated tree raised on each side with a
single plank.

“ In size and ﬁgure these Indians differ little from us :
their features are greatly varied, and afford no peculiar
characteristic, except in the stern expression of their eyes.
The colour of their skin is very brown, being constantly
exposed to the sun : but their children are born as white as
any among us. They have less beard than Europeans, but
enough to remove all doubt upon the subject ; and the sup-
position, that the Americans are without beards, is an error
that has been too readily adopted. I have seen,” he adds,
“the aborigines of New England, Canada, Nova Scotia,
Hudson’ s Bay, and have found many individuals among these
nations with a beard; whence I conclude that those who are
destitute of it have got rid of it by artiﬁcial means.”

The people of Norfolk Sound are described by Dixon;
and from the, general outlines of his account, as well as
from a vocabulary containing the numerals of their lan-
guage, it seems that they belong to the same nation as the
people of Port des Frangais. They speak, according to
Dixon, a different language from that of Prince William’s
Sound, the natives of which are, as we have observed,
Esquimaux. They have also the same habit of cutting
through the under lip in females, and making a second
aperture to the month, which prevails at Port dcs Francais.
This and the other customs of the inhabitants of Norfolk
Sound connect them also with the natives of Port Mul-
grave : they resemble the latter people in their make,
shape, and features, and in language. The natives of Port
Mulgrave are thus described by Captain Dixon: “ They
are in general about the middle size, their limbs straight
and well shaped.”

I must not terminate this Chapter without adding some
remarks on the singular languages of those nations. It is
observed by Dr. Scouler that the idioms of the Nootka-

P P

578 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

Columbians, though a distinct branch, yet indicate traces
of remote connection with the dialects of the northern tribes;
and it is probable that both these groups of languages
originated from one common stock. What is more interest-
ing are the signs of remote aﬁinity which both display to
theAzteca-Mexican,—a fact which recalls the tradition that
the Nahuatlacas originated from a region far to the north.axe
It was observed long ago, by Anderson, that the language
of Nootka bears a strong resemblance to the Mexican in
the terminations of words, and the frequent recurrence of
the same consonants. The same phenomena have fallen
under the notice of the Baron von Humboldt, who remarks,
that “ on a careful comparison of the vocabularies collected
at Nootka Sound and at Monterey, he was astonished at
the resemblance of the sounds and the terminations of
words to those of the Mexican: as, for example, in the
language of Nootka, apgaixitl is to embrace ; temextixitl,
to kiss ; kitltzitl, t0 Sig/2 ; tzitzi/mitl, earth ; inicoatzi/mitl,
the name of a month. Yet these languages are, on the
Whole, to be considered as essentially distinct, as it appears
from the comparison of their numerals.” To these remarks
of Von Humboldt, I shall add the following original ob-
servations of Dr. Vater. Having taken notice of one cir-
cumstance distinguishing the Nootka language from the
Mexican, viz. that tl in the latter occurs only as a ter-
mination of nouns, whereas, in the Nootka language, it
is found in words of all sorts, as, perhaps, chieﬂy in verbs,
he adds, “Yet agcoatl, a young woman, in the Nootka
dialect may bear a nearer resemblance to cau-atl, a wife or
woman, generally, in the Mexican. At any rate, that fre-.
quent recurrence of the same sounds, which in other lan-
guages are comparatively rare, as particularly of the tl, is

 

3* Words terminating in ATL abound in the N ootkian language as in
the Aztec. Agcoatl, a young woman in the Nootkian, resembles you-at],
a wife or woman in the Aztec, as Vater has observed. The N ootkian
name for the sun, Opulszt/cl, is compared by the writer of “Cook’s Voyage”
with Vitzliputzli, the name of the Mexican divinity.

CH. XXIX] INDIAN STATISTICS. 579

a circumstance of some weight.” This phenomenon, how-
ever, is not peculiar to the Nootka language, but common
to it and to the dialect of the Kolushi, and is even more
extensively prevalent. “ By means of the Specimens of
different languages, brought to our knowledge by the
Russians in the colonies planted of late on the American
coast, it appears that this remarkable termination of words
is not only common to the language of the Koluschi, but
even in the idiom of the Ugaliachmutzi it is so strik-
ingly frequent, that among the words, amounting to about
twelve hundred, collected by Herr von Resanoﬁ’, nearly the
twelfth part of the whole, but these words of all descrip-
tions, and not mer ely substantives, have tl, or sometimes tli,
or tle, for their termination.”

[The three tables following are extracted from School-
craft’s valuable work,—the ﬁrst on the Indian Population
of the United States, which is necessarily and obviously
approximate only; another on the Cranial Admeasure-
ments of the Aborigines; and the third, the Synopsis of
Indian Tribes. ]

ULTIMATE CONSOLIDATED TABLES OF THE INDIAN POPULATION OF
THE UNITED STATES—(From Vol. 1. p. 523.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

. ' l - l . Y .
Namesoanbes- $311? $3353.; Names ofTrlbes- 331%? $312553.
TABLE I. — Tribes Brought forward" 34,704
whose Vital and In- l
dustrial Statistics Mexico under the
have been taken by Treaty of Guadalupe
Bands and Families, Hidalgo.
under the direction A. Indian Population
of the Acts of Con- of Texas ............ 24,100
gress. B. Indian Population
A. Iroquois Group. 5,922 of New Mexico 92,130
B. Algonquin Group" 17,197 C. Indian Population
C Dacota Group" 6,570 of California ....... 32,233
D. Appalachian Group“ 5,015 D. Indian Population
—-—————‘ 34,704 of Oregon .......... 22,731
TABLE II.—Tribes of l E. Indian Population
the New States and 1 of Utah ............. 11,500
Territories Southand ‘ F. Indian Population
West, including the of Florida .......... 348
Acquisitions from ———--—- 183,042
Carried forward ...... 34.704 Carried forward ...... 217 ,746

 

 

 

"’ The census, in these groups, has been carried no farther, but is in progress.

580

NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN.

' [BOOK II.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

. Number Toth- . N b Tth-

Names Of Tr lbes. in Tribe. pulgtioii. Names Of Tr 1b68. inu'i‘xi'ilfg. pihZCioii.

Brought forward..... 217,746 Brought forward..... 106,030 217,746
TABLE III—General Gros Ventres ......... 3,000

ScheduleoftheTribes Green Bay Indians,

located East of the (See Menomonies

Rocky Mountains and Oneidas.)

and the L1ne of the ‘Iowas. (See Dacota

Mississippi, in high ‘ Group.)

northern latitudes ; i Kiowas .................. 2,000

all of whom, together ‘ Kickapoos ............... 600

with those named in ‘ Kanzas .................. 1,600

Table No. 2, remain i Kaskaskias ............ 200

to be enumerated, Menomonles ............ 2,500

under the operation l Mandans ............... 300

of the Indian Census , Minitarees ............... 2,500

in progress, ‘ Miamies ............... 500
Alabamas. (See Mus- H Missouris ............... 500

kogees).* g Mohawks. (See Iro-
Assinabgins, south of :‘ quois Group.)

lat. 49 ................ 1,000 ' Munsees ............... 200
Apaches. (See Texas, 1 Ottowas. (See Algon-

New Mexico and quin Group.)

Utah) , ‘ Ottowas, west ............ 300
Arapahoes ............... 3,500 v Otvoes ..................... 500
Absarokes, or Crows. .. 4,000 l Omahas ............... 2,000
Aurickarees ............ 1,500 Oneidas. (See Iroquois
Blackfeet ................ 13,000 ‘ Grour)

Blood Indians (few Onondagas. (See Iro-

reach the Missouri). 500 quois Group.)

Brothertons ............ 600 Ogellahs ............... 1,500
gherlqkees ............... 26,000 Pawnees ............... 17,300
ree s .................. 25,000 Poncas ................... 00

' Chiekasaws (not enu- iPottawatomies ......... 3,200

merated) ............ 5,000 Peorias ........... ‘ ....... 150
Choctaws ............... 16,000 Piegans. (See Satsika,
Comanches<SeeTexas.) Blood, & Blackfeet.)
8h§xlennes .............. 2,500 giankeshaws ............ :83

a c 065" .................. 2,000 ,uappas ...............
Chippewas. (See Al- Ricarees. (See Auric-
Clgonquin Groutp.) d SFiliarees) 1 600

uppewas, wes , an awnees ................ ,

Red River, north 1,500 Sioux oftheMississippi
Crees. (None in the (not enumerated in

United States.) No. 1) .................. 9,000
Chawas. (See Che- Sioux of the Missouri

yennes.) i (not enumerated in
Cayugas. (See Iro- No. 1) .................. ,500

quois Group.) :Satsika. (See Blackfeet,
Cayugéis and Iroquois, 30 S t850.1210 'd 400
was ................. 00 r1 ges .........
Dionondadies. (See Senecas. (See Iroquois
Wyandotts.) Group.)
Dacotas. (See Sioux.) i St. Regis Tribe. (See
lD}e1fawares(is....ﬁ. h) 1,500 i SIrequpls Group) 1 500

luaws. ee ta s. . emmo es ............... ,
Foxes and Sacs ......... 2,400 Senecas and Shawnees.

Folles Avomes. (See (See Iroquois Group)
Menomonies.\ , Swan Creek and Black
Florida Indians. (See RiverChippewas(Et

Table 2.) enumerated in -
FlatheadstSeeOregon.) gon quin Group) ...... 200

Carried forward ...... 106,030 217,746 1 Carried forward ...... 159,180 217,746

 

apparent excess in the total amount.—ED.

* The Muskogees are not given in the Table: their omission may account for the

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CH. XXIX.] INDIAN STATISTICS. 581
Names «mes-b ﬁst: Essa:- i Names omibes. mi: 33:23::
7
Brought forward..... 159,180 217,7416 ’ Brought forward..... 1803 385,076
Snakes. (See Table 2) ‘ RHODE ISLAND—
Shoshonees. (SeeTab.2) Narragansetts ........ 420
Tetans .................. 3,000
Tonewandas. (See Iro-
quois Group.‘
Utahs. (See Table 2) CONNECTICUT—-
Wyaudots. (See Iro~ i Mohegans at Mohe-
quois Group.) gan .................. 300
W'innebagoes. (See Mohegans at Sto-
Dacota Group.) nington ............ 50
Weas .................. 250 Mohegans at Groton 50
Yanktons. (See Sioux
of the Missouri.) —-— 167,330
TABLE IV. — Frag-
mentary Tribes still 1 NEW YORK—
existing within the Iroquois. (See Iro-
Boundaries of the quois Group)
old States. Algonquins (not enu-
MAINE— merated in Algon-
Souriquois of St. quin Group) ...... 40
Johns ................ 300
Passamaquoddies 379
Penobscots ............ 277
VIRGINIA—
MASSACHUSETTS— Nottoways, mixed
Marshpee .............. with the African
Chippaquadie ......... 1 race .................. 40
Christiantown ...... ‘
Gay Head ............. ‘i
As§°netspf Troy or iSOUTH CAROLINA--
all River ......... ! Cat awbas 200
Herring Pond ........ 847 l """""""
Hasanamieo ..........
Punkapog ............
Natic .................. NORTH CAROLINA——
Dudley ................ Catawbas ............. 250
Grafton ............... Cherokees. (See
Yarmouth ............ Table 1.)
[All mixed with the ——
race but 8 or 10.] Total in old States .. 3,153 3,153
Carried forward ...... 1803 I 385,076 i Grand Total ......... i ............ 388,229

 

There may, in addition to these numbers, be from 25,000 to 35

the area of the unexplored territories of the United States.
[In the ofﬁcial “ Report of the Seventh Census of the United States,” recently printed,

from which extracts are given in the “Companion to the British‘Almanack for 1855,’

 

,000 Indians, within

9

we ﬁnd that the Commissioner of Indian Aﬁairs estimated “ the total number of Indians
of both sexes and all ages,” in the United States, on the 10th November, 1853, at
400,764: ; who were distributed in the following manner :—

California ............................................. 100,000
New Mexico .......................................... 45,000
Texas ................................................... 29,000
Utah Territory ....................................... 11,500
Oregon and Washington Territories ............ 23,000
Valley of the Missouri .............................. 43,430

Indians of the Plains, or Arkansas Valley ......

20,

000

The remainder, for the most part, in Indian Territory West.

The numbers differ a good deal from
understand how the Commissioner
the vague estimates which make it

those given by Schoolcraft, and it is not easy to
reconciles the minute exactness of his grand total with
up ; but we give it as we ﬁnd it.——ED.]

582

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

types being measured separately for illustration, when two at least of them should be united

for the common average, makes the average lower than it really is; and as JDr.Mort0n’s
average was taken without including so many of these lower types, he not havmg measured

the crania, the common average may be safely ﬁxed at 83$ to 84 cubic inches.

  

 

 

ii

NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.
CRANIAL ADMEASUREMENTS OF AMERICAN INDIANS—(From Vol. ii. p. 335.) (
N . f A . . . ' —
ain‘t Amiga invi‘éii’ﬁi lgr‘im‘ii Aggggse‘ﬁil‘é‘ri’éi i
m a- - - -
sufed. angle. 097;. slgsgd. angle. (fill); .
OREGONIANS. ‘,
UNALT'ERED BY ART. Miccosaukie ............ 1 74’ 74’
Chenook .................. 4 79 80 Seminole ............... 9 76% 88%
From Columbia river . 10 76 80 i
_ __ 18 ii
144 Average .................. 75 88%
. _1_ .
Ave) age ..... . ............. g g2 (123 Two lowest in series... { Z: 33:
Two lowest in series... { 74 72 81 97 J
J h _ J ( 80 91 Two highest in series. {82 97 J
Two hig est 1n serles. .. 180 95 J:
DACOTA. i
CRANIA ALTERED BY J Assineboin ............ 1 79 101 J J
ART. . . Dacota .................... 1 77 90 ii
From Oregon and Cali- Otomie .................. 4s 74% 78 i
fornia .................. 15 71% 80 J Minetari ............... 4 g; 33% i
- - 66 71 Mandan ............... 4 5
TWO lowest 1n series i S; 72 J Osage ..................... 2 :2! 2:3
- - . 86 J Oteo .................. 3 9‘
J J
TWO hlgheSJ in series... { 7 7% 91 J Pawnee .................. 2 76% 73%
Rickaree ............... 3 80 78
- SHOSHONEES ...... 4 761‘; 81 J W'innebago ............ 2 79 89
Lowest measurements . 741 72 ;
Highest ,, 80 91 i 26
Average .................. ... 77 85
ALGONQUIN. T l . C 70 76
Chippewa. ............... 2 78;“, 91 J W0 0W6“ in series... 2. 71 76
Cotonay .................. 2 77 95 . . . 80 94:
Illinois .................. 1 82 broken ‘> Two.h1ghest in series ' i 83 101
Lenape .................. 3 77% 74%
Massasauga ............ 1 76 7 9% IROQUOIS.
Minsi ..................... 1 78 broken Cayuga .................. 1 78 95
Menomonee ............ 8 75% 84: Huron .................. 2 745 81
Miami ..................... 3 76 89 Iroquois .................. 2 74 96
Natick ................... : 4 76 85 Mingo .................. 2 77 80
Naumkeag ............... 2 80 79% Mohawk ............... 3 73 84’
Narragansett ............ 9 75 83 Oneida ................... 1 74 85
Ottigamie ............... J 44 81 92
Ottawa .................. J 41 7 2 80% 10 J
Pottawatomie ............ J 2 78 92 Average .................. 75 88% ‘5'
Quinipiac ................ J 1 7O 78 T ‘ . . f 70 77 '
Sauk ...................... _ 2 82 91 W0 10W“ “1 serles--- 1 73 80
Shawnee .................. ! 1 7s 72 1 i 77 95
T Two highest in series .. 78 102%
l 0 f
Average .................. J 77 83% SUMMARY. 1
Two lowest in series ‘ { 72) ;; Oregonian .............. 14: 7 7% 80 J
J I 8 4 95 Crania altered by art . 15 71% 80 f;
Two highest in series... J { 86 102 Shoshonees ............ 4 76% 81 J
J Algonquin ............... 50 77 833r
APPALACHIAN. gppalachlan ............. 18 77 83%
acota .................... 26 77 85
Cherokee .................. 2 75% 87 I ro uois 10 75 881
Choctaw .................. 1 74 79 ‘1 """"""""" ’
Euchee ................... ‘ 1 75 84 137
Tlascalan [Aztec] ...... 1 75 84 , 2 ,
Muskogee ............... 3 74: 90 Average Of the “11016 ' 763— 833-
The average of 76% degrees facial angle is when, excluding the ﬂat heads. The three lowestléq

CH. XXIX.] - INDIAN TRIBES. 583

SYNOPSIS OF INDIAN TRIBES.—(From Vol. iii. p. 4:01.)

A. NORTHERN, EXTENDING FROM THE ATLANTIC TO THE PACIFIC

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

OCEAN. I
Families. Languages. Languages. i
l
EAST OF ROCKY MOUNTAINS. WEST OF ROCKY MOUNTAINS.
I. Eskimaux 1. Greenland. 3. Kotzebue’s Sound Behring’s
Labradorﬂ‘= 4. Tshuktchi ......... } Straits.
II. Athapascas 2. Hudson’s Bay. 5. Kadiac Island, N.W. coast Ame-
Churchill’s river, Hudson’s riea.
Bay.* 8. Tahcali or Carriers (Harmon
Copper Mine river,* &c. and Hale).
6. Cheppewyans. 9. Kenai, Cook’s Inlet.
7. Sussees. 10. Tlascani, near rhouth of Colum-
bia (Hale).
11. Umquas, sth. of Columbia (Hale)
Loucheux,* mouth Mackenzie
River, doubtful.
B. EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI.
Families. Languages.
III. Algonkins ......... Northern ........... 12. SheshatApoosh Northern side Gulf of
13. Scoﬂies ......... l St. Lawrence;
14. Montagnars, Saguenay to Montreal.
15. Eastern Chippeways (Long).
13. Ojibways. '
17. Ottowas.
18. Potawatomies.
19. Knistinauxsl'
Eastern ............ 20. Micmacs, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick.
21. Etchemins, New Brunswick, Maine.
22. Abenakis (Penobscots).
Central Atlantic.. 23. Massachusetts.
244. N arragansets.
25. Mohicans.
26. Long Island.
Southern Atlantic 27. Minsi.
28. Delawares.
29. Nanticokes.
30. Powhattans.
31. Pamlicoes. '
Western ............ 32. Illinois .........
33. Miamis ...... E
Piankishaws*
34. Saukies, Foxes, Kickapoos.i
35. Shawnees.
”l 36. Menomonies.

 

 

 

 

 

* This asterisk denotes the languages of which I have no vocabulary.

'1‘ The Western Knistinaux have by conquest extended far beyond the meridian of the
Mississippi.

1 The Saukies and Foxes, though Algonkins, have for a long time been settled west of
the Mississippi ; and the Winnebagoes, though Sioux, are cast of that river. The
Dahcotas are partly found also there.

584:

NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN.

[1300K II.

B. EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI—continued.

 

Families.

Languages.

 

IV. Iroquois ............

V. Catawbas ............
VI. Cherokee .........
VII. Chocta, Muskhog

VIII. Utchees .........
IX. Natchez ............

 

Western ............

Five Nations ...

Southern ..........

 

. Wyandotts, or Hurons.

. Senecas.

. Cayugas.

. Onondagoes.

. Oneidas.

. Mohawks.

. Tuscaroras.

._ Nottoways.

. Catawba (Woocons extinct).

. Cherokee.

: (032:3; """ } nearly identical.

. Muskhoghee..

. Hitchittee
Seminoles"
Coosadas*
Alibamous*. . .

51. Utchee ........ _

52. Natchez ......

The Creek Confederacy;
but the Seminoles,
though Muskhogs,
had separated.

 

 

 

C. BETWEEN THE MISSISSIPPI AND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.

 

Families.

Languages.

 

X. Sioux ................

XI. Gros Ventres
Algonkins (III.)
XII. Pawnees .........

XIII. Kiaways .........
XIV. Kaskaias .........
XV. Cumanches ......
XVI. Pania, Towiacks
XVII. Caddoes ........

XVIII. Adaize .........
XIX. Chetimachas....
XX. Attacapas .........
XXI. Natchitoehes

North ...............

South ...............

West ...............

 

53. Winnebagoes,* east of Mississippi.
54:. Dahcotas.
55. Yanktons.
Tetons.*
56. Assiniboins.
57. Quappas, Arkansas.
58. Osages, Kansas.
59. Ottoes, Missouris, Ioways.
60. Omahas, Puncas.
61. Minetarees (stationary).
Mandans.*
62. Upsarokas, or Crows.
Shyennes (doubtful) [Algonkins—ED.]
63. Ahnenin.
64. Black Feet, Paegans Blood Indians.
65. Pawnees.
Ricaras.*

} :Wander on upper waters of Arkansas.

at

*Red River (Tawakeroes),Towekas,Wachos?
66. Caddo, Red River, (Nandakoes, Ta-

chies, Nabedaches.)
67. Adaize ........................
68. Chetimachas ............... South of
69. Attacapas .................. Red River.

Natchitoches, Apelousas*

 

 

 

 

5“ This asterisk denotes the languages of which I have no vocabulary.

CH. XXIX.]

INDIAN TRIBES.»

585

D. WEST OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.

 

XXXII. Kituanaha...
XXXIII. Ugaliach— }
mutz1 ......
XXXIV. Koulischen..
XXXV. Naass .........
XXXVI. Skidegatz
XXXVII. Wakash

 

 

Families. Languages.
OREGON (Hale).
XXII. J elish ........... Northern .......... 70. Atnahs, north of 49° N. lat.
. 71. Flatheads, part do.
72. Skitsaih.
73. Piscous.
Middle ............. 74. Skwalz (Nasqually).
Western ............ 75. Tsihailish (Sea-shore).
76. Cowelitz.
Southern ........... 77. N sirtshaus, or Upper Killamuks.
XXIII. Sahaptin ...... Upper .............. 78. Nez percés.
Lower .............. 79. Wallawallas.
XXIV. Wailatpu ...... 80. Cayuse.
81. Molele.
XXV. Chinook ....... Lower .............. 82. Chinooks, Clatsops.
Upper .............. 83. Watlala.
XXVI. Kalapuya ...... 84. Willamets.
XXVII. J akon ......... 85. Lower Killamuks.
XXVIII. Luturim.... 86. Clamets.
XXIX. Shasti ......... 87. Shasties.
XXX. Pulairih ......... 88. Palaiks.
XXXI. Shoshonees Eastern ............ 89. Snakes.
Middle ............ Bonnarks.*
Western 90. Wihinasht.

NORTH or FUCA’s STRAITS, along Paciﬁc.

91. Coutaria or Flatbows, north of 49° N. lat.

*Lat. 60, between Pr. William’s Sound and
Mount St. Elias (perhaps Athapascas).

92. Sitka, between 52 and 59 lat.

93. Huitsla, between 52 and 55 main.

94. Queen Charlotte Island.

95. Newittee ...... ,

96. Nootka Sound } Vancouver 5 Island.

UPPER CALIFORNIA, 32 to 42° N. lat.
97. Talatuif
98. Pujari
99. Sekumre
100. Tsamak
101. San Raphael, near San Francisco.
102. La Solidad, near Monterey.

103. San Miguel.
104. Kii, near San Gabriel.
105. Netela, near 8.. Juan Capitouro.

River San Sacramento.

 

 

 

 

r

* This asterisk denotes the languages of which I have no vocabulary.
1' These nine imperfect Californian vocabularies, collected by Messrs. Hale and Dana,
are not yet digested, but will probably be reduced to six families.

.. «m... _. --....1_.,._,_._

586 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK 11.

CHAPTER XXX.

OF THE SOUTH AMERICAN RACES.—GENERAL REMARKS—
CLASSIFICATION.

THE different races of people in South America have been
supposed to be much more numerous than late observa-
tions give us reason to believe them. As their languages
have become somewhat better known, the number of‘
distinct families has, as in many instances, been mate-
rially reduced; aud we can now refer, Without hesitation,
to comparatively few groups a great variety of dialects
which were long regarded as so many distinct forms of ‘
human speech. Still, however, the history of the South
American languages is in its infancy. It affords, in many
particular examples, the means of tracing affinity between
nations widely separated; but we cannot ﬁnd as yet in
South American leXicology satisfactory resources for a clas-
siﬁcation of the native races of this region into different
groups. The only attempt hitherto made with any de-
gree of success to distribute these nations into particular
departments is by following a geographical outline, or one
furnished by physical phenomena. On this principle, as
it has been observed by a well-informed and philosophical
writer, who has made the history of the South American
nations his particular study, we may divide the whole,
population of this great peninsula into a few groups
severally distinguished from each other by marked varie-
ties in their physical organisation, and at the same time ~
establish the important and interesting fact, that these :
varieties bear a decided relation 'to the geographical con-
ditions of the several regions in which they are displayed.
We must begin by observing, that there is no division .
of the world, of which the different parts are more clearly '
severed and distinguished by reference to their physical .
circumstances, than the great region of South America.

I CH. xxx] SOUTH AMERICAN NATIONS. 587

The whole surface of the continent is estimated by M
d’Orbigny to be equal to more than ﬁfef Europe. It

del Fuego. Its geographical structure raises it from the
level of the sea to that of perpetual snows; its surface pre—
sents the utmost variety in its forms and aspect. Towards
the west a vast chain of mountains, rising to the clouds,
follows the shores of the Great Ocean, covered with ice and
snow. At its northern extremity, this chain under the
torrid zone presents the most diversiﬁed climates; sterile,
j dry, and burning, in its abrupt descent towards the west;
! temperate or cold on its immense table- lands; covered With a
l luxuriant vegetation on its gently inclined easte1n declivity.

To the eastward, low hills, hot and wooded, present towards
‘the borders of the Atlantic a remarkable uniformity of
aspect of geological composition, and of outward forms.

In the midst of these regions so different, are immense
gplains ; at ﬁrst cold, arid, and rocky, in the southern parts;
.then temperate, verdant, and with a boundless horizon
Itowards the Pampas; lastly, of burning heat, and covered
'with forests under the torrid zone. Such are the features
I of external nature in the regions we are about to contem-
lplate; we shall observe what inﬂuences they exercise on
:the physical and moral characters of the men who people
lthese different tracts.

M. d’Orbigny divided all the South American tribes
:into three families of nations, that term denoting what we
1 should express by physical types : these greater depart-
: ments are subdivided into thirty-nine distinct nations.
‘ The following table is necessary for explanation of the
; author’s meaning :—

 

. \
reaches from the torr1d zone to the frozen regions of Tierra \ .x

/:

588 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN.

Branches.

lst Branck,
Peruvian.

2d Branch,
Antisian.

1. ANDIAN GROUP.

30! Branch,
k Araucanian.

 

F

lst Branch,
Patagonian or
Pampéan.

2d Branch,
Chiquitian.

2. MEDITERRANEAN GROUP.
A

3d Branch,
Moxean.

 

3. BRASILIO-GUARANI GROUP.

MM/M

/ ‘ ‘\/\’—\\ mf\ ,M'~\

Names of Nations.

Quichua or Inca
Aymara

Chango
Atacama.
Yuracarés
Mocéténés
Tacana

Maropa
Apolista

Auca or Araucano
Fuégian

Patagon or Téhuelche
Puelche
Charrua.
Mbocobi or Toba
Mataguayo
Abipones
Lengua
Samucu
Chiquito
Saravéca
Otuké
Curuminaca
Covaréca
Curavés
Tapﬁs
Curucanéca
Pa'iconéca.
Corabéca
Moxos
Chapacura.
Itonoma
Canichana
Movima
Cayuvara
Pacaguava
Iténés

Caribi
Guarani
Tupi
Botocudo

[BOOK 11:

 

11; CH. xxx] SOUTH AMERICAN NATIONS. 589

The following remarks will explain the distribution
intended by the preceding Table :—

1. The Alpine nations of South America or tribes of
a the Andian family.
On the chain of the Andes, on its slopes, and on the
-: shore of the Great Ocean, a powerful monarchy, that of the
Incas or Quichuas, held in subjection all the mountain
tribes from Chili to Quito, without even reaching down
into the eastern plains: yet leaving at its southern ex-
tremity in freedom the warlike Araucanos and the ﬁshing
tribes in the Tierra del Fuego.
All these nations are brought together in one great
department : they are the native races of the South Ame-
rican Cordillera from the southern to the northern ex-
tremity. The countries which they inhabit are alike in
physical structure, and the races of men bear a decided
analogy, though with varieties, in the organisation of their
bodies. ,
2. In the central parts of South America, between the
region above described and the following, are the countries
belonging to the second group; but this region is also
‘made to include the Southern Pampas ; viz. all the level
plains which lie to‘ the southward of the Rio de la Plata.
'The following are the subdivisions of the tribes belonging
“to the department of nations corresponding to this section
of the continent. 1. People of the Pampas, including
fPatagonians and other nations of the plain and Open
countries on the Paraguay: these may be termed the
Equestrian nations of South America. 2. Forest nations
dwelling in the small woody valleys of the Chiquitos under
the eastern border of the Andian chain. 3. People of the
inundated tracts within the province of Los Moxos, where
the rivers of South America stagnate and almost form in-
land lakes. A collective name for the tribes belonging to
these three last divisions is yet wanting; I shall term them
the Mediterranean nations of South America.
3. Almost from the foot of the Peruvian Andes east,

 

590 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK 11.

regions of comparatively level country extend towards the
Atlantic. The immense plains through which the Orinoco
and the Maragnon, or river of Amazons, and their great
tributary streams, take their course towards the sea, con.
stitute a third region, contrasted in its geographical
features with the ﬁrst. This is the abode of the third
group of South American nations; among whom are the
most extensively spread races of the New VVorldpthe
Caraibs, the Tupi, and the Guarani; they are distinguished
by the name of Brasilio-Guarani nations.

Some revolutions have taken place in the situation and
relative position of these nations since the arrival of the
Spaniards, of which We must take notice.

Already, before that era, the Caribbees, or Caraibs, of
the northern coast had effected extensive conquests 1n the
interior ; but the monarchy of the Incas, in Peru, was the
most powerful dynasty in South America. The Incas and
the Aymaras, reduced under the yoke of Spain and Chris-‘
tianised, have never changed their abode; the proud Arau-
canos have withdrawn themselves from the Spanish colonies
of Chili, and have passed southward into the Pampas to
maintain their independence ; the Pesherais have remained
on their frozen rocks ; the Patagonians in their arid plains ;
the Puelches have left the banks of the River Plate to
dwell in the Pampas of the south ; the Charruas have
been exterminated from the Banda Oriental and Entre-'
Rios; the Mbocobis and the Lenguas dwell in their old
asylum. The nations belonging to the Chiquitos and the
Moxos have submitted to Christianity, and remain upon
their ancient soil. The Antisian nations have not changed
their abode: a part have embraced Christianity ; a part
remain savages where the Spaniards found them. Slight
changes have taken place in the abodes of the South
Americans, and, except in the Vicinity of towns, Where
different tribes are blended into a mixed population, and
unless where the love of liberty has caused them to with- q
draw, South America presents nearly the same distributioné

 

 

:3? CH. XXX.] SOUTH AMERIQAN NATIONS. 591
‘ 1 0

q of races as at the era of its conquest. The numbers of
C individuals have principally changed.

Three principal nations among the South American
.t tribes have been celebrated from the extent of their migra-
l tions; the others have been nearly ﬁxed. The migratory
nations are the Quichua, the Guarani, and the Araucanos ;
'7 we observe the ﬁrst departing under Manco-Capac, from
rthe Lake and Plain of Titicaca, proceeding northwards
towards Cuzco ; thence dispersing themselves, in the spirit
iof conquest, farther northward to Quito, southward to
gChili, following either the uplands of the Andes, or the
i margin of the sea: the Guarani, coasting along the ocean-
l border towards the north, their savage and wa1like bands
1 advancing to the Antilles under the name of Caribbees,
1 and under the same name ascending the Orinoco and the
. Amazon, and their tributary streams. Elsewhere the
i Guarani of Paraguay followed the Parana, and descended
1 southwards to Buenos Ayres, while, at a known epoch, we
1 observe them in great numbers abandon Paraguay, and,
turning north-west, traverse the plains of Oh aco, and settle
l themselves under the eastern feet of the Peruvian Andes,
where they remain under the name of Chiriguanos. The
Araucans have only made partial migrations from the
Andes towards the eastern plains. The Guaranis have
generally moved from north to south; the other migrations
of the American races have issued in various deviations
from a central point.

A survey of the numbers of people belonging to each
race yet subsisting in South America affords a gratifying
consideration, and one that tends to relieve the distressing
picture which the history of North America presents.
The following table shows the numbers, as far as they can
be ascertained, belonging to each race who have been at
least received within the pale of Christianity, and those
who yet remain in the wilderness of original Paganism.
This consideration, if we can separate it from the events of
the Spanish conquest, for which it is to be hoped that

 

592 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

soldiers, and not the ministers of religion, are responsible,
must be allowed, by a comparison with the history of North
America, to reﬂect honour on the Roman Catholic Church,
and to cast a deep shade on the history of Protestantism :—

Christians. Savages.
Peruvian branch .................. 1,315,4152
Antisian branch .. . . .. .. . . . . .. . . .. 11,857 2,700
Araucanian branch ................ 341,000
Patagonian branch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 32,400
Chiquitian branch ................ 17,735 1,500
Moxian branch .................... 23,7 20 3,497
Brasilio-Guarani family . . .. . . . . . . . . 222,036 20,100
Total . . ., .............. 1,590,900 94,197

It seems, from this table, that more than a million and
a half of the pure aboriginal races live in South America
in the profession of Christianity. The American race,
through the exertions of missionaries, is destined to survive
to future ages; and though it will eventually become
mixed with the European, we may look for improvement
rather than a dwindling deterioration, since it appears that
the mixed descendants are physically a more vigorous
offspring than either of the parent stocks.

Physical Characters of the Soath American Races.

Nothing can be more erroneous than the assertion made
by Ulloa, and often repeated, that the South Americans
are all of one complexion, and that this complexion is red,
or of the colour of copper. Humboldt says, “ La denomi-
nation d’hommes rouge-cuivrés n’aurait jamais pris nais-
sance dans l’Amérique équinoxiale pour designer les in-
digenes ;” and M. d’Orbigny extends the same observation
to the southern parts. The complexions of the South.
American nations, according to this writer, whose observa- .
tions have been most extensive and accurate, are of twol
different hues, each of which 1s found in various degrees \
of paleness and of intensity: one ,is an olive- brown, the
other yellow. The natives of Peru, of the Pampas, of

on. xxx] SOUTH AMERICAN RACES. 593

Araucania, of the Chiquitos, and the Moxos, are of the
olive-brown; the Brasilio-Guarani tribes are of a yellowish
cast. It does not appear, from the examination of facts
which this writer has instituted, that the shade of colour
varies decidedly according to difference of latitude or
climate; but it seems to be modiﬁed in a remarkable
manner by the dryness or moisture of the atmosphere.
Where the air is dry, the peOple are of deeper hue ; where
moist and foggy, their colour is more dilute. In the shape
of the head among South American tribes, no constant
observation can be laid down; the form of the cranium
varies in every tribe. The Peruvians have most generally
heads of an oblong form, somewhat compressed laterally,
the forehead a little prominent, short, and falling some-
what backward ; the Antisians and Araucans display nearly
the same shape. In the people of the Pampas the head
is generally rounded, nearly ellipsoid, contracted in length,
and but little compressed laterally, with a forehead mode-
rately prominent, and not falling back ; in the Chiquitos,
the same character is exaggerated, and the head is nearly
circular, while in the Moxos it is more oblong; this last \
form is very nearly that of the Guarani. An artiﬁcial
deformity of the head is Well known in the South American
nations; it had its greatest degree in the ancestors of the
Aymara, who now resemble the other Peruvians. The
Aymara are supposed to be the descendants of the people
to whose ancestors belonged the wonderfully deformed
skulls of Titicaca.

Most erroneous was also the assertion of Don Antonio
deUlloa, the great enemy of the South American aborigines,
that their physiognomy is everywhere the same. “ Visto
un Indio de qualquiera region, se puede decir que se han
Visto todos.” i. 6. He who has seen an Indian of any
part of the country, may say he has seen them all. This
was the erroneous declaration of a prejudiced man. M.
d’Orbigny, on the contrary, avers that a Peruvian differs
more from a Patagonian, and a Patagonian from a Guarani,

QQ

594 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. , [BOOK II.

than does a Greek from an Ethiopian or a Mongole. Nor ‘
is the expression of Countenance in these nations always .
gloomy and severe; it differs in the same nation under ‘
the inﬂuence of varying moral conditions. The Guarani
of Paraguay, of Corrientes and Bolivia, have a countenance
expressive of sorrow, dejection, and indifference; they
appear neither to think nor feel. The free Guarani, the
Guarayos, on the contrary, have an expression of life and
animation,—“ leur aspect dénote des hommes spirituels.”

...._._.—....

CHAPTER XXXI.

OF THE ALPINE NATIONS OF SOUTH AMERICA, OR THE
ANDIAN FAMILY.

THE Andian family comprehends the principal nations of
the whole South American Cordillera, including Peru and
Chili, and some of the countries on both sides of that long
chain. These nations, though differing in language and
manners, have certain traits in common, which justify the
assembling of them in one department. Their physical
character is deﬁned as follows : “ Colour olive-brown, more
or less intense ; stature small; forehead of little elevation,
and retiring ; eyes horizontal, never turned upwards at the
outer angle.” Three branches are comprehended in this
stock: the Peruvian, or the nations who inhabited the
greater part of the old kingdom of Peru, or the present
republics of Peru, Bolivia, and a part of that of Argentine ;
secondly, the Antisian, or tribes in the country called Antis
by the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, the historian of his native
land and race ; their countries are situated on the eastern-
most of the three ridges of the Cordillera ; that is, to the
eastward of Cuzco: it was by mistake that the Spaniards
gave the name, which they corrupted into Andes, to all
the three branches of the Cordillera. The third branch
of this stock are the Araucanos, the celebrated warlike

CH. XXXI.] ANDIAN RACES: QUICHUAS. 595

race who defended long the mountains of Chili against the
Spaniards. All these nations display in their physical type
the characters above described; they differ in some par-
ticular respects. The nations belonging to the Peruvian
‘ branch are of the smallest stature; the Araucans are the
most vigorous in form, and they are of fairer complexion
g than the rest.

 

1. 0f the Peruvian Branch of the Andian Family of
Nations.

These nations, as I have said, consist of four races of
3 distinct language, the Quichua or Inca race, or rather the
race of people who were the prOper subjects and followers
of the dynasty of Inca sovereigns, the Aymaras, the Ata-

, cama, and the Changos.

The Q-aiclma or Inca Permnans.——It was among the
nations of this stock that nearly all the civilisation of
South America existed. The Peruvians are well known to
have inhabited cities; in their elevated plains, they had
troops of domesticated animals, the llama and the alpaca;
and they cultivated extensively the guinea and the potato,
a native plant of these mountains, which Stood to them in
place of the cereal gramina of the civilised nations of the
Old World; in the hot plains, they planted maize and the
ocea, or oxalis. Their woollen manufacture was comparable
to the ﬁnest fabrics of Europe. They worked the precious
metals, and copper and lead, but were ignorant of the more
valuable use of iron. Among the Peruvian nations, the
dominant race were the Quichuas, or Incas, distinguished
by their language, which is the Quichuan. The Quichuas
are a people of considerable mental culture ; in the opinion
of M. d’Orbigny, they are by no means inferior in intelli-
gence t0 the nations of the ancient world; they have a
lively conception, and acquire knowledge with facility.
The old Incas had calculated with accuracy the duration
of the solar year ; they had acquired the art of sculpture;
they recorded the even‘s of history by symbolic signs and

596 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

by quipus, or knotted cords; they had a code of laws, and
a regularly organised government ; Peruvian orators swayed
in public harangues the passions of the multitude: they
cultivated poetry and music. Their language was har-
monious, graceful, and formed by the most artiﬁcial system
of inﬂections and combinations. Their religion was, if we
may apply such epithets to any uninspired faith, the mere
result of the inward light of the untaught human mind,
in the highest degree spiritual and sublime. They recog-
nised in Pachacamac the invisible God, the creator of all
things, supreme over all, who governed the motion of the
heavenly bodies, and whom they worshipped without image
or temple in the open air, while to the Sun, his visible crea-
ture, they erected temples, honoured him with costly gifts,
and with rites performed by consecrated virgins. Like the
Rajputs of the Hindus, the royal dynasty of Incas were
the offspring of the Sun : the nearest relative of the reigning
Inca was the high-priest, who offered up the ripened fruits
of the earth, and on stated occasions sacriﬁced llamas, the
only bloody offerings of the Peruvians. In the milder
character of their religion, and the greater softness and
gentleness of their moral disposition, the Peruvians are
strongly distinguished from the nations of Anahuac, and
particularly from those of the Toltec and Aztec races.

The physical characters of the Quichua, or Inca race,
have been carefully described by M. d’Orbigny. Their
complexion, as he assures us, has no tinge of the red or
00pper colour which is assigned to the nations of South
America, nor the deep yellow of those of the Brasilio-
Guaranian race. It is the same mixture of brown olive ‘
that we discover in the Patagonians of the Pampas. Indeed
the colour of the Quichuas is that of Mulattos, and their ~
uniformity is very remarkable among all the men of a pure
race. Ulloa, in his description of the Americans, often
confounds these nations; he speaks as if they were but one
stock, and, confounding them in his memory with the .
North Americans, calls them all red, which they are :

CH. xxx1.] ANDIAN RACES: QUICHUAS. 597

not. Nevertheless he attributed to the heat of the sun and
the action of the air the deeper colour of the Peruvians,
which M. de Humboldt correctly terms bronze.

“ The stature of the Quichuas is low. . We have never
met with any who attained a greater height than ﬁve feet
three inches. The great number of measurements that we
have made authorise us to believe that their mean height
is not above four feet nine inches, and often under that in
many provinces, particularly in the elevated plateaux Where
the rareﬁcation of the air is greatest; while those whom
we had seen, who were of a higher stature, lived princi-
pally in the warm and humid valleys of the province of
Ayupaya. The women are still less, and, perhaps, below
the relative proportion which generally exists among white
races.”

The forms of the Quichuas are more robust than those
of other mountain tribes; they may be described as cha-
racteristic of the race, The Quichuas have very large
square shoulders, a broad chest, very voluminous, highly
arched, and longer than usual, which increases the size of
the trunk, while the normal relation, in respect to length,
of the trunk to the extremities, does not appear to be the
same among the Quichuas as among our European races ;
it differs equally from that of other American families ; the
extremities are, nevertheless, very muscular, and bespeak
great strength; the head is larger than usual in proportion
to the rest of the body ; the hands and feet are always small.
The women present the same characteristics; their necks
are always large.

“ It has been observed, that the trunk is longer in pro-
portion than among other Americans ; and that, for the
same reason, the extremities are, on the contrary, shorter.
We endeavoured at the same time to explain this fact by
the greater development of the chest. It would appear
that any given part of the body may take a greater
extension from any adequate cause, while other parts
follow the ordinary course. An evident proof of this fact

598 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

may be found in the phenomena of imperfect conformation,
in which a certain part of the body, in consequence’of
deformity, does not assume, in external appearance, its
complete natural development, as we see in the trunk of a
dwarf, while this defect does not prevent the extremities
from acquiring those proportions that they would have had
if the trunk had received its full growth. This accounts
for the want of symmetry in the persons of dwarfs, and
for that length of the upper or lower limbs so much out
of proportion with the body. If we admit this fact, difﬁ-
cult to contest, why, in the case in question, may we not
_ admit as well, that the chest, from a cause which we shall
explain, having acquired a more than ordinary extension,
might naturally lengthen the trunk without causing the
extremities to lose their normal proportion, which would
make it appear, as, indeed, it would be, longer than among
other men, where no accident can have altered the form
common to the race?

“ Let us return to the causes which occasion in the
Quichuas the great volume of chest which has been observed
in them. Many considerations have led us to attribute this
to the inﬂuence of the elevated regions in which they
live, and to the modiﬁcations occasioned by the extreme
expansion of the air. The platea’ux which they inhabit
are always comprised between the limits of 7500 to 15,000
feet above the level of the sea; there the air is so rareﬁed
that a much greater quantity must be inhaled at each inspi-
ration than at the level of the ocean. The lungs require
in consequence of their great necessary volume and of their
greater dilatation in breathing, a cavity larger than in lower f
regions. This cavity receives from infancy, and during
the time of its growth, a great development entirely inde- :
pendent of that of other parts. We were desirous of de- f
termining whether, as we might suppose d priori, the ‘
lungs, in consequence of their great size, were not subject 1
to extraordinary modiﬁcations. Inhabiting the city of 1
La Paz, upwards of 11,000 feet above the level of the ‘

CH. xxx1.] ANDIAN RACES: QUICHUAS. 599

‘ocean, and being informed that in the hospital there were
constantly Indians from the populous plateaux still more
elevated, we had recourse to the kindness of our country-
man, M. Burnier, physician to the hospital, and he per-
mitted us to make a post-mortem examination of some of
these Indians from the highest regions ; in these we have,
as we expected, found the lungs of an extraordinary dimen-
sion,'which the external form of the chest clearly indicated.
We remarked that the cells were much larger, and more
in number, than in those of the lungs we had dissected in
France; a condition very necesssry to increase the surface
in contact with the ambient ﬂuid. To conclude, we have
discovered, 1st, that the cells were more dilated ; 2dly, that
their dilatation increases considerably the volume of the
lungs; 3dly, that consequently they must have, to contain
them, a larger cavity ; 4thly, that, therefore, the chest has
a capacity much larger than in the normal state; 5thly,
lastly, that this great development of the chest elongates
the trunk beyond its natural proportions, and places it
almost out of harmony with the length of the extremities,
this remaining the same as if the chest had preserved its
natural dimensions.

“ The features of the Quichuas are well characterised,
and have no resemblance to those of the nations of
the Mediterranean and Brasilio-Guarani races ; theirs is a
" type entirely distinct, though approaching slightly to the
Mexican. Their head is Oblong before and behind, a
little compressed at the sides; the forehead is slightly
arched, short, and falling a little back; nevertheless, the
skull is often voluminous, and announces a tolerably large
deve10pment of brain ; their face is generally broad,
approaching to an oval form; their nose is remarkable,
always prominent, long, and strongly aquiline, as if bent
at its extremity over the upper lip; the nostrils are large,
broad, and very Open; the mouth is larger than common,
and prominent, though the lips are not very thick; the
teeth are always beautiful, even in old age: the chin is

600 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

rather short, without receding, sometimes being even rather
prominent : the checks are slightly raised, and only in
advanced age ; the eyes are of common size, and sometimes
even small, always horizontal ; they are never oblique, or
raised at their exterior angle ; the cornea is never white, it
is invariably rather yellow ; the eyebrows are long, arched,
narrow, and scanty ; the hair is always of a beautiful black,
thick, long, very soft, and straight, and descending very low
over the forehead and sides ; the beard is reduced among
all the Quichuas Without exception, to some straight and
scanty hairs, covering the upper lip, the sides of the
mouth, and the middle of the chin. The Quichua nation
is, perhaps, among the indigenous races, that one which
has the least beard. The proﬁle of the Quichuas forms a
very obtuse angle, and little different from ours : only the
maxillaries advance more than in the Caucasian race; the
arches of the eyebrows are prominent; the base of the nose
is very deep. Their physiognomy is, upon the whole, uni-
form, serious, reﬂective, even melancholy, without, however,
showing indifference : it denotes rather penetration without
frankness. It might be said that they endeavour to hide
their thoughts under the sameness that is remarked in
their countenances, where emotions are rarely exhibited
externally, and never with that vivacity that betrays the
feelings of some races; their features altogether retain a
mediocrity of expression. The women are seldom very ’
handsome ; their noses are not so prominent or curved as
those of the men: the latter, although they have no beard,
have a masculine expression, derived from their strongly
marked features. An ancient vase, which represents with
striking ﬁdelity the features of the present race of Quichuas,
convinces us that for four or ﬁve centuries their physiog-
nomy has undergone no sensible alteration.”

The outline annexed shews the form of a Peruvian
skull in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons.
It was brought from an ancient temple in Peru, and is
supposed to have belonged to the Quichua race: in its

CH. XXXI.] ANDIAN RACES: AYMARAS. 601

general shape, it is very similar to many other crania from
the same country, and to many of the ﬁgures given by Dr.

Morton in his great work, Fm. 95.
“ Crania Americana.” The //J>‘*\\\

. o A
forehead 1n this skull is nar- / s \

row, but the vertex elevated :
these traits, and the short-
ness of the antero-posterior
_ diameter, are the principal
characters of the skull of the x
ancient Incas. Skull ofa Penman.

0f the Aymarms.—The second race belonging to the
Peruvian branch of the Alpine family of nations in South
America are the Aymaras, who greatly resemble the Incas
or Quichuas in physical characters, but differ from them
entirely in language. They were a more numerous, and
extensively spread, and, as it is supposed, a more early
civilised people. The Aymaras appear to be the de-
scendants of that ancient race, who, in ages long past, in-
habited the high plains covered by the singular monuments
of Tiaguanaco, the most ancient city of South America,
and the banks of the mountain lake of Titicaca, where
Manco-Capac, founder of the late dynasty of the Incas,
was believed to have risen from the bosom of the waves.
The fourth of the Incas, who founded their empire at
Cuzco, reduced under his sway Tiaguanaco, and conquered
the country of the Aymaras. This event happened but
two or three centuries before the arrival of Pizarro in
Peru.

No written documents remain to record the ancient
history of the Aymaras. That the solar worship of the
Incas, their arts and civilisation, were derived from them,
may be inferred from the position of the ancient temples,
which turn precisely to the rising sun, and from the
various allegorical sculptures on the sides of the monolithal
porticos. On these is seen thc ﬁgure of the sun sur~
rounded by rays, and that of a man holding the sceptre,

 

602 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

the emblems of a double, both secular and priestly, rule;
while on each side are rows of crowned kings ; and aloft
the condor, the great vulture of the American Alps,
supposed to be the messenger of the gods. It was from
Tiaguanaco, according to the researches of M. d’Orbigny,
that the arts and civilisation of Peru originated, whence
they were conveyed by Manco-Capac and the Incas to
the later city of Cuzco, the seat of regal and sacerdotal
magniﬁcence at the era of the Spanish Conquest.

The Aymaras resemble the Quichuas in one of their
principal characteristics of organisation, which is the great
length and breadth of the chest, a form which eminently
adapts them, by the greater expansion which it allows
to the pulmonary organs, to be the inhabitants of high
mountain-tracts where the atmosphere is light and rare.
They have also the same form of the head, which is often
large, with a capacious cranium, oblong from back to front,
and slightly compressed at the sides. The heads of the
present Aymaras display no traces of that ﬂatness which
is so conspicuous in the skulls found around the lake of
Titicaca, and in other parts of the Aymara country.

In their character, likewise, in their intellectual facul-
ties, in manners, customs, private and social, in agricul-
ture and manufactures, and dress, the Aymaras resemble
in every respect the Quichuas, to whom they were
subject. If we cast a rapid glance over the mode of
architecture of their monuments, the origin ,of which is
lost in the darkness of antiquity, we shall ﬁnd a great
difference between them and those of the Incas. We
refer to the monuments of Tiaguanaco, situated in the
centre of the country belonging to this nation, near to the
lake of Titicaca, of which many ancient authors have
spoken, and of which the origin was so completely un-
known, that they were said, by a ﬁgurative expression,
to have been built before the sun enlightened the earth.
The monuments discovered in this country by M. d’Or-
bigny announce a civilisation more advanced than those

CH. XXXI.] ANDIAN RACES : AYMARAS. 603

which have been described in the ruins of Palenque. They
consist of a tumulus raised more than 100 feet, sur-
rounded with pillars; of temples, from 100 to 200 metres
in length, placed precisely towards the east, and adorned
with colossal angular columns; of porticos of one stone,
Which are covered with reliefs of skilful execution, al-
though of rude design, displaying symbolical representa-
tions of the sun and the condor, his messenger; also a
colossal statue of basalt loaded with bas-reliefs, in which
the design of the carved head is half Egyptian ; and lastly,
the interior of a palace, formed of enormous blocks of rock
completely hewn, whose dimensions are often seven metres
in length and four metres in breadth and thickness. In
the temples and palaces the portals are not inclined, as
among those of the Incas, but perpendicular: and their
vast dimensions, and the imposing masses of which they
are composed, surpass in beauty and grandeur all that
were afterwards built by the sovereigns of Cuzco. We
know not the existence of sculpture, or of bas-reliefs, in
the monuments of the Quichuas, while those of Tia-
guanaco are all thus ornamented. “ The presence of these
remains of an ancient civilisation, upon the point from
which the ﬁrst Inca emerged, to found the empire of
Cuzco, appears to offer an additional proof that from thence .
were transported with Manco-Capac the last memorials of
the earlier grandeur of the Aymaras.”

The tombs of the Aymaras are very different from
those of the Quichuas ; instead of being subterranean,
sometimes they are great square buildings with a simple
opening, through which the dead body was introduced.
Corpses were arranged round a conﬁned cavity, sitting in
their clothes, and, in some instances, covered with a kind
of cloth of straw; sometimes these tombs consist of small
houses built of unburnt bricks of the same form, the top
inclined, and the Opening always directed towards the east ;
often they are square towers of several stories, containing
each a body, as in the Isle of Quebaya and some others

604 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

upon the lake of Titicaca ; but these tombs, although of
immense size, are always joined in groups, and appear
often like large villages.

The fact that the peculiar form of the ﬂattened skulls
found at Titicaca and elsewhere is the result of artiﬁcial
pressure, is so important in regard to the physical history
of the race, and of mankind in general, that I shall incur
the risk of being somewhat prolix in order to lay before my
readers M. d’Orbigny’s observations on this subject.

It is not difﬁcult to furnish proofs of the artiﬁcial
change in the aspect of the skulls themselves. “ We
observe,” says M. d’Orbigny, “ in the ﬂattening of the
frontal bone, in the projection that it forms over the
parietal bones at the upper part, that there has evidently
been compression before and behind, and which has forced
the mass of the brain backwards, by pushing, as it were,
the frontal bone over the parietals.”

“ The head of a young subject in my possession shows
still more clearly by a longitudinal fold which exists at the
upper medial part of the vertex, by a strong projection of
frontal over the parietal bones, and by the prominence
equally strong of the upper part of the occipital over these
parietal bones, that the pressure has been employed in a
circular manner from the earliest age of infancy by means
of a large ligature. This supposition appears still more
admissible when we observe from behind, that not only the
mass of the brain has given a great size to the posterior
parts, to the prejudice of the anterior, but also that the
pressure, having greatly increased the convexity of the
posterior lobes of the brain, the parietal bones have
necessarily followed the same shape in being modelled upon
them ; the parietal bones, likewise, form always two latero-
posterior convexities, slightly separated by an evident de-
pression. W'e ﬁnd again another proof of this pressure in
the obliteration of the sutures, which is observable upon all
the points affected by pressure, even in the heads of the
youngest subjects.”

CH. xxx1.] FLATTENED HEADS OF TITICACA. 605

M. d’Orbigny considers it as now fully proved, that
the depressed or elongated form of these heads is not, as
was supposed, the natural character of the skulls of the
Aymaras, but is only an exception evidently owing to the
intervention of art. It would be interesting to inquire into
the antiquity of this custom of ﬂattening the head, and the
inﬂuence that it is likely to have exercised over the intelli-
gence of the subjects among whom it is found most marked.

“ As to the antiquity of the custom, we see by the proﬁle
of the head of a colossal statue before the era of the Incas,
that they were not then depressed; for the ancient people,
who always aimed to exaggerate existing characteristics,
would not have failed to exhibit them. It is, therefore, pro-
bable that this custom was contemporaneous with the reign
of the Incas. Even the lengthening of the ears of one of
these compressed heads may lead us to determine very
nearly the age in which the individual lived. It was found
in the province of Caraugas to the west of Oruro. It is
known that this province was only conquered under the
reign of the seventh Inca, Yahuar Hucac, who, according
to all probability, lived about the thirteenth century; thus,
as the Incas only granted the honour of stretching the ears
by a special grace, and to recompense a conquered nation
for its prompt submission to their laws, and as this con-
cession came necessarily at the end of the establishment of
the customs of the conquerors, we may suppose that it was
not generally in practice among the Aymaras till towards
the fourteenth or ﬁfteenth century. The statues show,
besides, that the custom of lengthening the ears was
unknown at the time of the ﬁrst civilisation of the plateaux
of the Andes.

“ We have not been able to learn anything clearly with
respect to the inﬂuence which this artiﬁcial deformity of the
head had upon the intellectual faculties of the Aymaras,
since the old historians give us no information ; but there
is reason to believe that there may be a displacement of the
parts of the brain without any diminution of substance.

606 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. ' [BOOK II.

It will be admitted that, by the nature of their occupations,
FIG» 96- the chiefs of these nations
had probably their intel-
lectual faculties more ex-
panded than their vassals.
May we not from this fact
draw an argument in favor
of our opinion ? for the
. most depressed heads that
Skull of Titicacan. we have seen have been
constantly found in tombs whose construction announces
that they belong to the chiefs.”

Atacamas and Ohmz'gos.-Two other nations of inferior
numbers make up the Peruvian group : these are the
Atacama, who occupy the western declivity of the Peruvian
Andes, and the Changos spread along the coast of the
Paciﬁc. They resemble the Quichua in physical cha-
racters ; but the Changos are of darker hue : their colour
is a tawny approaching to black. We cannot fail to connect
this circumstance with their local situation on the sea-
coast, while in so many parallel observations are elsewhere
to be found.

The entire mass of the Peruvian nations has embraced
Christianity. The old Peruvians were pastors and agricul-
turists. Their collective number is stated at nearly two
millions, of whom upwards of 1,300,000 are of the pure
American blood. The example of the Peruvian nations is
sufﬁcient to solve the question, whether the American races
are susceptible of civilisation and of Christianity.

 

2. Antisirm Branch of the Alpine Races of South
America.

It is from the Inca, Garcilaso de la Vega, learned in
the history of his ancestors, which he has written in the
Spanish language, that the name of Antisian is derived
as the distinguishing term for the races who inhabit the
eastern declivity of the Bolivian and Peruvian Andes eX- -

g on. XXXI.] ANDIAN RACES: ANTISIANS. 607

‘_r tending from the 13° to the 17° of southern latitude. In
i this region we look in vain for those lofty and shadeless
[ uplands, where cold mountains and grassy plains near the
[ limits of perpetual snow enable the Quichua and Aymara
[ herdsman to live peaceably on the produce of his tillage
i and of his ﬂocks, amidst the ruins of ancient civilisation
3 and monuments of his national glory. The territory held
l by the Antisian races appears at the ﬁrst View unﬁt for
l human habitation. It consists of abrupt and precipitous
; mountains, on which, however, a vigorous and magniﬁcent
' vegetation is everywhere displayed; of deep and gloomy
' valleys, where impetuous torrents rush over rocky beds.
It is on the banks of mountain-streams, and amidst the
darkness of lofty primeval forests, that the Antisian tribes
have acquired those modiﬁcations of character, physical
and moral, which distinguish them from the natives of the
high and open regions before described.

The nations belonging to this branch are the Yura-
cares, the Mocéténes, the Tacanas, the MarOpas, and the
Apolistas.

The people of these races, dwelling amid humid forests
scarcely penetrated by the solar rays, are, in comparison
with the Quichuas and Aymaras, almost white,* and those
tribes are the fairest who dwell most under the dense and
thickest woods. Their hue is a white, but slightly tawny
or mixed with yellow. One remarkable trait, as yet but im-
perfectly described, is that many persons among these tribes
have their skin spotted with large patches of a still paler
hue. Collectively they are of much greater stature than the
Peruvians of the higher region : their forms are vigorous
and robust; their countenances differ from those of the
mountaineers; their faces are more round ; their features
less elevated; their languages are peculiar; their manners
barbarous and wild.

 

 

* The Yuracarés are so named by the Quichuas; the word yum/c
meaning “ White,” and lurz' “men,” in their language. See The Physical
History of Mankind, Vol. v. p. 476,—ED.

608 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [1300K II.

[Some notices of the almost unknown tribes coming
under this head, occur incidentally in Lieut. Herndon’s
work on the Amazon,* which river he reached by a land
journey from Lima, over the Andes, and along the Huallaga
and Ucayali rivers. The little information previously ac-
cessible may be estimated from the fact that Dr. Latham
could obtain only an imperfect list of their names. The
statements of Lieutenant Herndon relate chieﬂy to the
tribes on the Ucayali ; they are scanty, as he was merely
on his way to the objects of his expedition, but they are
given as the only notices obtainable.

The Conibos live invillages, cultivate the ground, weave
cotton cloth, and make baskets : the weaving is mostly done
by the women. All wear a long cotton gown, which is
painted in various devices by the women. Lieutenant
Herndon met one man whom he describes as the dandy of
his tribe ; he was painted with a broad stripe of red under
each eye, three narrow stripes of blue were carried from
one ear to the other, across the upper lip; the whole of the
lower jaw was painted with a blue chain-work of Chinese-
looking ﬁgures. A broad tight necklace of black and white
beads was around his neck, and a breast-plate of the same
hung down from it, partly hidden by the long gown. He
had broad bracelets of white beads, and bands of lizards’
skins, set round with monkeys’ teeth, higher up the arm.
He wore a little silver shield hanging from his nose, and a
thin plate of silver, 2% inches long, thrust through a hole
in his lip, and hanging on his chin. He had his wife and
two children with him, not described.

The Remos and Shipebos on the same river are painted
and clothed much like the Conibos. “ The Remos are
low and small ; the Shipebos taller.” ' The Pirros are
exactly like the Conibos, but they speak a different lan-
guage. “ They have no idea of a future state, and worship
nothing. In fact, I think they have no ideas at all,

 

* Exploration of the Valley of the Amazon, by Lieut. Wm. Lewis
Herndon, United States Navy. Svo. Washington, 1854:. ‘

E on. xxx1.] ANDIAN names: ANTISIANS. 609

E although they can make a bow or a canoe,~and take a ﬁsh ;
E and their women can weave a coarse cloth from cotton,
and dye it.” The Amajuacas are hunters ; they live in the
interior in villages, and seldom come down upon the rivers;
the Pirros and Conibos sometimes make war upon them,
and bring away captives.

“ The Conibos, Shipebos, Setebos, I’irros, Remos, and
r Amajuacas, are the vagabonds of the lUcayali, wandering
E about from place to place, and settling where they take a
t fancy. They are great boatmen and ﬁshermen. .' . They have
; settlements on the banks of the river; but many of them
i live in their canoes, making huts of reeds and palms upon
l the beaches in bad weather ..... Many have two 0r three
wives; they marry young, and have many children, but
i do not raise more than half of them. They seem docile
i and tractable, though lazy and faithless.” In another
5 place he says, “ The Indians here [at Sarayacu], as else-
' where, are drunken and lazy. The women‘do most of the
: work; carry most of the burdens to and from the chacras
. [huts] and canoes ; make the masato [an intoxicating drink
' made from the yucca], and the earthen vessels out of
' which it is drunk; spin the cotton and weave the cloth;
:cook, and take care of the children. And their reward
i is to be maltreated by their husbands, and, in their
. drunken frolics, to be cruelly beaten, and sometimes badly
' wounded.”

The Sencis, above Sarayacu, on the right bank of the
[ river, are said, on the authority of the Peruvian missionary
; governor, to be superior to the other tribes ; to be
mumerous, bold, and warlike ; to have names for the con--
: stellations, and to take an interest in the astronomical
lobservations made by white men; and ﬁnally, to be so
iindustrious “ that they kill those who are idle, and in-
I disposed to do their fair share of work.” Lieut. Herndon,
l however, tells us that he saw some Sencis at Sarayacu, who
:seemed to be just like other Indians, and that he heard
i there of nothing peculiar about them.
R R

— ,_.- ,- .

610 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

The Campas, on the upper waters of the Ucayali, are the
most numerous and warlike tribe, who have succeeded in
prohibiting all strangers from entering their country.
Lieut. Herndon believes that these are the warlike Chunchos
Who have been so often opposed to the whites, and who
destroyed the missions of the Cerro de la Sal in 1742 ; and
he has “ little doubt that they are descendants of the Inca
race.” The Cashibos, 0r Callisecas, found on the Pachitea,
an afﬂuent of the Ucayali, are also warlike and exclusive;
they have beards, and are said to be cannibals. A small
tribe called Lorenzos occupy the upper part of the same
river.

The inhabitants of ‘Sarayacu are divided into the three
tribes of Panos, Omaguas, and Yameos ; the latter the
whitest and handsomest tribe seen by Lieut. Herndon.
They lived in separate parts of the town, and spoke diﬂ’e-
rent languages, but in their communication they used the
Pano language.

Lower down the river, and along the south bank of the
Amazon, are the Mayorunas, a warlike and exclusive tribe,
of whom Lieut. Herndon could hear little more. than that
they wore beards, were whiter than the other Indians, and
were naked. His boatmen were careful not to camp on
their side of the river.

Lieut. Herndon also visited the Yaguas, a tribe on the 1
northern frontier of Peru, where it joins the republic of ‘
Ecuador. He describes them as having a vacant and stupid1l
expression, but being in their general appearance tho- :
roughly savage. Their dress 1s composed of a girdle of bark
around the loins, with bunches of a ﬁbrous bark hanging 1
down before and behind, and similar bunches hung round .
the neck and arms by a collar and bracelets of little beads.
Long tail-feathers of the macaw were stuck in the armlets, ‘
reaching above the shoulders, and a chaplet of smaller white 1
feathers was worn around the head. The dress of the 1
women was a yard or two of cotton cloth rolled round the 1
hips. Their houses are like a gigantic bee-hive, about i

CH. xxx1.] ANDIAN RACES. 611

thirty feet in diameter, composed of strong poles well
wattled and thatched ; on the inside, four or ﬁve small
cabins of cane are built around the walls at intervals, in
which separate families reside. The middle space is used
in common; “ it is never cleaned, nor even levelled, and is
littered with all manner of abominations. The Yaguas are
quiet and harmless, but the men are lazy, and much given
to drunkenness. The patient, much-enduring women do
all the work, including the preparation of drink for their
lazy masters. They are fond of dancing, which they keep
up with a vigour somewhat opposed to their alleged lazi-
ness, to the monotonous music of the drum.

Lieut. Herndon, speaking of these Indians generally,
compares them to children, and thinks that good example,
with a wholesome degree of discipline, may do much with
so docile a race ; but he continues, somewhat inconsistently,
“ I myself believe, and I think the case of the Indians in
my own country bears me out in the belief, that any
attempt to communicate with them ends in their destruc-
tion. They cannot bear the restraints of law, or the burden
of sustained toil, and they retreat before the face of the
White man, with his improvements, till they disappear”

(p. 228).]
3. The Araucaniom Branch.

The Araucanian branch of the Alpine family of South
American nations comprehends the native inhabitants of all
the southern regions of the Cordillera, and of its declivities
on both sides, reaching from the 30° of south latitude to the
extremity of the Land of Fire. It consists of two nations,
'the Araucans, a warlike and indomitable race, whose
heroism is celebrated in the history of the Spanish con-
querors of Peru, and the Pesherais, or IchthyOphagi of
Tierra del Fuego, who inhabit the southern extremity of
the long American mountain-chain separated from the
continent by the Magellanic Straits. These two nations
have, owing to their different local circumstances, very dif-

612 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

ferent manners ; but they display, according to the observa-
tions of M. d’Orbigny, who lived among one of the two
nations, similar physical characters. They exemplify, in-
deed, that physical type which is peculiar to the American
mountaineers, and common to the nations of this and of
the ﬁrst branch of the Alpine group. One description is
applicable to both nations : their heads are proportionably
large ; their face round, with projecting cheek-bones, large
mouths, thick lips, short, ﬂattened noses, with wide nos-
trils ; their eyes are horizontally placed, and not inclined ;
otherw1se their countenance would approximate greatly to
that of the nomadic Tartars; they have little beard ; their
foreheads are narrow and falling back; their chins broad
and short. ' ‘
The Araucans are of the same colour as the Peruvian
nations, but of a much lighter shadei" The Boroanos,
one of these tribes, are, indeed, almost white. M. d’Or-'
bigny discredits the positive statement of Molina, that the
Araucans of the high province of Boroa have fair com-'
plexions, with blue eyes. The statement of Molina, that
the Boroanos are very fair, is given and repeated in dif-
ferent passages. I ﬁnd, in an extract given by Malte-Brun
from an account of Chili, in the “ Viagero Universalj,"
translated from the Spanish in the “ Annales des Voyages,” ‘
the following account of the Araucans in general 2—“ Ilsi
ont le teint brun-roux et plus clair que celui des autres:
Américains. Ceux de la tribu des Boroanos sont meme
blancs et blonds.” An English traveller in Chili, Mr. Cald-
cleugh, gives some conﬁrmation to this remark. He says ,
that, among the lower classes in Chili, some surprisingly 1.
white men, with features different from those of the a
Spaniards, were pointed out to him, and were said to be
the descendants of the White Araucans (see Plate 58).
There could be nothing very wonderful in the appear— ~'
ance of the xanthous complexion in the high tracts of ‘

 

. ’X‘ The portrait of an Araucan, from the Atlas of Von Spix and Martius,l
exempliﬁes this description.

en. XXXI.] ANDIAN RACES: ARAUCANIANS. 613

South America beyond the tropics, when we consider that
the same phenomenon displays itself in the inhabitants of
the Rocky Mountains in the Northern hemisphere.

[A volume by Don Ignatius Domeyko, printed at San-
tiago in 18 45, O“ives a rather different account of the physical
characteristics of the Araucans. The following notice is
extracted from a translation of part of the work taken out
of a Report in a late number of the Literary Gazette. \Vith
regard to the remarks on their moral condition, it must be
premised that the work of the reverend professor is upon
the whole somewhat of a panegyric. “ They are of swarthy
complexion, less ruddy but clearer than that of the other
indigenous Americans. The face is somewhat oblong, eyes
large, lively, and expressive, with narrow, well-arched eye-
brows. The countenance is more like the Caucasian than
the Mongolian type. The nose is less broad and more
prominent than that of the Indians of the North ; in
some it is aquiline : the lips are well formed, the lower
one a little prominent : the hair black, harsh, and dense,
but never curling ........ The Araucanian Indian’s
features are less Indian, and his complexion less coppery
in colour, than the Indians of the Northern provinces of
Chili ..... In domestic life they are sociable and liberal,
but jealously preserve the rights of their homestead. No
guest enters a house without the knowledge and permission
of the owner. W'hen guests have entered the house by
invitation, the owner approaches, gives his hand to each,
invites them to feel at ease, and, having conducted them
to their appointed seats, sits down in front of them. He
then with great seriousness makes a long and elaborate
discourse of compliments, which may occupy a full half-
hour. The guests silently evince respect, and are as solemn
as if they were concerned in some religious act. While
these ceremonials. of etiquette are taking place, refreshment
is being prepared in another room. The discourse ended,
the features relax, the tone is changed, and generalconver-
sation on ordinary topics succeeds. It is customary,

614 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

on the conclusion of the discourse, for the owner to rise
from his seat, and, if the guests be worthy, to embrace
each three times, placing his hand alternately to the right
and to the lef ” (Literary Gazette, Nov. 26, 1853).]

The Peskemis, or Ichthyopkagéof Tierra del Fuego.—-
The Pesherais are the inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego,
referred by d’Orbigny to the Araucanian race. These
people ﬁrst received the name Péchérais from Bougainville;
by it they have been since distinguished, and there seems to
be no reason for changing this designation for the awkward
one of Fuegian.

The afﬁnity of the Pesherais to the Araucanos is as yet
only a matter of conjecture; the supposition is founded
on their proximity and mutual resemblance.

The Pesherais inhabit all the coast of Tierra del Fuego,
and both borders of the Strait of Magellan, from the
Island of Elizabeth and Port Famine towards the east, as
far as the group of islands which spread to the northward
and southward of the Strait ; they are separated from the
Patagonians by the sea, and by the chain of mountains
which constitutes the isthmus, and joins the Peninsula of
Brunswick to the continent. It is between these limits
that navigators discovered the people whom they have
described as Patagonians of small stature. The Pesherais
may there communicate on one side with the Patago-
nians, to the east of the Port Famine, or with the tribe
of the Araucans, of the Archipelago of Chonos, upon the
western side of America; and this accounts for the Spanish
words which Captain Weddell heard them pronounce.
Their manner of life, and the ices of the mountainous e
country which they inhabit, conﬁne them exclusively to :
the coast. . 1

Their colour is olive, or tawny, and paler than that of the .
Peruvians and their neighbours the Araucanos. ‘

Their ﬁgure has but little elegance, like that of almost
all the Americans; they have huge forms and large chests, 3
and are, notwithstanding, tolerably well made. The dif- .

CH. xxx1.] ANDIAN RACES : PESHERAIS. 615

ference of opinion between travellers who saw them robust
and with well-formed limbs, as Brak, Narborough, De-
gennes, Cook, and Weddell, and, on the other hand, Duclos
Guyot, and Bougainville, who represent them as puny and
meagre, arises, probably, from the season when they were
seen, as the winter would naturally have great inﬂuence
on the plentifulness of their nourishment. Their staggering
gait depends, no doubt, upon the crookedness of their legs,
which is caused by their way of sitting on the ground
cross-legged, after the eastern fashion; this custom naturally
turns the feet inwards. The women appear to have the
same shape as the men; and it would be in vain to seek
among them those proportions which are consecrated by
European art.

Their features indicate relation to the Araucanos,
whose neighbours they are; their head is rather large, and
their face round ; they have a short and rather broad nose,
open nostrils, little eyes, black and horizontal; the mouth
is wide, the lips thick, the teeth white, and well arranged;
the ears are small, and the cheek-bones project but little.
They appear to have very little beard, and pluck it out, as
they do also their eyebrows. Their hair, like that of all
the Americans, is black, long, and ﬂat. With this assem-
blage of characteristics, we never ﬁnd among them that
ﬁerce expression which marks some nations of hunters : on
the contrary, they have a smile full of simplicity, and their
character perfectly corresponds with their exterior. Mild
and oblig'mg as they are, no voyager has ever com-
plained of them, and many have even described them
with praise.

“ As they are habitually a walking and wandering race,
the manner of their existence does not permit them to
form themselves into large societies. Living only by the
chase and ﬁshing, they are always advancing in small
numbers from one place to another, as they exhaust the
animals, and especially the shell-ﬁsh of the coasts. Since
they inhabit a country cut up into a multitude of islands,

616 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

they have become navigators, and in this differ completely
from the nations who border upon them; for the Pata-
gonians have never had a notion of making a raft to pass
a river. The Pesherais traverse incessantly all the shores
of the Land of Fire, and of the countries situated to the
westward of the Strait : they are seen assembled in com-
panies of two or three families, or sometimes four. They
construct canoes with the bark of trees, sewn together with
the tendons of animals, twelve or ﬁfteen feet long, and
three wide, and stop up the joints with rushes ; within they
support them with branches, and without smear them over
with resin, with aid of no other tools than shells or pieces
of ﬂint: then they desert their cabins, which are conical,
and made of branches of trees ﬁxed in a. circle in the
ground, and joined at the top. They often live in dwellings
some feet under ground, and covered with clay or the skin
of the sea-wolf; and, near the middle, a ﬁre burns, whose
smoke can only escape by a single low aperture, which
serves them for a door. Men, women, children, and a
number of dogs, embark in the frail skiff ; the women
row, the men remain inactive, but always ready to pierce
the ﬁsh which they see with a dart armed with a sharp stone
at the end. Thus they arrive at another island ; and then
the women are charged with guarding the canoes, and ﬁsh-
ing for shell-ﬁsh, while the men busy themselves in the
chase with a sling and bow, with arrows headed with ﬂint.
Next they build a new cabin, and live there for some
time; but, as the chase and ﬁshing become less plentiful,
re-embark and proceed to establish themselves elsewhere.
Each family is thus constantly exposed to the perils of the
sea, and to the rough weather of a climate almost always
frosty, and that, so to say, without clothing. A piece of
sea-wolf’s skin scarcely covers the shoulders of the men,
while the woman only has a little apron of the same mate-
rial, or, in winter, some pieces of the skin of the guanaco.
In the midst of this poverty, who would not be surprised
to see a sort of reﬁnement and coquetry among the Pesh-

CH. xxx1.] PESHERAIS or TIERRA DEL FUEGO. 617

erais ? They cover their neck, arms, and legs, with nick-
nacks or shells; they paint their bodies, and still more
often their faces, with different white, black, and red
ﬁgures,—a custom common to the Patagonians; and the
'men sometimes adorn their heads with a bonnet and
feathers. All of them carry a kind of buskins made of
the skin of the sea-wolf.”

As is customary among hunting people, they have often
quarrels and petty wars among them, which last but a
short time, but are often renewed.

Unfortunate in their climate and country, they live for
the most part on shell-ﬁsh, roasted or raw ; on ﬁsh, birds,
and sea-wolves, whose fat they eat raw ; sharing their food
with their dogs, which accompany them wherever they go.
Thus they pass the most rigorous season, not under ground,
like the inhabitants of the extreme North, but without the
temperature having the slightest inﬂuence on their manner
of life. Among them, as among all other savage tribes,
the women, whom civilisation spares from hard toil, are
forced to engage in occupations the most fatiguing, besides
the employments natural to their sex, and their duties as
mothers: they row, ﬁsh, build cabins, and, even in the
water, brave the extreme rigour of cold. In a word, the
’Pesherai women are, perhaps, of all the savage women of
America, those whose lot is the hardest.

The religion of the Pesherais, according to the slight
account that voyagers have given of it, appears to be that
of the Patagonians; they believe at any rate, in anothei
life, and mark the instant of death by lamentation and
superstitious ce1emonies.

When sick, they have sorceries, like the Patagonians
and Araucanos, practised by a woman : pressure of the
stomach, suction of diffe1ent parts of the body, magic words
addressed to an invisible being, the physician-priest has
his hail powdered and adorned with two white feathe1s,
which 1s not seen among the Patagonians.

Though they have been 1"“0fe11ed to the race of black

618 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [300K II.

men Who occupy Van Diemen’s Land, the Pesherais
have certainly none of the characteristic traits of the
nations of the Great Ocean; they evidently belong to the
American family. So far as their features and stature are
concerned, they have much resemblance to the Araucanos ;
their language approaches in sound to that of the Pata-
gonians and Puelches, and in grammatical form to that of
the Araucanos; their arms, religion, and their style of
painting the face, are also those of the three neighbouring
nations; but they are distinguished from them by their
speech. Their physical characters seem, on the whole, to
connect them with the branchbf the Aucas, or Araucanos,
of Chili. 7

CHAPTER XXXII.

MEDITERRANEAN GROUP OF SOUTH AMERICAN NATIONS.

I VENTURE to give this designation to the third great
class of races in South America, inhabiting principally in-
land countries, intermediate between the Alpine nations of
the Cordilleras, and the widely spread tribes of the Brasilian
countries, or of the western region. The races included in
this department are further divided into three subordinate
groups or branches,———the Patagonian, the Chiquitian,
and the Moxian. I shall ﬁrst describe the Patagonian
branch.

1. Patagonian Branch.

The Patagonian group comprehends, besides the proper
Patagonians, several other nomadic tribes who resemble
that people, and who live partly to the southward and in
part to the northward of the Rio de la Plata. Those to the
southward are all the wandering hordes of the Pampas, or
level plains between the River of Silver and the Magellanic
Straits. The northern tribes are people who resemble the

CH. xxx11.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: PATAGONIANS. 619

Patagonians in physical characters, living between the
river Paraguay and the lowest outskirts of the Cordillera,
extending northward as far as the latitude of Potosi in 20°
south latitude, and reaching over the great inland plain
of Chaco. The Patagonian tribes are the nomadic nations
of the New World. Ever erratic, since horses have been
' naturalised in South America these nations have become
equestrian nomades, and wander over their arid plains, living
under tents of skins, or in the forests of Chaco under huts
of straw or bark. They are all ﬁerce, untamable warriors,
averse to agriculture and all the arts of civilisation; and
have ever resisted, some to extermination, the arms of the
Spaniards.

The complexion of these nations is darker than that of
most other South Americans ; it has nothing of the red
or copper colour, but is an olive-brown. M. d’Orbigny
compares it to the colour of Mulattos.ale The natives of
Chaco are all, according to that writer, equally dark with
the Patagonians : the Charrua and the Puelche are of the
deepest tint (see Plate 59). Among the tribes of this stock
are the tallest, more powerful, and athletic forms. The
Patagonians and the Abipones are celebrated in this point
of view. The stature of the most southern of the stock is
greatest ; it diminishes as we go northward towards Chaco,
in the middle part of the continent. In these tribes gene-
rally the trunk of the body is large and robust; the breast
strongly arched; the limbs massive and round; but the
hands and feet are small. The women are stout and
vigorous, and without feminine grace or comeliness. The
heads of the Patagonians are large ; their face broad and
ﬂat; their cheek-bones prominent. These characters are
tolerably well displayed in the following sketch.

 

3“ This description suits at least one nation of the stock, namely, the
Charruas, who, however, are darker than Mulattos. A plate opposite to
this page displays a tolerably good portrait of a small group of Charruas,
who were exhibited some years ago in Paris, whither they had been
brought at the time when the Charruan race was exterminated.

620 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11'. .

FIG. 97.

 

Patagonian.

In the nations of Chaco, the eyes are small, horizontal,
but sometimes turned up slightly at the outer angle ; the

FIG. 98. , nose depressed, broad, with
i/f‘i; ~- patulous nostrils ; the mouth
/, /_, 71:53. i \ large; lips thick and pro-’

minent ; chin short ; eye-
brows arched ; beard scanty ;
hair lank and black; the eX-

pression of their countenance
- l“ i l ' is cold, sullen, often ﬁerce.*
° Skull ofaPataé’vmn' The languages of these
nations have some characters in common, though they are
distinct among themselves : they are harsh, and guttural,
and difﬁcult of utterance.

    

* There is a Patagonian skull in the Museum of the Royal College
of Surgeons, from Which the sketch that accompanies the text was taken;
Its contour is large and ‘Iround, the longitudinal diameter short: the
breadth of the face, which cannot be estimated by the outline, is very

considerable.

..cu. XXXIL] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: PATAGONIANS. 621

The particular nations cOmprehended under this group

are the Téhuelche, or proper Patagonians; the Puelche,
or tribes of the eastern Pampas to the southward of the
.Silver River; the Charruas, on the Uruguay; the Tobas
or Mbocobi, who possess the greater part of Chaco; these
are the most numerous nations of the whole group, their
probable number amounting to 14,000 souls; the Mata-
guayos, likewise in Chaco; the Lenguas; and lastly, the
celebrated Abipones of Azara and Dobrizhofer, the Gen-
taurs of the New World.
_ Besides these nations, the Spanish authors give the
names of forty others, inhabitants of Chaco and the coun-
tries to the westward of the Paraguay. Among them the
Payaguas and the Mbayas are the most celebrated. In
the opinion of M. d’Orbigny, their number has been
greatly exaggerated. They appear to belong to this same
group of nations, if arranged according to their physical
characters.

The following account of Chaco and its inhabitants is
taken from Dobrizhofer, who made a long abode in South
.America.

Chaco, according to this writer, is looked upon by the
Spaniards as the theatre of their misery, and by the native
people as their Paradise or Elysium. “ Several tribes,”
he says, “formerly dwelt in Chaco, of whom the names
alone, or very slender relics, now exist. Of this number

were the Calchaquis, formerly very numerous, famous for
0 military ferocity; at present a few survive in a corner of
' the territory of Santa Fe, the rest having long since fallen
Victims to war or to the small-pox. Nearly the same fate
has swept away the equestrian tribes of the Malbalaes,
Mataras, Palomos, Mogosnas, Oxejones, Aquilotes, Chu-
rumates, Ojotades, Tanos, Quamalcas, &c. The eques-
trian nations still subsisting in Chaco are the Abipones,
Natekebits, Tobas, Amokebits, Mocobios, Yapetalacas‘,
and Oekakakalots, Guaycurus or Lenguas. The Mbayas,
dwelling on the eastern shore of the Paraguay, call them:-

622 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

selves Epiguayegis; those on the western, Quetiadegodis.
The pedestrian tribes are the Lules and the Ysistines, who
speak the same language, viz. the'Tonocote, and have been
for the most part converted by us, and settled in towns ;
the Homoampas, Vilelas, Chunipies, Yooles, Ocoles, and
Pazaines, who are in great part Christians; the Mata-
guayos, whom we have so often attempted to civilise, and
who have always proved indocile ; the Payaguas, the
Guanas, and the Chiquitos. Other tribes, Speaking various
languages, in the woods, have been added by our order to
the colonies of the Chiquitos, as the Zamucos, Caypotades,
Ygaronos.”

The particular characters of the southern tribes of this
division, who inhabit the open plains called the Pampas,
must be expected to diﬁ‘er considerably from those of the
forests of Chaco.

The people of the Pampas, who are the Puelche, are
described by the English missionary, Falkner, and by Don
Felix de Azara. “ At the arrival of the Spaniards,” says
Azara, “ they wandered 0n the shores of the Great River,
opposite to the Charruas, a nation of Paraguay, but with-
out any intercourse, neither people possessing barks or
canoes by which they might pass the stream. They made
a vigorous resistance to the colonists who ﬁrst settled at
Buenos Ayres; but were obliged gradually to retire towards
the south.”

The people of the Pampas lived formerly by hunting
sloths, hares, stags, and ostriches, which were very abun-
dant in their country ; but since horses and horned cattle
have run wild, and Spread in immense herds over the ‘
plains, they have fed on the ﬂesh of these animals. Their
language, according to Azara, is different from all others.
They are not so taciturn as other nations in this part of
America, and their voice is not so low and almost in-
audible. “ Leur taille,” says the author above cited, “ ne
me parait pas inférieure a l’Espagnole, mais en général ils
ont les membres plus forts, la téte plus ronde et plus

CH.XXXII.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: PATAGONIANS. 623

grosse, les bras plus courts, 1a ﬁgure plus large, et plus
sévere que nous et que les autres Indiens, et- la couleur
mains fonce’e.” The men go nearly naked. “ Ils ne font
point usage du barbote :” by this last circumstance they
are distinguished from all the tribes of Paraguay. The
women wear a poncho, or shirt, which covers their whole
body. They wander about and dwell under tents formed
of hides, which they easily remove. They are of milder
disposition and less depraved than most of the nations of
savages in this part of America.

Azara has likewise described the tribes inhabiting
Chaco. He says that the Abipones in particular are well
formed, and have handsome faces, much like those of
Europeans, except in colour. “ I observed that almost all
of them had black, but rather small eyes; yet they see
more acutely with them than we do with our larger ones.”
The common shape of their noses is aquiline ; they are a
very handsome people; have seldom or never any bodily
defects. Almost all the Abipones are so tall that they
might be enlisted among the Austrian Musketeers ; they
are destitute of beard, and have perfectly smooth chins,
like all the other Indians. “ If you see an Indian with a
little beard, you may conclude, without hesitation, that one
of his parents or more remote ancestors was an European.”
The same writer afterwards adds, “that they have a few
straggling hairs, or down, on their chins, which are plucked
out by the women, who act as barbers. All the Abipones
have thick, raven-black locks.” As to colour, he says
“ that none of the native Americans whom he has seen are
as fair as the Germans or English; but many of them are
fairer than many Spaniards, Portuguese, and Italians.
They have whitish faces, but this whiteness, in some
nations, approaches more to a pasty colour; in some it is
darker,——a difference occasioned by diversity of climate,
manner of living, or food. The women are fairer than the
men, because they go out of doors less frequently.” He
informs us in the sequel to these observations, that the

624 ., ‘ NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. ‘ [300K 11‘;

AbipOnes, Mboeobis, and Tobas, and other tribes who
live in Chaco, about ten degrees farther north, and, con-
sequently, in a hotter climate, are yet of fairer colour than
the Puelche and Aucas of the Magellanic region. Probably
the different degrees of elevation above the level of the sea
ought here to be taken into the account. The author of
this lemark contrasts the fact with the more them moderate
whltehess of the people of Ttemcl del Fue’go.

2 and 3. Agricultural and, Fishing Tribes of the Ohiqultos
and the Moxos.

The inland and almost central provinces of .South
America, to the northWard of Chaco, receive their Spanish
names of Los Chiquitos and Los Moxos from two prin-
cipal nations who inhabit them. These same nations are
the types of two groups of American races who are found
in the same regions. M. d’Orbigny makes them subor-
dinate divisions of the class of nations described under the
last head. They differ, however, in many important par-
ticulars from all the Patagonian tribes, and from those of
Ghaeo. These differences may, indeed, be accounted for
by referring to the local conditions of their respective
countries. Unlike the wide plains of Chaco, which afford a
proper abode to nomadic and equestrian tribes, the country
of the Chiquitos, consisting of low hills covered with forests,
and intersected by an inﬁnity of small streams, conﬁnes the
people to the places of their birth, where» they live in small
villages, and cultivate the soil. The Moxos, on the other
hand, dwell in vast plains, subject to frequent inundations,
and traversed by immense rivers, which they are obliged to
navigate in boats. The Moxos are ﬁshing tribes, ichthyo-
phagi of the river-lands of the interior. The Chiquitos
lived in small villages, each containing a family or clan :
among them the men were naked; the females covered a
with a loose and gaily decorated garment. They buried
their dead, and, like other savages, with them laid arms
and provisions for their use in a future life. The Chiquitos

CH. xxx11.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: CHIQUITIANS. 625

are remarkable for the liveliness of their disposition, for
their fondness for dancing and music, for their kindness
on all occasions, their sociable temper, their hospitality,
their freedom from jealousy as to their wives and
daughters, for their perseverance, and the facility with
which they became Christians. We must not, however,
suppose that all the tribes proved themselves equally docile :
the deaths of several Jesuits since the foundation of the
missions would prove the contrary ; but, once become
Christians, they persevered, and at this time would not
return to the woods under any consideration ; and in this
they differ from the people of the plains, who, so far from
having ever submitted to the yoke, are to this day what
they were at the era of their discovery. The nation of the
Chiquitos were the most easy of reduction, and, without
doubt, drew others by their example.

The features of the Chiquitos, according to M. d’Or-
bigny, differing from those of the nations of Chaco, might
serve as the type of the races inhabiting the hilly tracts in
the centre of America. They have a round head, larger
than usual, almost always circular, and seldom compressed ,
at the sides ; a round and full face ; cheek-bones projecting
but little ; a‘ low and arched forehead ; a nose always short,
and but slightly ﬂattened; and nostrils little open, com-
pared with those of southern nations; the eyes, full of
expression and vivacity, are small and horizontal; however,
in the case of some individuals, they are slightly drawn out
at the outer corner, which makes them seem a little ele-
vated; but this is an exception. The lips are tolerably
thin; the teeth good; the mouth small; the chin rounded
and short; the eyebrows narrow and gracefully arched: they
‘have a thin beard, and not curled, which only grows at an
advanced age, and never covers more than the upper lip
and under part of the chin; their hair is long, black, and
sleek, and, in extreme old age, grows yellow, but never
White. Their features, on the whole, do not approach to
the European type.

s s

626 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. ' [BOOK II.

The Moxos resemble the Chiquitos in their moral
qualities, which are, with but little modiﬁcation, the same
in all these nations. Before the conquest, ﬁxed by their
religious customs, they were scattered among villages esta-
blished on the banks of the rivers and lakes, as well as in
the woods or in the midst of plains : they were everywhere
ﬁshermen, hunters, and principally cultivators of the land.
The chase was only used by them as a recreation, but ﬁsh-
ing was a necessary employment, and agriculture procured
them provisions, and the materials necessary for a favourite
liquor, which, as among the Chiquitians, was made in a
common house where strangers were received, and where, on
certain days, the inhabitants met to drink, sing, and dance ;
but their amusements had a character of gravity that was
not found among the Chiquitos : their customs, also, were
more barbarous. A Moxos would sacriﬁce his wife if she
miscarried, through superstition, and his children if they
were twins; while the mother, on her side, often got rid
of her children when they troubled her. Marriage was a
convention that might be dissolved at the wish of the
parties, and polygamy was of ordinary occurrence. Their
habit of being always in canoes caused them to explore
the streams, which they were ever traversing, whether
for hunting or ﬁshing, or even for going to their habita-
tions. They were all, more or less, warriors; but tradi-
tions and records have only preserved the memory of a
single cannibal tribe who ate their prisoners ; this was the
Canichana, who, even to this day, are the terror of the other
tribes. The manners of this nation have been modiﬁed by
the discipline of the missions; but it has preserved many
of its primitive customs.

Several particular nations are included under each of
these divisions. The tribes coming into the same group
with the Chiquitos are thus enumerated by M. d’Or!
bigny :—

CH. XXXII.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: CHIQUITIANS. 627

Number of Individuals in each Nation.

 

 

Name of Nations. Christians. Heathens. Total.
Chiquitos ............ 14,925 . . . . -— . . . . 14,925
Samucus ............ 1,250 . . . . 1000 . . . . 2,250
Paiconécas .......... 610 . . . . 300 . . . . 910
Saravécas ............ 350 .. . . —-— . . . . 350
Otukés .............. 150 . . . . — . . . . 150
Curuminacas ........ 150 . . . . — . . . . 150
Curavés 150 — 150
Covarécas ............ 5O . . . . 100 . . . . 150
Corabécas .......... —— . . . . 100 . . . . 100
Tupiis.............. 50 —— 50
Curucanécas 50 — 50
Totals ........ 17,735 1500 19,235

From this total, it is easy to judge of the number of
the aborigines remaining in the territory of the province
of Chiquitos. If we believe historians, the number must
have been much greater, and entire nations, as well as
many tribes of Chiquitos, must have been decimated in the
expeditions of discovery made by those adventurers who
left Paraguay in search of gold; in the incursions of the
Mamelucos of San-Pablo, of Brazil, who hunted down
the Indians to sell them; and, lastly, by a company of
Spanish merchants of Santa Cruz, of the Sierra, who, fol-
lowing the example of the Portuguese, made for some time
an infamous trade of the poor Chiquitos with the prOprie-
tors of the mines of Peru. Afterwards there were con-
tinued pestilences, the ravages of which were dreadful,
from the era when the Jesuits arrived in the territory of
the province, and continued to our time. All these causes
of depopulation make it probable that at present not
more than half the number of inhabitants who possessed
the country at the time of its discovery, survive. It is
easy to see, on casting an eye over our table, that the
nation of Chiquitos forms, by itself, six-sevenths of the
population of the country; while, of the rest, only the
Samucus and Paiconécas are of any importance: hence
the propriety of taking the nation of the Chiquitos as the

628 , NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

type of a group of nations, in which we recognise the
following general characters: —

The colour is the same as that of the aborigines of
Chaco, though a little less deep , that 1s to say, bronze, or
more correctly, a pale brown, mixed with. olive, and not
with red or yellow. It has been observed thatthe Samucus
are more deeply coloured than the other nations of the
province; but this is in so slight a degree, that it is
necessary to see many individuals together in order to
recognise the difference.

The stature .of the Chiquitos is smaller than that of
the inhabitants of the plains of Chaco and of the south,
and scarcely varies. The average 'is 'ﬁVe feet one inch
and a half, while the tallest are not more than ﬁve feet
ﬁve to six inches. The women do not approach so nearly
to the men in height as is common among the southern
nations ; they only preserve the relative proportions.

The form of the body, among the Chiquitos, differs but
little from that of the Indians of Chaco: as in them the
trunk is robust, the chest protruding, and the shoulders
broad; but in general there is less of strength apparent
in them. The body is compact; the limbs are full, exhi-
biting a well-rounded shape, without having any apparent
muscles; otherwise the men are straight and well-set, and
have an easy gait. The women are larger and heavier,
and of the same diameter down the whole length of their
body; accordingly, they exhibit much vigour, and present
nothing of the ideal beauty of ancient forms.

The features of the Chiquitos are characteristic: the
head is large and nearly round, not compressed at the
sides ; the face very full and rounded; the cheek-bones not
projecting; the forehead low and arched; the nose, always 3
short, is less ﬂattened than that of the races of the plains ,
the eyes are sunk, lively, expressive, almost always hori-
zontal; but, in the case of some individuals, the outer angle '
is drawn out, and shows a tendency to raise itself, as in the f
Guaranian race; the lips are tolerably thin; the mouth ’

i
l

-l,

CH. XXXII.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: CHIQUITIANS. 629'

much smaller than among'the nations of Chaco, and always
ready to smile; the chin is rounded and short; the eye-
brows thin and well-marked; the beard only covers the
under part of the chin, and the moustache, which is con-
stantly thin, is not curled; the countenance is open, and
shows gaiety, frankness, and much vivacity. Notwith-
standing, no one could say that they have elegant ﬁgures;
most of them, on the contrary, are below mediocrity. The
women have a still rounder face than the men, with an
expression of much gaiety and simplicity. In general, the
ﬁgure of the men has nothing masculine. ‘

The Chiquitian languages are as numerous as the
nations who speak them. Far from being as guttural as
those of Chaco, most of them are even sweet and melodious,
and present neither harsh sounds nor that redundance of
consonants so common in the latter. The language of
Chiquito, by its termination in oh, and that of the
Morotocas, a section of the Samucus, by those in 0d and ad,
offer a trait of resemblance to those of Chaco. The
guttural sound of the Spanish j occurs in the languages of
Saravéca, Curuminéca, Covaréca, and Pa'i'conéca; but in
all the others it is wanting. The French u, pronounced
in the nose, is to be found in the language of Chiquito, in
the Otukéan, Curuminécan, Covarécan, and Paiconécané.
Several of them have the French ch, and the soft sound of
the z. A singular anomaly occurs in the Chiquitian lan-
guage, in which, for many things, men and women use
different words ; while, for others, the woman uses the
same words as the men, contenting herself with changing
the termination. Though those languages are very com-
plicated, especially that of the Chiquitos, none of them has
an extended system of numeration, which proves the exist-
ence of few relations, and an entire want of trafﬁc.

The nations who resemble the Moxos are associated
with that people under one division, as follows :~—

630 NATURAL HISTORY or 'MAN. [BOOK II.

Number of Individuals'in each Nation.

 

 

Name of Nations. Christians. Heathens. Total.
Moxos ............ 12,620 . . . . 1000 . . . . 13,620
Chapacuras . . . .. . . 1,050 .. . , 300 .. .. 1,350
Itonamas .......... 4,815 . . . . -— . . . . 4,815
Canichanas .. . . . . .. 1,939 .. . . -— .. . . 1,939
Movimas.......... 1,238 —- 1,238
Cayuvavas ........ 2,073 . . . . —- . . . . 2,073
Pacaguarras........ 12 1000 1,012
Iténés ............ 3 .. . . 1197 . . . . 1,200

Totals ........ 23,750 3497 27,247

The colour of the Moxians is pale brown, mixed with
olive; the Chapacuras, the Itonamas, and the Canichanas,
appear to have absolutely the same tinge as the Chiqui-
tians; while the Moxos and other nations of that group are
a little less dark, having, perhaps, a little yellow mixed with
the former shades ; but this difference is so slight that it
can only be discovered by close attention; otherwise, the
general tinge, diﬁ'ering but little from that of the people of
Chaco, is only a little paler or a little more yellow.

In the Moxian branch, the stature is generally greater
than among the Chiquitians, and it nearly resembles that
of the inhabitants of Chaco. The tallest attain a height of
ﬁve feet six inches, and the average stature of the Movimas,
Moxos, Canichanas, and Cayuvavas, is at most ﬁve feet
two inches. The only nations who do not arrive at this
size are the Chapacuras and Itonamas. This diﬁerence
may be explained up to a certain point : among the ﬁrst,
by their neighbourhood to the mountains of Chiquitos.
The women are generally in proportion with the men:
nevertheless, those of the Canichanas appeared to us
smaller; while among the Movimas, as we have already
noticed among the tribes of the Pampas, the women are,
on the contrary, nearly as tall as their husbands, or, at
any rate, much above the usual relative proportion.

The ﬁgure of the Moxos resembles that of the Chi-
quitians and inhabitants of Chaco; at the same time that,
among these latter, broad shoulders, a chest very much

CH. XXXII.] MEDITERRANEAN GROUP: MOXIANS. 631

arched, and a stouter body, prove great strength,——with this
difference notwithstanding, that the Moxos, generally still
more vigorous than the Chiquitians, are apparently as
strong as the natives of Chaco; yet they are distinguished
from both by taller ﬁgures, bodies of better shape, and
more slender waists. Their limbs, without projecting
muscles, are generally fuller and more rounded. These
characters present an exception to be remarked in the case
of the Itonamas, who, though resembling in form the other
nations, always have their limbs thin, and especially their
legs. The Moxos are well-set, and walk straight, and
with much ease. The greater number, especially of the
Moxos, are subject to obesity. The women differ a little
from those of the Chiquitian branch; they have large
shoulders and hips; but their persons are less compact,
and their waist is narrower, which indicates a tendency
to the slight ﬁgure of European women. They are more
agreeable, in general, than the Chiquitian women; they
are yet robust, and have the bosom well formed, and of but
moderate development, and their hands and feet are small.

The features of the Moxos are very different and easily
distinguishable from those of the Chiquitians : the head is
large, and a little elongated behind; the face is less full
and broad than that of the Chiquitians, and is rather
oblong; the cheek-bones are scarcely to be seen: the fore-
head is low and little arched; the nose short and ﬂat,
without being too large; the nostrils are expanded; the
mouth small ; the lips not thick ; the eyes are in general
small and horizontal ; the ears small ; the eyebrows narrow
and arched; the chin rounded; the beard black, with
little hair, and slow of growth; it is only seen on the
upper lip and chin, and is never curled; the hair is black,
long, thick, and sleek. Such are the general characters
remarked in almost all these nations, yet with some excep-
tions.*

4“ For further details I must refer to M‘ d’Orbigny, from whosehwbrlc
these observations have been abstracted.

 

632 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 11.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

THE BRASILIO-GUARANI, 0R EASTERN NATIONS OF SOUTH
AMERICA.

THE vast region of South America which lies to the
eastward of the river Paraguay, and is cut off from the
remainder of the continent by that stream, and by a line
reaching northward from its sources to the mouth of the
Orinoco in the Gulf of Mexico, was inhabited by a great
number of aboriginal tribes, who were at one time supposed
to speak as many distinct languages, and to constitute
separate nations. Later information has considerably
diminished their number. Two great families of nations
exist within this region, viz. the Guarani, spread through
Paraguay, and known to be allied to the Tupi tribes of
Brazil 3* and, secondly, the races who belong to the stock
of the Caribi, Galibi, or Caribbees, in the countries bor-
dering on the Gulf of Mexico. They have a certain re-
semblance in feature and complexion, and are, according
to d’Orbigny, referable to one physical type, of which the
following is the characteristic description :—

“ Complexion yellowish; statue middle; forehead not
so much arched as in other races ; eyes obliquely placed, and
raised at the outer angle.” These traits, which belong to
the great nomadic races of South America, approximate to

 

* An interesting discussion upon the diﬁ'usion of the Tupi-Guarani
languages, by Dr. R. Gr. Latham, will be found in the Appendix to Wal-
lace’s “Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro,” London, 1853. See
p. 530 et seq. Dr. Latham conﬁrms the statements of Hervas, who includes
the Omagua in this class of languages, as stated by the author in this
chapter, and carries it down so far to the south as Buenos Ayres. He
shows also that the Mundrucu tongue, spoken by a large and warlike nation
dwelling between the Tapajos and Madeira Rivers, is allied to the same
class. The Mundrucus number from ﬁfteen to twenty thousand warriors,
and are the terror of all the other tribes Who dwell on the right bank of
the Amazons. See Lieut. W. L. Herndon’s “Exploration of the Valley of the
Amazon,” Washington, SW. 1854, p. 314:.—ED.

CH. XXX111.] ' GUARANIS. 633

those of the nomades of High Asia. The complexion is-
nearly the same, for these nations do not generally belong
to the Red Men of the New World : the face is round, the
nose short, but the nostrils are not so wide or patulous
nor do the cheek-bones project so much as in the Asiatic
races. Von Spix and Martins thought the Caribi strik-
ingly similar to the Chinese.

The Guarani nation is one of the most interesting
South American races, owing to the fact that they showed
themselves particularly susceptible of civilisation and of
instruction in the Christian religion, which they embraced
in great numbers through the instructions of the Jesuit
missionaries. We have many interesting accounts of the
achievements of these zealous promoters of social improve-
ment among the inhabitants of the wildernesses of South
America, chieﬂy in the writings of ecclesiastics, before the
evil hour when the king of Spain, yielding to the advice
of the enemies of religion and of monarchy, ordered their
expulsion from Paraguay, and left 120,000 new converts
from one single aboriginal nation destitute of the advice
and guidance of their spiritual and temporal instructors.

1. Southern Guarani 0f Paraguay. — The southern
Guarani are those of Paraguay, either reduced now under
the missions above mentioned, or still wandering in a state
of liberty in the forests of that great province. Besides
the Guarani, commonly so termed, who are converted to
the Catholic religion, and inhabit thirty-two large towns
on the shores of the Parana, Paraguay, and Uruguay, there
are other tribes of the same race still hidden in the forests,
who have assumed different names from the neighbouring
rivers or mountains, but still speak the Guarani language.
Among these are the Tapes, Tobatinguas, and Cayuguas.

2. Western Guarani—The western Guarani are the
people described by Hervas under the names of Guarayi,
Chiriguani, and Cirionos. The Guarayi were civilised by
the Jesuits, and reduced under the celebrated missions of
the Chiquitos. In the woods between the Chiquitos and

634 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK II.

the Moxos, there are still some tribes of savage Guarayi.
Dobrizhofer says, “ Their language is a dialect of the
Guarani, very little corrupted ;” though, according to some
traditions, they inhabited this country in the time of the
Inca Yupangui. The Pagan Chiriguanos are formidable
to all their neighbours. According to Abbot Gilii, the
Guarani language is spoken with purity by the natives oi
160 villages between the great river of Chaco and that of
Mapayo of Santa Cruz, in the valleys of the Andes. To
the northward of Santa Cruz are the barbarous Cirionos,
who speak a dialect of the Chiriguano, and consequently of
the Guarani language.

3. Eastern Gaaram)‘ 0f Brant—The Eastern Guarani
are the Tupi, or native inhabitants of the Brazils. “ The
general language of Brazil,” says Hervas, “ called Tupi,
from the name of the ﬁrst Indians who were converted to
the holy faith, is not more different from the Guarani, viz.
of Paraguay, than the Portuguese from the Spanish.” The
same writer enumerates, from information derived from
ecclesiastics, the following tribes who speak the Tupi, with
little variety of dialect, viz. the Cariyi, southward of the
Tupi proper, reaching as far towards the south as the Rio
'Grande del Sud, or S. Pietro, the Samoyi, Tupinaqui,
Timmiminos, Tobayari, Tupinambi, Apanti, Tapigoas, and
several other tribes, occupying all the maritime countries
as far northward as the river Maraﬁon.

4. Tribes Related to this Race on the Maraﬁon.—
According to. Hervas, the Omagua, and other dialects
allied to it, spoken in the kingdom of Quito, are also
branches of the great Guarani language. This implies a
still further extension of the same race. Azara, as we have
seen, supposed it to reach even as far northward as Guiana.

The Omagua, with the tribes nearly connected with
them, form one of the most extensive nations in the
northern parts of South America. They possessed the
banks and islands of the Maraﬁon, or river of Amazons,
200 leagues from the mouth of the Napo river, and pro-

CH. XXXIII.] TRIBES or THE AMAZON. 635

bably formed a great part of those numerous tribes found
by Orellana in this region.

[Wallace’s Narrative of his Travels on the Amazon River
may be consulted for many interesting details on the cha-
racter of the aborigines who frequent its shores : out of these
the following brief notices are selected. There is a general
character among the whole of the Amazon Indians from
which particular tribes vary but very slightly. “ The
skin is of a coppery or brown colour of various shades,
often nearly the tint of smooth Honduras mahogany;
jet-black straight hair, thick, and never curled, black eyes,
and very little or no beard ..... In some, the whole face is
wide and rather ﬂattened, but I could never discern an
unusual obliquity of the eyes, or projection of the cheek-
bones : in many of both sexes, the most perfect regularity
of features exists, and there are numbers Who in colour
alone diﬂ'er from a good-looking European. Their ﬁgures
are generally superb ..... the development of the chest
is such as I believe never exists in the best-formed Euro-
pean, exhibiting a splendid series of convex undulations,
without a hollow in any part of it.”

“ High up the rivers Tocantins and Araguaya, there are
numerous tribes of tall well-formed Indians ..... most
of them have enormously elongated ears hanging down
on their shoulders, produced probably by weights sus-
pended from the lobe [in youth ..... Commencing near
Santarem, and extending among all the half-civilised
Indians of the Amazon, Rio Negro, and other rivers, the
Lingoa Geral,ale or general Indian language, is spoken.

 

 

4‘ In his Notes to Wallace’s Narrative, p. 529, 531, Dr. Latham observes
that the basis of the Lingoa Geral is Guarani, or Tupi ; that the races in
.the Portuguese colony of Brazil who speak it are Tupis, while the allied
populations of Entre Rios, Corrientes, Monte Video, and Paraguay, all
settled by Spaniards, are known as Guarani. “ This gave us a Tupi- Guarani
class of languages, in which it was not very incorrect to say that the
Tupi were the Guarani of Brazil, and the Guarani the Tupi of Paraguay.
The chief difference was a verbal and nominal one” (1). 53l).

636 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. . [15001911.

Near the more populous towns and villages, it is used
indiscriminately with the Portuguese; a little further it
is often the only language known; and far up in the
interior it exists in common With the native language of
the tribe to which the inhabitants belong. It is now
spread over all the interior of Brazil, and even extends
into Peru and Venezuela, as well as Bolivia and Para-
guay ..... It is a simple and euphonious language, and
is often preferred by Europeans who get thoroughly
used to it.”

Mr. Wallace informs us (p. 481) that he was best
acquainted with the tribes on the Uacaiari, an equatorial
river which falls into the Rio Negro, between 67° and 68°
W. Long. He enumerates in this region thirty tribes, of
whom fourteen are upon the main stream; all have their
distinct names, but they are collectively known as the
Uaupés, which name is applied to the river itself on our
maps. They are generally tall, very stout, and well
formed. The men do not cut their hair, but tie it behind
with a cord, and let it hang down below the middle of
the back, invariably decorating the head with a comb,
which is stuck in at the top; the women cut theirs to a
moderate length, and it falls loose over the neck and
back; they wear no comb. The men have little beard,
which they carefully pull out, and they, as well as the
women, pull out the hair of the eye-brows. The colour
of the skin is a light, uniform, glossy, reddish brown.

They cultivate the soil, manufacture many useful
articles, and have permanent houses; all their dwellings
are built on one plan, which is a parallelogram having a
semicircle at one end. They are always built of a size to
contain several families, sometimes a Whole tribe. One
measured was 115 feet long by 75 broad, and about 30
in height, which held a dozen families, of near 100 persons.
The roof is supported by cylindrical columns, beautifully
straight and smooth, formed of trunks of trees; there is a
clear opening in the centre 25 feet in width, and on the

CH. XXXIII.] TRIBES or THE AMAZON. 637

sides partitions of palm-leaves divide the area into dis-
tinct habitations for the separate families; the walls are
made of the same material, so thickly bound together that
they are proof against arrow and bullet. There is a large
door at the square end 6 feet wide, and 8 or 10 in height,
for the tribe generally, and a smaller one at the semicir-
cular end for the chief, who has exclusive possession of
that part of the house. The whole is carefully and strOngly
built, and all the parts “ are bound together with split
creepers, in a manner that a sailor would admire.” Their
hammocks, cooking utensils, and baskets, of which they
have great quantities, are kept in the private apartments;
the huge ovens and pans for making cashiri [mandioc beer]
are placed in the sides of the central space, leaving room
for the sports of the children and dances of the tribe in
the middle.

The men wear a small piece of cloth as the only dress,
the women none whatever; but all paint their bodies with
red, black, and yellow colours, in regular patterns, as an equi-
valent. The men alone have any ornaments ; and this cir-
cumstance, together with the never absent comb, gives them
a feminine look, which Mr. Wallace thinks is the source
of the tales of Amazons found by the early navigators on
these rivers.

Their agriculture extends to a great variety of products,
and is chieﬂy carried on by women, while the men are
much engaged in hunting and ﬁshing... We refer to the book
for details on their modes of cultivation, the preparation
of the produce, and various modes of catching ﬁsh.

Among the weapons of these tribes one is the gravatana,
which is precisely the sampitan of the Malays, —a blow-
pipe, used, like the sampitan, with small poisoned arrows,
and for the same purpose,—-an evidence of the little ethnoﬁ
logical value of similar analogies.

One tribe, the Cobeus, are cannibals; they eat the
pe0ple of other tribes, and even make war for the purpose
of procuring the means of gratifying their unnatural pro-

638 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

pensity. When they have more than they can consume
at once, they smoke-dry the ﬂesh over the ﬁre, and pre-
serve it for food a long time.

The work from Which the above is taken, contains a
good deal more about these and other tribes: but our
limits compel us to conﬁne ourselves to the concluding
paragraphs :——“ The main feature in the personal character
of the Indians of this part of South America is a degree
of diﬁ’idence, bashfulness, or coldness, which affects all their
actions ..... It is the same peculiarity which causes the
men never to exhibit any feeling on meeting after a separa-
tion; though they have, and show, a great affection for
their children, whom they never part with, nor can they
be induced to do so, even for a short time. They scarcely
ever quarrel among themselves, work hard, and submit
willingly to authority. They are ingenious and skilful
workmen, and readily adopt any customs of civilised life
that may be introduced among them; and they seem
capable of being formed, by education and good govern-
ment, into a peaceable and civilised community.

“ This change, however, will perhaps never take place:
they are exposed to the inﬂuence of the refuse of Brazilian
society, and will probably, before many years, he reduced
to the condition of the other half-civilised Indians of the
country, who seem to have lost the good qualities of
savage life, and gained only the vices of civilisation.”]

0f the Oar/5673a” Race.

The ,Caribian race, who, as we have seen, are supposed
by M. d’Orbigny to be connected in language and other
proofs of affinity with. the Guarani, are of themselves one
of the most extensively spread families of nations of South
America.axe The people who give name to this group are

 

* M. d’Orbigny has omitted these nations in his description of the
South American tribes. From M. de Humboldt we derive the greater
part of our information respecting them. The other nations of the
Brazils, Whose afﬁnity to the Caribi and the Guarani can only be con-

CH. XXXIII.] TRIBES or THE CARIBI. 639

the celebrated race of Oaraibs, 0r Caribis. In the sixteenth
century, this race was found spread over all the shores and
islands of America, from the mouth of the river of Amazons,
or from the borders of Brazil, to the Orinoco and the
neighbourhood of Porto Rico. The lesser Antilles received
from this nation the name of Caribbean Islands.'* The
Tamanacs, who belong to the same family, live on the right
bank of the Orinoco : they were formerly powerful, but are
now reduced to a small number.+ The Arawacs live near
Surinam and Berbice: on the upper part of the river of the
last name they border on the Caribbees.i The Guaraiinas
inhabit the two islands in the delta 0f the Orinoco, where
they build their houses upon trees.§ The Guaiquerias
inhabit the Island of Margarette and the Peninsula of
Araya.“ The Oumanagotos live to the westward of Cu-
mana, in the mission of Piritooﬂ The Pariagotos are the
inhabitants of the Peninsula of Paria. Lastly, the Chayma,
a race whose relations have been discovered by the Baron
Von Humboldt, live to the westward of the Guaraunas,
along the high mountains of the Cocollar and the Guacharo,
in the missions of the Arragonese Capuchins of Cumana.

The Chaymas are inhabitants of a country distant more
than 100 leagues from that of the Tamanacs. The dialect
of the other nations mentioned above are associatedeither
with the Tamanac or with the Caribbee, and more gene-
rally with the former. The idiom 0f the insular Caribbees,
in the Antilles, diﬁ’ers somewhat from that spoken on the
Continent ; but these tribes are evidently branches of one
stock.

Von Humboldt has given us a more particular account

 

jectured from a general resemblance, are best described in the works of
Von Spix and Martins.

* “ Mithridates,” p. 674.

1' Von Humboldt’s “ Personal Narrative,’ ” Vol. iii. p. 254.

+ Quandt’s “ N achricht von Suriname und seinen Einwohnern.”

§ Von Humboldt’s “ Personal Narrative,” p. 277.

|| Ibid. p. 283.

1f Ibid. p. 281.

6410 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

of the Chaymas, who are a people less known than the
Caribbees. He describes their countenance and features as
follows z—“ The countenance of the Chaymas, without
being hard and stern, has something sedate and gloomy;
the forehead is small, and but little prominent. The eyes
of the Chaymas are black, sunk, and very long; but they
are neither so obliquely placed nor so small as in the
people of the Mongolian race. The corner of the eye is,
however, sensibly raised up towards the temples ; the eye-
brows are black, or dark brown, slender, and a little
arched; the eyelids are furnished with very long eyelashes,
and the habit of casting them down, as if they were lowered
by lassitude, softens the look of the women, and makes the
eye, thus veiled, less than it really is.”

We are informed by the same author, that the com-
plexion of the Chaymas is the same as that of the other
American tribes who are nearly in the same latitude. It
is not a copper colour. “ The denomination of rouge-
cuivrés, or copper-coloured, could never have originated in
equinoctial America, in the description of the native inha-
bitants.”* He remarks, also, that the old accounts of the
earliest voyagers to these regions represent some of the
inhabitants, as those of Paria, to be of a much fairer colour
than that now prevalent among the generality of the inha-
bitants. The climate of Paria is remarkable for the great
coolness of the mornings. The inhabitants of Paria, ac-
cording to Ferdinand Columbus, “ were better made, more
Civilised, and whiter than the people whom the discoverer
of America had till then seen.” But many other writers
are more particular in their account. If we may believe
these writers, the old inhabitants of Paria were clothed,
though the races now existing on the coast are naked :
they were nearly white, when not exposed to the sun’s rays,
and had long ﬂowing hair,'0f a yellow or auburn colouraL

 

* Von Humboldt’s “ Personal Narrative,” p. 22 1.
1‘ “Pariae incolae albi, capillis oblongis, protensis, ﬂavis.” “ Utriusque

CH. xxx111.] Borocunos. 641

The Botocudos.*

The Botocudos are well known as one of the most
barbarous nations of the world. Their country, in the
sixteenth century, was the Capitanerias of Ilheos, as far
as Porto Seguro, where they carried on a dangerous and
destructive warfare against the Portuguese colonists of the
Brazils. They are now conﬁned to the inland country,
from the Rio Doce to the Rio Pardo, that is, from the 18°
to the 20° of south latitude.

M. d’Orbigny says that the complexion of the Boto-
cudos is very similar to that of the Guarani, but somewhat
1ighter,———the result, as he supposes, of their inhabiting
shady forests : it approaches to the colour of the Guarayos.
A native Botocudo described by this traveller resembled
the Guarani in stature, form, and proportions, and likewise
in features, with this exception, that the cheek-bones were
a little more prominent, the nose somewhat shorter, the
mouth larger, the countenance more savage, the beard still
less, and the eyes smaller and more oblique at the outer
angle, which give them a greater resemblance to the Mon-
goles. The Botocudos are likewise of a yellower colour
than the Guarani and other nations of South America.
(See the right hand ﬁgure of Plate 60.)

The Botocudos are said to have been cannibals, and the
most savage of all the American nations. They wore for

 

sexﬁs indigenae albi velut nostrates, praeter eos qui sub sole versantur.”—
Peter Martyr. Gomara and Garcia are cited nearly to the same eﬁ'ect by
Von Humboldt—Personal Narrative, Vol. iii. p. 288, English translation.

For the Caribs and kindred races, see Latham’s “ Varieties of Man,”
p. 446—448. Dr. Latham is of opinion that a part of the Caribs
conquered their way from South to North, rather than in the opposite
direction, as some writers have supposed from very unsatisfactory reasons.
-——Sir R. Schomburgk’s valuable papers in the Transactions of several learned
societies contain much information on the tribes in British ' Guiana.
Dalton’s “History of British Guiana,” London, 1855, affords the most
recent notices of these tribes—ED.

* The best accounts of the Botocudos are to be found in the voyages
of MM. Spix and Martins, of M. Auguste de St.-Hilaire, and Prince
Maximilian of N euwied.

'1‘ '1‘

642 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK II.

ornaments collars or strings of human teeth.ale Of late,
attempts have been made to introduce among them civilisa-
tion and Christianity. The following account of these
eiforts is to be found in the papers of the Society for the
Protection of Aborigines :—

“ In contrast with these violations of human right, per-
petrated, upon the conﬁnes of the Brasilian empire, upon
the aborigines of Guiana, it is gratifying to be able to
report the peculiarly pleasing and encouraging change
which has taken place nearer to the seat of the imperial
government, and under the auspices of the young emperor.
The Botocudo Indians, who inhabit the country watered
by Rio Doce and its tributaries, have been described as
amongst the lowest of the human race on the continent of
South America. Wandering, savage; and all but naked,
they rendered their repulsive countenances more ugly by
the insertion of billets of wood in their perforated lips and
ears, and cannibalism is said to have been practised among
them. By the exertions of Guido Marliere, to whom com-
munications were made on the part of this Society, almost
at the commencement, Guido Pocrane, a Botocudo Indian
of great native talent, was introduced to the blessings of
civilisation and Christianity, and his new acquirements
were directed to the amelioration of his countrymen. His
exertions have been crowned with signal success, and four
sections of the barbarous tribes have been brought under
the inﬂuence of civilisation, and taught to cultivate their
soil, from which they have raised not only enough for their
own support, but a surplus, which has been the means of
rescuing even a portion of the white Brasilians from famine
and starvation. Useful laws have been introduced among

them, and Guido Pocrane, in the criminal code which he ,

has established, has set an example which legislators, the j

hereditary professors of Christianity, would do well to imi-

tate, in the total exclusion of capital punishmen -.”

 

* In the ﬁrst volume of Sir. W. Ouseley’s Travels, there is a portrait of j
a Botocudo woman ornamented in the way described. i

on. XXXIII.] OTHER SOUTH AMERICAN RACES. 643

The various nations of the Brasilian countries, whose
languages have never been adequately investigated and
compared, but are generally regarded as distinct from each
other, bear a resemblance in physical characters to the
Guarani. They are supposed by M. d’Orbigny to belong
to the same race or family of nations. This opinion is
founded on the various portraits furnished by the works of
MM. Spix and Martius, Prince Maximilian of Neuwied,
and MM. Rugendas and Debret, of the Bogres of the pro-
vince of San Paolo, the Cumacans, the J uris,* the Coroa-
dos, and the Cordopos. The same observation applies also
to a variety of tribes less known, and of whom we have but
imperfect descriptions, such as the Macuani, the Penhams
of Minas-Geraes, the Machacali, the Capoxos, the Cataxos,
the Comanaxos of the frontiers of Porto Seguro and of
Bahia, the Carivi, the Sabucas, the Murus, the Mun-
drucusqL

All these tribes, and many others described by the
travellers above mentioned, resemble in the general type of
organisation the Brasilio-Guarani races.

 

* See the left hand ﬁgure on Plate from the Atlas of Spix and Martius.
Wallace, in his “ Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro,” London, 8vo.
1853, says, “ The J uris. . . . are remarkable for a custom of tattooing in a
circle (not in a square, as in a plate in Dr. Prichard’s work) round the
mouth, so as to resemble the little black-mouthed squirrel-monkeys
(Callithrix sciureus)” (p. 510).—-—ED.

1‘ See note in p. 632, suprd.

64441 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK III.

BOOK III.

CONCLUSIONS.

\I‘lvvx/«rxtw/v

CHAPTER I.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS DEDUCED FROM THE PRECEDING
SURVEY OF HUMAN RACES.

IN the ethnographical outline which I have new con«
eluded, the facts have been very brieﬂy stated, and it
would be difﬁcult to recapitulate them in a shorter com«
pass. I shall merely point out some of the most Obvious
inferences.

The different races of men are not distinguished from
each other by strongly marked, uniform, and permanent
distinctions, as are the several species belonging to any
given tribe of animals. All the diversities which exist are
variable, and pass into each other by insensible gradations ;
and there is, moreover, scarcely an instance in which the
actual transition cannot be proved to have taken place.

Thus, if we consider the varieties of ﬁgure which are
generally looked upon as the most important, and begin
with those of the skeleton and the skull as their founda-
tion, we shall ﬁnd every particular type undergoing devia-
tions and passing into other forms. We have seen that, in
many races who have, generally and originally, as far as we
can go back towards their origin, heads of the pyramidal
ﬁgure, with broad faces, or the Mongolian type, the oval
or European shape, with European features, displays
itself in individuals, and often becomes the characteristic .
Of tribes. We must refer the reader to the account given

on. 1.] GENERAL RESULTS. 6&5

in the preceding pages of the ﬁve great nomadic races, to
the description of the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, and
Indo-Chinese nations.

Again, the shape of the head in the black races varies
in like manner. The Sudanian nations have a black com-
plexion and crisp hair, with a form of the head different
from that of the Negro; and the type varies in particular
tribes, and even in the same tribe. Towards the south, the
black and crisp-haired Africans display, in the highland of
the Kaﬁrs, a form resembling the European; and, in the
country of the nomadic Hottentots, make a signal approxi~
mation to the physical character prevalent among the
nomades of High Asia. Among the aboriginal races of
the New World, similar varieties and similar deviations
occur. We have seen that the nations of America are not,
as it has been represented, reducible to one physical type,—
that their skulls display many different leading forms ; and
although the ethnology of the Western Continent is as yet,
owing to obvious causes, much less complete than that of
Asia and Europe, we have, notwithstanding this circum-
stance, found instances in which the most strongly marked
deviations are displayed within the limits of one and the
same great family of American nations.

Individual varieties have been pointed out as affording
a similar evidence. In the plates at the early part of this
volume, which contain ﬁgures of three skulls in one view
(p. 111), the reader may see an example of striking resem-
blance in heads taken from the most dissimilar and widely
separated races of mankind. Many similar examples might
easily be found, and, perhaps, some still more precisely
to the purpose. The three ﬁgures above mentioned were
taken casually from skulls now in my own collection.

With respect to colour, it is still more easy to trace
the greatest variations within the limits of one race. There
is, perhaps, not one great family of nations, having its
branches spread through different climates, which does not
display in this particular the most strongly marked'varie-

646 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K III.

ties. It is true that among European colonists settled in
hot climates such varieties are not so perceptible within a
few generations; but in many well-known instances of
earlier colonisation they are very clearly manifested. We
have traced them in the instances of the Jews and Arabs,
in the tribes of Hindus, or rather of the Indian race,
spread through India, compared with those of the Hima-
layan countries. We might add innumerable facts tending
to bring out the same result. Under this head, it would
be quite fair to take the whole Indo-European family of
nations as one example, since from one identical stock
must have sprung the Gothic, the Iranian races, and the
Arian stem of India, including the xanthous Siah-Posh
of Kaﬁristan, the yellow-haired and blue‘eyed villagers
of J umnotri and Gangotri, and the black Hindus of
Anu-gangam.

It has often been said that the native tribes of America
present an exception to the general observation deduced
from a survey of the nations of the Old World, and that
the complexion of the Americans displays no relation to
climate. We have proved, 0n the contrary, that tribes
alike belonging to the American stock manifest the in-
ﬂuence of external agencies not less distinctly than do the
white inhabitants of Europe compared with the black
races of Africa. Witness the comparison of the white
Americans of the north-west coast with the black Cali-
fornians.

If any one should call in question the assertion that
the colour of human races has any relation to the climates
of different countries, we have only need to appeal to the
most general and broadly marked facts which the history
of mankind presents.

Thus it is obvious that the intertropical region of the
earth is the principal seat of the black races of men, and the
region remote from the trOpics that of the white races, and
that the climates approaching to the tropics are generally
inhabited by nations which are neither of the darkest nor

on. IL] PHYSIOLOGICAL COMPARISON. 649

the total duration of life, are given, though with individual
exceptions and varieties to every species of animals.

A remark must be made in the outset of this inquiry
which will considerably modify the result. Although it
is obvious, on a cursory view of the subject, that greater
uniformity prevails in the several tribes of the animal
kingdom in regard to these fundamental laws and in the
physiological constitution, than in the outward aspect or
colour and the nature of the integument, still there is a con-
siderable range of variation, even in the internal functions.
We have already adverted to the change produced in cows,
or to an hereditary peculiarity produced by habit and by
human interference in the breeds, and changing the length
of time of giving milk. It seems from this, and from other
facts which have been related, that when domesticated ani-
mals have been brought to undergo a particular modiﬁcation
of their natural state, and to obey a new law for some gene-
rations, the habit becomes, “Were, their second nature,
and that their hereditary constitution is changed. Facts of
a similar kind may be collected from the history of human
tribes. We have seen that the nations who have inhabited
for centuries the heights of the South American Andes
have a longer or more capacious chest, and lungs of a
greater volume, than other races,—a structure of body
eminently useful to men who breathe a rare atmosphere,
——a peculiarity, moreover, which the conditions of their
existence have an obvious tendency to produce by their
mechanical eﬂorts. Here, then, since the Quichuas and
the Aymaras are but branches of the American family of
nations, and not a distinct and peculiar race, such as any
one might assume to have been created on the spot, with a
physical adaptation to its local conditions,—here we ﬁnd
an instance of long-continued habit, and the result of ex-
ternal agencies, modifying the structure of body, and with
it the state of the most important functions of life, in
such a manner as to constitute and bring forth, de novo,
an adaptation to the surrounding agencies. This may

650 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

furnish an idea of the modiﬁcation which various races
undergo, and have undergone, in different regions,—-modi-
ﬁcations which have brought them into relation with the
physical conditions prevalent in such regions. Many
parallel facts are obvious to those who look for them.
If we compare the light and muscular, though lean and
agile, Arab, whose daily allowance of food is ﬁve dates and
a little water, with the fat, blubber-eating Esquimaux,
what a vast difference do we perceive in the external ap-
pearance I bespeaking an equally great one in the internal
constitution of these two nations. These peculiarities are
the result of external circumstances : we perceive the
actual presence of external conditions which have a natural
tendency to call them forth. In other instances, when we
cannot perceive how these agencies operate, we may infer
a similar causation, and this particularly in those cases
where an adaptation is to be discovered of the peculiar
organic type to the local conditions of existence.

It is, doubtless, on a similar principle that the constitu-
tion of races becomes so formed as to bear without incon-
venience particular climates, which are unwholesome and
destructive to other races. Thus the natives of Sierra
Leone sustain comparatively little inconvenience from their
climate, though it is destructive to Europeans. That
this is not owing to original organisation we collect from
the fact, of which we are assured by an intelligent phy-
sician long resident in the colony, that the free Negroes
who were brought from Nova Scotia, and whose ancestors
had been generally resident for some generations in a very
different climate from that of Sierra Leone, are subject to
the same diseases as Europeans. In my “ Researches into
the Physical History of Mankind,” I have collected a great
number of examples of similar acclimatisation, or of a
change brought about in races of men who have been
removed to a new climate. It is there proved, if I am not
mistaken, by abundant evidence, that this process generally
requires many generations to bring it about, and that, when

CH. ILJ PHYSIOLOGICAL COMPARISON. 651

once produced, the new characters are hereditary, and im-
pressed upon the race.

If due allowances are made for such modiﬁcations,
which are changes taking place according to a law of
adaptation, we shall ﬁnd all human races remarkably
uniform with respect to all the principal laws, or leading
phenomena, Of the animal economy.

1. The average duration of human life is nearly the
same in the different races Of men. But in order to
estimate the facts which bear upon this subject, an account
must be taken of the vast inﬂuence which climate alone
exercises on the rate of mortality. It is well known that
the proportional number of individuals who attain a given
age diﬁ‘ers in different countries; and that the warmer
the climate, other circumstances being equal, so much the
shorter is the average duration of human life. Even
within the limits of Europe the difference is very great.

In some instances, according to the calculations Of M.
Moreau de Jonnes, the rate Of mortality, and inversely the
duration Of life, differ by nearly one-half from the propor-
tions discovered in other examples. The following is a
brief extract from a table presented to the Institute by
this celebrated calculator. The table comprehends returns
belonging to different periods, illustrative of the effect
produced by political changes and improvements in the
state of society on the duration of human life. I have
omitted this part, and have only abstracted that Which
illustrates the inﬂuence of climate :—

652 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. .

Table exhibiting the Annual Mortality in diferent Countries in Europe.

In Sweden from 1821 to 1825 ...... 1 death in 45
Denmark .. 1819.. —- ...... 45
Germany .. 1825.. ~- ...... .. .. 45
Prussia .. 1821 .. 1824 ...... .. .. 39
Austrian Empire .. 1825.. 1830 . . . . .. .. . . 43
Holland . . 1824 . . —- ...... . . . . 40
England . . 1821 . . — ...... . . . . 58*
Great Britain . . 1800 . . 1804 ...... . . . . 47
France . . 1825 . . 1827 ...... . . . . 39'5
Canton de Vaud . . 1824 . . — ...... . . . . 47
Lombardy .. 1827.. 1828 31
Roman States .. 1827 . . —— ...... . . . . 28
Scotland . . 1821 . . — ...... . . . . 50

The difference of twenty-eight and ﬁfty is very con-
siderable : but even the latter rate of mortality is consider-
ably greater than that which the data collected by M.
Moreau de J onnes attribute to Iceland, Norway, and the
northern parts of Scotland.

No adequate data have yet been collected for estimating
the comparative longevity of different races of men, after
making suitable allowances for the inﬂuence of climates;
but facts are easily to be found which prove that no great
difference exists in this respect between the most- dissimilar
tribes. It was calculated by Buffon, with reference princi-
pally to white men, that a third part of the human race die
before the age of ten years ; one-half before that of thirty-
ﬁve; two-thirds before ﬁfty-two ; and three-fourths before
sixty-one years of age. A very different computation has
been made by later writers : according to Hufeland’s
estimate, out of a hundred individuals born, ﬁfty die before
their tenth year, and six only live to be above the age of
sixtyﬂr

Many instances of longevity in Europeans have been
collected by Mr. Easton, from Whose work I have taken the

”1“ There must be a mistake in this number. According to Porter and

Rickman, the number of annual deaths in England, from 1821 to 1831,

is 1 in 51.
1‘ Hist. Nat. du Genre-Humain, par M. Virey, Paris, 1824.

 

(3H. 11.] DURATION or LIFE. 653

ﬁrst of the following tables. He has discovered the follow-
ing numbers of persons who have reached the ages below
stated :—

From 100 to 110, both inclusive. . . . 1310

110..120 ................ 277
120..130 ................ 841
130..140................ 26
140..150 ................ 7
150..160 ................ 3
160..170 ................ 2
170..180.......... 3

Instances of Longevity in Negroes.

 

Mallum Dando, king of Rabbah .. .. . . .. .. . . . . . . 115
Robert Lyuch, Jamaica ...................... 160
Catherine Lopez, Jamaica .................... 134,
Margaret Darby, Jamaica . . . . . . 130
Mulatto at Fredericktown, North America, in 1797 180
Mary Goodrall, Jamaica ...................... 120
Statera , St. John’s, Antigua . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Rebecca Tury, Faimouth, Jamaica .............. 140
Tom, a slave of Mrs. Bacon, South Carolina . . . . . . 130
Francis Peat, Kingston .. 130
Jane Morgan, Jamaica ........................ 120
Juan Moroygota ............................ 138
Joseph Ban, Jamaica .......................... 146
Catherine Hiatt, Jamaica .. .. .. .. .. .. .. . . 150
Frances Johnson, a Sambo woman .............. 107

Particular notices respecting these individuals maybe
seen in the ﬁrst volume of my “ Researches into the Phy-
sical History of Mankind,” where the reader who wishes to
pursue the inquiry will ﬁnd evidence that a similar degree
of longevity belongs to other races of men, both in the Old
and New Continents.

The general conclusion to which we are brought by all
the facts that can be collected in relation to the period
imposed by nature on human longevity, and the general
duration of human life, is that there 1s no asceitained dif-
ference in this particular between the various races which
constitute the human family. It would appear that the

654: NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. .

same law, as to the duration of life, has been imposed by
Providence on all nations of men. In this point of View
they appear as one species. Even in different climates the
tendency to exist for a given time is the same: the duration
of life varies only from the circumstance, that the external
causes which bring about an accidental and premature
catastrOphe, or which wear out the health and impair
the bodily frame, are more rife or more potent in one
climate than in another.

0f the Progress of Physical Development and the
Periodical Changes of the Constitution: Natural and
V ital Functions of diﬂ'erent Races.

The speciﬁc temperature of the body is the same, or
nearly so, in all the races of men. This subject has been
investigated, and the above-stated fact established by the
researches of Dr. Davy.

There is no remarkable difference in the frequency of the
pulse, or any of the other vital functions, between different
tribes,except such occasional, and temporary, and individual
variations as are easily explained by the results of imme-
diate external agencies.

There is one subject connected with this department of
physiology which has not yet been fully explored, or, at
least, on which naturalists and physicians have not arrived
at an unanimous sentiment. It has been a very general
and long-established opinion, that the period appointed by
nature for marriage, and the commencement of relations
between the sexes, varies in different climates; that women
begin to bear children, or to be capable of bearing them,
at a very much earlier period in warm countries than in
cold ones, and that they become old at an age when the
females of Europe are still in their prime. This notion
has been universally preyalent among physiologists: it was
established by the authority of the celebrated Haller, and
until lately has never been called in question. It was laid
hold of by Montesquieu as a fact which tended to explain

CH. 11.] PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT. 655

some of the great moral diversities which distinguish the
Oriental from the Western nations. “ Women in hot
climates,” says this philosopher, “ are marriageable at
eight, nine, or ten years of age. Thus, in these countries,
infancy and marriage almost always coincide. They are
old at twenty ; their reason, therefore, never accompanies
their beauty. When beauty demands the empire, the want
of reason forbids the claim; when reason is obtained,
beauty is no more. The women ought, then, to be in a
state of dependence, for reason cannot procure in old age
that empire which even youth and beauty could not give.
It is, therefore, extremely natural that in these places a
man, where no law opposes it, should leave one wife to
take another, and that polygamy should be introduced.”

A very exaggerated idea has prevailed in Europe,
founded on the assertions of travellers who wanted data
for accurate conclusions, as to the periods of physical de-
velopment, particularly in Arabia and Palestine, and it is
to these countries that Montesquieu chieﬂy referred. Very
different conclusions might be deduced from passages in
the Old Testament as to the inhabitants of Palestine;
and, with respect to the women of Arabia, the question
seems to have been settled by a reference to authority
which on this point few will venture to dispute; I mean
that of Mohammed and the commentators on the Koran.
In the fourth chapter of the Koran, “ On Woman,” there
is this command in reference to the duty of a guardian :—
“Examine the orphans (in religious matters) until they
attain the age of marriage.” “ The age of marriage,” says
Mr. Sale, “ or of maturity, is reckoned to be ﬁfteen,—a
decision supported by a tradition of the Prophet, although
Abu ‘Hanifah thinks eighteen the proper age.” In the
regulations touching divorce, in the chapter of the “Cow,”
precautions are laid down against dismissing a wife under
any uncertainty as to her being pregnant at the time. Sale
adds, “ that in the case of women who are too young—such
premature marriages being sanctioned or tolerated in Ara-

656 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [300K III. .

bia, a custom which is probably the real foundation for *
the mistaken notion to which I advert—~as well as in those
who are too old to have children, it is the rule to wait only
three months. The age at which they are reckoned too
old is that of ﬁfty-ﬁve lunar 07' ﬁfty-three solar years.”
We thus ﬁnd that the periods of life at which the prin-
cipal physical changes take place are just the same among the
natives of Arabia as in Europe; and the plea or excuse,
founded on this supposed premature development and
decay'bf the female sex, in favour of the depraved morality
of the Oriental nations, is just as groundless as was the
position long maintained, but refuted by the inquiries of
Carsten Niebuhr, that the proportionate numbers of the
sexes are different in Arabia and in Europe.

The whole subject of the periodical changes in physical
life with respect to the female sex has been of late years
investigated afresh by a very able writer, who has collected
much new and valuable information regarding it. To his
papers, which have elucidated a very important part of
physiology, and are calculated to remove much prejudice
and misconception, I must>refer my readers who wish to
pursue the inquiry. The general conclusion which he has
in my opinion fully established, is, that the difference of
climate occasions very little, if any, important diversity as
to the periods of life and the physical changes to which
the human constitution is subject; and that in all these
great regulations of the animal economy, if we may use
such an expreSsion, mankind, whether white or black, are
placed by nature nearly on an equal footing. As the dura-
tion of life and the age of adult growth are known to be
nearly the same, it would be contrary to all probability
should any material difference be found to prevail in re-
spect to any one particular function or set of functions;
yet the contrary opinion was universally prevalent from the
time of Haller till it was refuted by Mr. RobertonﬁIE

* Mr. Roberton’s memoir, which deserves to be much better known
than it has hitherto been, was published in the “ Edinburgh Medical and

 

CH. 111.] PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTER.. L 6 357’,
\ 2 raryf'

CHAPTER III.

COMPARISON OF HUMAN RACES WITH RESPECT TO MENTAL
ENDOWMENTS.

THERE is one point of View in which it still remains
for us to compare the different tribes of the human family;
that 1s, with regard to mental endowments.

Psychology 1s, with respect to mankind, the history of
the mental faculties , it comprehends, likewise, an account
of those properties in the different races of animals which
most nearly resemble the mental endowments of man. It
has been observed, in the preliminary part of this work,
that the instincts of one tribe of animals are not those of
another , that no two separate species resemble each other
precisely in their habits of life, tendencies to action,
manner of existence, or in the internal principles of feel-
ing, appetency, and aversion, of which the actions and
habits are the outward signs and manifestations. If now
it should appear, on inquiry, that one common mind, or
psychical nature, belongs to the whole human family, a
very strong argument would thence arise, on the ground
of analogy, for their community of species and origin.

But can it be maintained that such is really the fact?
On ﬁrst adverting to this inquiry, most persons would be
likely to adopt the negative side of the question; for what
greater contrasts can be imagined than those which present
themselves when we compare in their actual state the dif-
ferent races of mankind P Let us imagine, for a moment,
a stranger from another planet to visit our globe, and to
contemplate and compare the manners of its inhabitants,
and let him ﬁrst witness some brilliant spectacle in one of
the highly civilised countries of Europe,———the. coronation
of a monarch, the installation of St. Louis on the throne of

 

Surgical J ourna ,” Vol. xxxviii. 1832. The same writer has lately pub.
lished an additional memoir, with a continuation of his researches in
reference to the Negro race, in No. 152 of the same Journal.

UU

   
  
 

 

Of California 7, -

    

658 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

his ancestors, surrounded by an august assembly of peers,
and barons, and mitred abbots, anointed from the cruse of
sacred oil brought by an angel to ratify the divine privi-
lege of kings,—let the same person be carried into a hamlet
in Negroland, in the hour when the sable race recreate
themselves with dancing and barbarous music,—1et him
then be transported to the saline plains over which bald
and tawny Mongoles roam, differing but little in hue from
the yellow soil of their steppes, brightened by the saffron
ﬂowers of the iris and tulip,-let him be placed near the
solitary den of the Bushman, where the lean and hungry
savage crouches in silence like a beast of prey, watching
with ﬁxed eyes the birds which enter his pitfall, or the
insects and reptiles which chance brings within his grasp,
——let the traveller be carried into the midst of an Australian
forest, where the squalid companions of kangaroos may be
seen crawling in procession in imitation of quadrupeds,—~—
can it be supposed that such a person would conclude the
various groups of beings whom he had surveyed to be of
one nature, one tribe, or the offspring of the same original
stock? It is much more probable that he would arrive at
an opposite conclusion.

It is only by tracing the history of the diversiﬁed human
races from ancient times, and by comparing the former
with the present state, we are made aware of the great
changes which time and circumstances have eﬁected in the
condition of particular nations, and are brought to admit
the probability of the opinion that beings apparently so
different in their whole manner of existence can be in any
way allied. It is this inquiry that brings within our ob- V
servation, in the ﬁrst instance, one of the great distinctions ,
between the nature of mankind and that of animals. I
allude to the uniformity of habits in successive generations
Which prevails through all the tribes belonging to the
lower departments of the living world, and the variations
which take place in human races, and their tendency to
improve, or to alternate periods of improvement, with re-

CH. 111.] PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTERS. 659

verses and retrograde changes. The Numidian lion and
the satyr of the desert, the monarchies of bees and the
republics of African termites, are precisely to-day what
they were in the age of jEsop and in the kingdom of J uba ;
while the descendants of the tribes who are described by
Tacitus as living in squalid misery in solitary dens, amid
the morasses of the Vistula, have built St. Petersburg and
Moscow; and the posterity of cannibals and phthirophagi
now feed on pillaus and Wheaten bread. When we con-
sider that the habits of men are so changed, in some races
whose past and present state comes within the sphere of
history, we cannot presume to determine that such differ-
ences as those to which we have before adverted may not
have been the result of circumstances favouring the pro-
gressive improvement of our race, and, in other instances,
preventing it, or forcing a tribe already civilised to return
to the brutality of savage life.

It would appear that, in all that belongs to the sus-
tenance of life and the supply of bodily wants, the habits
of men are liable to indeﬁnite variations. In the external
aspect of human actions and human society, the most com-
plete changes that can be imagined have actually taken
place, and in these things there is nothing stable or per-
manent. In order to discover ﬁxed principles of human
action, which, by reason of their constancy, may be regarded
as typical of the whole family of mankind, or of some par-
ticular department of it, and thus furnish a topic of com-
parison with the uniform and speciﬁc instincts of the brute
creation, we must look somewhat more deeply into the
subject, and contemplate the inward principles of human
nature, the sentiments, feelings, sympathies, internal con-
sciousness, as well as the external habits of life and action,
which thence result. There are, indeed, certain habits of
mankind which, from their prevalence, may be regarded as
universal characters. The use of conventional speech has
been regarded as one of the most remarkable characteristics
of humanity: its universal existence among men is not less

660 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [neck III.

remarkable than its total absence among the inferior tribes.
The use of ﬁre, of artiﬁcial clothing, of arms, the art of
domesticating animals, are, some of them at least, charac-
ters not less general. But all these arts, as well as that
of conventional language, are only certain outward mani-
festations of that internal agency which is the really dis-
tinctive attribute of human nature. It is this principle,
and its most essential and characteristic phenomena, if we
can discover them, that we must take as the subject of
comparison with the psychical nature of the lower animals.
If, now, we inquire more intimately into the relations of
this faculty of man with that which corresponds with it in
brutes, we shall ﬁnd great and important relations to sub-
sist between them. Both, for example, are principles of
action bestowed on the respective orders of creatures to
promote the well-being and conservation of individuals and
of tribes. The desire of present pleasure, or to secure for
the future happiness and prosperity, is the end or aim and
the leading principle of action in all animated beings, and
this is the great source of active energy in mankind and in
the lower tribes. But, in the nature of this principle,
some philosophers insist on drawing a strong distinction
between mankind and the inferior orders, and they found
it on the circumstance, taken for granted rather than
proved, that all the acts of the low er animals are performed
without consciousness of the end. “ Deus est anima bruto-
rum,” said the metaphysicians of the middle ages, who.
maintained that the lower species are merely mechanical
agents. The assertion had no other groundwork than a
mere conjecture: it was incapable of proof; for who can
demonstrate that birds, in building their nests, are not
aware that they are making provision for their young;
that the. ant constructs her heap without caution of her
future wants; that the working bees which surround their
queen feel nothing like a loyal devotion to the monarch of
the hive ; or that the termites, who drag their vanquished
enemies into captivity, and force them to guard their young,

I

CH. 111.] PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTERS. 661

do not lord it over their vassals with the same domineering
pride with which the Persian despot trod on the neck of a
Roman emperor?

The changeless uniformity which prevails in the habits
of one class of beings, contrasted with the variation, equally
remarkable when one generation is compared with another,
in the higher class, is a more really characteristic difference
between the life of instinctive and that of rational agents.
This is the distinction most obvious, and the only one that
is obvious, to a superﬁcial and casual observer. But those
who look more closely into the nature of actions, and into
the more recondite history of feelings and sentiments, which
are the prime movers and secret springs of actions, are
enabled to discover a more important distinction ; and this
is to be found in the very different scope towards which
the active energies of instinct and of reason are directed.
The energies of all the lower animals, the whole sum of
their activities, excited into action by the stimulus of
desire or aversion, according to different laws impressed
on each species, are directed towards the present safety and
immediate well-being of the individual or of his tribe. But
if we survey the whole sphere of human actions, in the vast
ﬁeld of observation which the entire history of mankind
presents, we shall ﬁnd the same remark can here be
applied but in a very limited degree. On the contrary,
there is nothing more remarkable in the habitudes of man-
kind, and in their manner of existence in various parts of
the world, than a reference, which is everywhere more or
less distinctly perceptible, to a state of existence to which
they feel themselves to be destined after the termination of
their visible career, and to the inﬂuence which both civilised
and barbarous men believe to be exercised over their con-
dition, present and future, by unseen agents, differing in
attributes according to the sentiments of different nations,
but everywhere acknowledged to exist, and regarded with
' sentiments of awe and apprehension. The rites every-
where performed for the dead, the various ceremonies of

662 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

sepulture, of embalming, of cremation, funereal processions
and pomps following the deceased, in every age and nation
during countless ages,—tombs raised over their remains,
innumerable tumuli scattered over all the regions of the
world,the onlymemorials of races long extinct,——the morais,
or houses of the dead, and the gigantic monuments of the
Polynesians,—the magniﬁcent pyramids of Egypt and of
Anahuac,—the prayers and litanies set up in behalf of the
living and of the dead in the churches of Christendom, in
the mosques and pagodas of the East, as heretofore in the
temples of the Pagan world,—-the power of sacerdotal and
consecrated orders, who have caused themselves to be
revered as the interpreters of destiny, and as mediators
between gods and men,———pontiﬂ's, vicegerents of the Deity,
on the banks of the Tiber, of the Brahmaputra, and the
Arabian Gulf,—sacred wars, desolating empires through
zeal for some metaphysical dogma, which the mass of those
who fought and perished never understood,——toilsome pil-
grimages performed every year, during long successive cen-
turies, through every region of the earth, by thousands,
of black and of white men, seeking atonement for guilt
at the tombs of prophets and saints,~—-immolations of the
old and the young, voluntary deaths of the aged, and sacri-
ﬁces of children by their parents,——the slaughter of ani-
mals for the typical or piacular averting of contracted
guilt,—all these, and other similar phenomena in the his-
tory of all the barbarous and civilised nations of the world,
would lead us to believe that all mankind sympathise in
deeply impressed feelings and sentiments, which are as
mysterious in their nature as in their origin. These are
certainly among the most remarkable of the psychological
phenomena which are peculiar to human beings, and which
serve to distinguish the habits of men, not in their external
aspect, but in their inward nature and originating princi-
ples of action, from the whole life and agency of the lower
orders of the creation.

If it should appear, after a full investigation of these

CH. Iv.] PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTERS. 663

phenomena, that there are leading principles in the psycho-
logy of human races which, in their most important rela-
tions, stand in correspondence with the diversiﬁed instincts
of the lower species, and, moreover, that these leading
principles are common to all human races, a strong argu-
ment, as we have before observed, is plainly deducible in
favour of the common origin of mankind.

I shall now endeavour to pursue this line Of inquiry,
and to illustrate the psychological history of the most widely
separated races of men. This Object may be attained by
collecting, in the ﬁrst place, the most striking and charac-
teristic particulars relating to the moral and intellectual
state of such tribes, of their original superstitions or reli-
gious dogmas in times when they were as yet out 01? from
participation in the common acquirements Of the civilised
and Christianised world; and, secondly, by showing how
far such races have been found capable of receiving and
appropriating the blessings of civilisation and Christianity
when they were introduced among them.

It would occupy too much time and space to go through
this problem in relation to all the diﬂ‘erent tribes of men,
and it will be suﬁicient to survey two or three Of the most
diversiﬁed races. The nations of the New World, taken
as an aggregate, may claim the ﬁrst place in this inquiry
I shall collect facts which may tend to throw some light
on the inquiry, as it regards the American nations from
the Polar regions to Cape Horn; secondly, I shall advert
to the woolly-haired races of Africa. A comparison of
these with the nations of Europe and Asia will furnish a
suﬂicient ground for resolving all doubts, or for conﬁrming
them.

 

CHAPTER IV. '
PSYCHOLOGICAL VIEW OF THE NATIVE RACES OF AMERICA.

IE there is any department of the human family which
may be said, with an appearance of truth, to differ in its

664 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

psychological character from the rest of mankind, it will
be allowed to be the aboriginal stock of people in the New
World. A celebrated writer, Dr. Von Martins, who has
enjoyed great opportunities of research into the natural
history of the Portuguese territory in America, and is well
known to have directed his attention to the ethnography of
its inhabitants, has represented in a very strong—and, as
it appears to me, in an exaggerated—manner the moral
as well as the physical peculiarities of these people. In
order to avoid the risk of misrepresenting his opinions, I
shall cite some passages from one of his works which has
appeared in an English translation. ' '

“ The indigenous race of the New World,” he observes,
“is distinguished from all the other nations of the earth,
externally, by peculiarities of make, but still more, inter-
nally, by their state of mind and intellect. The aboriginal
American is at once in the incapacity of infancy and
unpliancy of old age,———he unites the opposite poles of intel-
lectual life. This strange and inexplicable condition has
hitherto frustrated almost every attempt to reconcile him
completely with the European, to whom he gives way, so
as to make him a cheerful and happy member of the com-
munity: and it is this his double nature which presents
the greatest difﬁculty to science when she endeavours to
investigate his origin, and those earlier epochs of history
in which he has for thousands of years moved, indeed, but
made no improvement in his condition. But this is far
removed from that natural state of child-like security which
marked (as an inward voice declares to us, and as the
most ancient written documents afﬁrm) the ﬁrst and fore-
most period of the history of mankind. The men of the
red race, on the contrary, it must be confessed, do not
appear to feel the blessing of a Divine descent, but to have
been led, by merely animal instinct and tardy steps, through
a dark Past to their actual cheerless Present. Much,
therefore, seems to indicate that the native Americans are
not in the ﬁrst stage of that simple, we might say physical

OH. Iv.] CHARACTERISTICS or AMERICAN RACES. 665

(naturkistorischen) development, —— that they are in a
secondary regenerated state.

“ Besides the traces of a primeval, and, in like manner,
ante-historic culture of the human race in America, as well
as a very early inﬂuence on the productions of nature, we
may also adduce as a ground for these views the basis of
the present state of natural and civil rights among the

aboriginal Americans,—-I mean precisely, as before ob- ‘u

served, that enigmatical subdivision of the natives into an
almost countless multitude of greater and smaller groups,

and that almost entire exclusion and excommunication with ‘

regard to each other, in which mankind presents its dif-
ferent families to us in America, like fragments of a vast
ruin. The history of the other nations inhabiting the
{earth furnishes nothing which has any-analogy to this.

“ Long-continued migrations of single nations and tribes
have doubtless taken place from a Very early period through-
out the whole continent of America, and they may have
been especially the causes of dismemberment and Corrup-
tion in the languages, and of a corresponding demoralisa-
tion of the people. By assuming that only a few leading
nations were at ﬁrst, as was the case with the Tupi people,
dispersed like so many rays of light, mingled together, and
dissolved, as it were, into each other by mutual collision,
and that these migrations, divisions, and subsequent com-
binations, have been continued for countless ages, the
present state of mankind in America may assuredly be
accounted for; but the cause of this singular mis-develop-
ment remains, no less on that account, unknown and
enigmatical.

“ Can it be conjectured that some extensive convulsion
of nature—some earthquake rending asunder sea and land,
such as is reported to have swallowed up the far-famed
Island of Atlantis—has there swept away the inhabitants
in its vortex? Has such a calamity ﬁlled the survivors
with a terror so monstrous, as, handed down from race to
race, must have darkened and perplexed their intellects,

/
f

\
I
I

I

666 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 111. .

hardened their hearts, and driven them, as if ﬂying at ;
random, from each other, far from the blessings of social .
life ‘9 Have, perchance, burning and destructive suns, or
overwhelming ﬂoods, threatened the man of the red race
with a horrible death by famine, and armed him with a
rude and unholy hostility, so that, maddened against him-
self by atrocious and bloody acts of cannibalism, he has
fallen from the godlike dignity for which he was designed,
to his present degraded state of darkness? Or is this
inhumanising (Ent-mensckung) the consequence of deeply-
rooted preternatural vices, inﬂicted by the Genius of our
race (with a severity which, to the eye of a short-sighted ‘
observer, appears throughout all nature like cruelty) on
the innocent as well as on the guilty P”

Thus far Dr. Von Martius. His various works con-
tain many developments of the same series of observations.*
He is a writer highly imaginative, and his mind was forcibly
struck with the singular aspect of human existence which
he discovered in the western parts of South America.
Had he taken a more extensive survey of the nations of
the whole Continent, his opinion might have been some-
what modiﬁed.

That the American nations are not, in a psychological
point of view, removed at so great a distance from the rest
of mankind as these observations would lead us to suspect,
will appear, if I am not mistaken, from the following con-
siderations :—-—

1. The religious sentiments and impressions which pre-
vailed of old among the nations of the New World, the
dogmas that were universally received among them, their
expectations as to a future state of existence, the religious
rites and practices which they performed, their superstitious .

* “Von dem Reehts-Zustande unter den Ur—Einwohnern Braziliens,
Eine Abhandlung,” von Dr. (1F. Ph. Von Martins. Miinchen, 1832.
Mo. Translated in the second volume of the “Journal of the Royal
Geographical Society.”——-“Reise in Brazilien,” von Dr. Von Spix und
l\[artius, ex. Th. 4to.—~“ Ueber (lie Zukunft und Vergangenheit der
Amerikanischen Volkstamm,” von Dr. Martins. Miinchen.

 

a 011. IV.] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 667

j persuasions, the modes in which their credulity displayed
itself, the juggleries and impostures by which they prac-
tised on each other, and excited the opinion of preter-
natural powers, of the possession of magical skill,——all
these, and other exhibitions of the internal feelings, were,
as they appear among the American races, precisely in
harmony with what we discover in other departments of
mankind.

I shall take the account which Loskiel, an excellent
old writer, who resided many years among the Delaware
Indians, has given of their native religion and super-
stition.

“The prevailing opinion of all these nations,” says
Loskiel, “is that there is one God, or, as they call him,
one Great and Good Spiri .” It seems, from the testimony
of this writer, which is supported by the evidence of all
those who have conversed with the aboriginal nations of
North America, that the conceptions of these nations
respecting the Deity are much more complete and philoso-
phical than those of most savage people in the Old Continent.
They suppose him literally to be the Creator of heaven
and earth, of men and all other creatures ; they represent
him as all-mighty, and able to do as much good as he
pleases; “ nor do they doubt that he is kindly disposed
towards men, because he imparts power to plants to grow,
causes rain and sunshine, and gives ﬁsh and venison to
man for his support ;”——these gifts, however, to the Indians
exclusively. “ They are convinced that God requires of
them to do good and to eschew evil.” We may observe
that, in these particulars, the Americans resemble the
Northern Asiatics. We are assured by the late traveller,
M. Erman, on the authority of the metropolitan Philo-
phe'i, who lived among the Ostiaks on the Oby, that
these people had, before Christian missionaries ever came
among them, a belief in the existence of a Supreme Deity,
of whose nature they had pure and exalted ideas, and to
whom they afﬁrmed that they never made offerings, nor

668 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K III'.

had they represented his form; while, to inferior gods, and f.
particularly to Oertidk, who was a sort of mediator, and 1

whose name, as it was preserved among the Magyars,

Oerdig, was used by the monks as a designation for the .

devil, they made divers gifts: they performed before his

image dances, which Erman, who visited the Kolushians *

on the Sitcka, declares to be precisely similar to the war-
dances of those Americans. Some of the American people
make images of the Manitos. _

Besides the Supreme Deity, the American nations be-
lieve in a number of inferior spirits, whom the Delaware

1

1

Indians term Manitos : they are both good and evil. 1
“ From the accounts of the oldest Indians,” says Loskiel,
“it appears that when war was in contemplation, they used ;

to admonish each other to hearken to the good and not to
evil spirits, the former always recommending peace.” They
had formerly no notion of a devil, or evil being, in the
Christian and Eastern sense of the term, but readily adopted,
according to Loskiel, such a belief from the white people.
They have among them preachers who pretend to have
received revelations, and who dispute and teach different
opinions. Some pretend to have travelled near to the
dwelling of God, or near enough to hear the cooks crow,
and see the smoke of the chimneys in heaven ; others de-
clare that no one ever knew the dwelling-place of God, but
that the abode of the Good Spirit is above the blue sky,
and that the road to it is the milky way,—a notion, by the
way, which Beausobre and others have traced in the remains
of the Manicheans, and other Eastern philosophers.

The Americans believe in the existence of souls distinct
from bodies, and many of them in the transmigration of
souls. According to Loskiel, they declare “ that Indians
cannot die eternally ; for even Indian corn is viviﬁed, and
rises again.” The general opinion among them is that the
souls of the good alone go to a place abounding in all
earthly pleasures, while the wicked wander about dejected
and melancholy.

C CH. m] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 669

Like other nations, they had sacriﬁces. “ Sacriﬁces,”
says Loskiel, “ made with a View to pacify God and the
subordinate deities, are of very ancient date among them,
and considered in so sacred a light, that unless they are
performed in a time and manner acceptable, illness, mis-
fortune, and death, would befall them and their families.”
They offer on these occasions hares, bear’s ﬂesh, and Indian
corn. Many nations have, besides other stated times of
' sacriﬁce, one principal festival in two years, when they
. sacriﬁce an animal, and make a point of eating the whole.
“ A small quantity of melted fat is poured by the oldest
men into the ﬁre, and in this the main part of the offering
consists. The offerings are made to Manitos. The
Manitos are precisely the Fetisses of the African nations
I and of the Northern Asiatics; they are tutelar beings,
Eoften in visible forms. Every Indian has a guardian
gManito : one has the sun for his Manito, one the moon;
lone has a dream that he must make his Manito an owl,
tone a buffalo. The Delawares had ﬁve festivals in the
Eyear, one in honour of Fire, supposed to have been the
[ parent of all the Indian nations.”

Like other nations, these people believed in the neces-
; sity of puriﬁcation from guilt by fasting and bodily morti-
:ﬁcation. Some underwent for this end the pain of being
Ibeaten with sticks from the soles of their feet to their head.
' “ Some give the poor people vomits as the most expeditious
:mode.”

Like the Northern Asiatics, the American nations had,
instead of a regular priesthood, jugglers or sorcerers, who
pretended to have supernatural power and knowledge.
They appear to conform in every respect to the Shamans
of the Siberians, and the Fetiss-seers of the African nations.
Mr. Catlin’s work contains numerous anecdotes illustrative
of this part ; and of other likewise of the superstitions of
the native Americans.

- As for their susceptibility of civilisation and of Christ-
ianity, enough has been said in the preceding chapters of:

 

670 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. LBOOK III... .1

this work to prove that those who deny it to the nations of 3
America are under the inﬂuence of a mere prejudice, .
Whole tribes in North America have embraced Christianity,
and live under its inﬂuence, and are addicted to agri- .
culture and improving in ' arts. How far their reputed .
conversion goes must be amatter of personal inquiry, and ,
can only be known from those who have had intercourse
with the people themselves. I have been assured by Mr.
Schoolcraft, a most intelligent and enlightened man, long
employed by the government of the United States as a
' public agent in the affairs of the Cherokees, who has had
most extensive opportunities of becoming intimately ac-
quainted with the Indians in various parts, that he has .
known many persons of that race whose minds were
thoroughly imbued with the principles and sentiments of
the Christian religion, and who lived and died in that
faith, who were in the full sense of the expression pious
and devout Christians.* The following account, given by

 

4* The closing sentences of the eloquent preface to the great work of
Schoolcraft on the “ Indian Tribes of the United States” contain the most
recent views of this profound and philosophical observer.

“We perceive in them many noble and disinterested traits. The simpli-
city of their eloquence has challenged admiration. Higher principles of
devotion to what they believe to be cardinal virtues, no people ever evinced.
Faith has furnished the Christian martyr with motives to sustain him at
the stake: but the North American Indian has endured the keenest
torments of ﬁre without the consolations of the Gospel. Civilised nations
are cheered on their way to face the cannon’s mouth by inspiring music;
but the warrior of the forest requires no roll of the drum to animate
his steps.

“ Mistaken in his belief in a system of gods of the elements—miscon-
ceiving the whole plan of industrial prosperity and happiness—wrong in
his conceptions of the social duties of life, and doubly wrong in his notions
of death and eternity, he yet approves himself to the best sensibilities of
the human heart by the strong exhibition of those ties which bind a father
to his children, and link whole forest communities in the indissoluble bonds
of brotherhood. He lingers with affection, but with helpless ignorance,
around the dying couch of his relatives ; and his long memory of the dead
ceases but with life itself. No costly tomb or cenotaph marks his place of
burial; but he visits that spot with the silent majesty of grief. God has

, on. Iv.] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE AMERICAN RACE. 671»

i Loskiel, of the congregation of converted Indians belonging
' to the Moravian or Herrnhuter’s settlement at New Salem,
' will be read by many persons with interest :—
> “ This mission,” he says, “ has now stood forty-ﬁve
; years. From a register of the congregation, dated 1772,
‘ we learn that, from the beginning of the mission to that
year, 720 Indians had been added to the Church of Christ
by holy baptism, most of whom had departed this life
rejoicing in God their Saviour. I would willingly add the
number of those converted to the Lord since that period ;
but as the church books and other writings of the mission-
aries were burnt when they were taken prisoners in the
Muskingum, in 1781, I cannot speak with certainty. Sup-
posing even that from 1772 to 1787 the number of new
converts was the same, yet, considering the long standing
of the mission, and the great pains and sufferings of the
missionaries, the ﬂock collected was very small. The
reason of this may be found partly in the peculiar character
of the Indian nations, but chieﬂy in this, that the mission-
aries did not so much endeavour to gather a large number
of baptised heathen, as to lead souls to Christ who should
truly believe on and live unto Him.”

I shall conclude these remarks on the psychological
history of the American nations with a short survey of the
Esquimaux. This race belongs, as we have seen, to the
class of nations who, by their peculiar culture of language,
as well as by local circumstances, are separated from the
rest of mankind and form the original stock of the New
World. I term them aboriginal, because the era of their
isolation goes back beyond the reach of history. If, in

 

planted in his heart affections and feelings which only require to be moulded,
and directed to noble aims. That impress seals him as a brother,—erring,
indeed, and benighted in his ways, but still a‘brother.

“ To reclaim such a race to the paths of virtue and truth; to enlighten
‘the mind which has been so long in darkness ; and to give it new and solid
foundations for its hopes, is a duty alike of high civilisation and warm
benevolence.”

Dec. 3, 1850.

672 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1200K III.

this race, so widely distinguished from other human tribes,
we can prove the existence of a similar intellectual and
moral nature, it may well be assumed that in no other
human tribe will similar principles be found wanting.
“ The habits of the Hyperborean peOple,” says M. Lesson,
“ are nearly the same wherever they have been carefully
observed. Living on tracts of the earth where living
nature seems to be expiring, buried under the eternal ices
of the pole, their industry is directed towards ﬁshing and
the chase, which are their only resources for support, and
in which they have acquired great skill. The rigour of
the climate during long winters has obliged them to dig
for themselves subterraneous abodes and storehouses for
the provisions which they lay up against the season when
they can no longer ﬁsh or hunt. During the long polar
nights which the aurora borealis feebly illuminates, the
Esquimaux, buried under the ice and snow in yourtes
excavated deeply in the soil, feed upon dried ﬁsh or the
ﬂesh of whales, and drink with delight the oil which they
have laid up in bladders. They sew with nerves their
winter garments, made of the skins of seals, the hair of
which serves the purposes of fur; and make their summer
dress of the intestine of the largest whales, which resem-
bles varnished stuffs.

“ The Esquimaux is skilful in the chase of foxes and
sables, whose skin serves him for clothing and for an object
of barter in the trafﬁc of the Arctic people. He boldly
harpoons the cetacea : his darts, made of bone and pointed
stones, are surmounted with inﬂated bladders, the resist-
ance of which upon the water wears out the strength of the
whale, who speedily rises and exposes himself to fresh
attacks.”

“ Superstitious to excess, says the same writer, “the
Polar race, with some slight shades of difference, displays
the same religious sentiments prevalent among all its tribes.
Their loose morality renders the men addicted to polygamy,
and causes them to prostitute without shame their wives

,3

31 CH. Iv.] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 673

a and daughters, whom they regard as creatures of an inferior
if order, to be disposed of according to their pleasure.

“ In Greenland and in Labrador, missionaries of the
‘5 United Brethren have long ago settled among the native
1 people, who are of the same race which is elsewhere spread
7 along the shores of the Polar’ seas. We have obtained
3 'much more accurate information respecting the habits of the
1 people from these missionaries than from any other quarter.
. The following particulars, which I extract from their ac-
counts, relate chieﬂy to the Esquimaux of Greenland, from
whom, however, it is well known that the western tribes .
of the same race differ but in accidental circumstances.

“ The voyagers who ﬁrst described the natives of
Greenland formed very erroneous opinions respecting
them. It was reported that they worshipped the sun, and
sacriﬁced to the devil. Sailors, who had observed them
look intently on the heavens on rising in the morning,
hence derived the ﬁrst of these notions; the second arose
from the discovery of ﬂat square stones, strewn with cinders
and bones : it was concluded that these were places of
sacriﬁce, and to whom should they sacriﬁce but to the
devil P When the Moravian missionaries learned their
language, and were able to converse with them, they found
these notions to be quite erroneous.”

The Greenlanders, like other nations, believed in the
existence of supernatural powers exercising control over the
destinies of men. It appears, however, as we might a
priori imagine, that they had in general no clear idea of a
Creator or a creation. “ They knew not, and, perhaps, the
generality of them never considered, whether things were
always as they are or not.” Yet, if we may believe the Mora-
vian missionaries, whose good faith seems above suspicion,
there were some philosophers among these Pagan seal-
catchers who speculated on the doctrine of ﬁnal causes. An
Esquimaux told one of the missionaries that he had often
reﬂected that a kadjak, with all its tackle and implements,
does not grow of itself into existence, but must be made

x x

 

67 4 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K 111.

with labour and contrivance ; but a bird, he added, is
constructed with greater skill than the best kadjak, and no
man can make a bird. “ I bethought me,” said the Green-
lander, “ that he proceeded from his parents, and they
from their parents : but there must have been some ﬁrst
parents—whence did they come P Certainly, I concluded,
there must be a being able to make them and all other
things : a being inﬁnitely more mighty and knowing than
the wisest man.” -

The Greenlanders believed in the existence of spirits,
good and evil, besides the souls of men. The angekoks,
or diviners, who pretended to have visited frequently the
realm of souls, describe them as pale and soft, not to be
felt if anyone should attempt to grasp them. They
believed in a future existence, which was to be without end.
This Elysium was generally placed by them in the abysses
of the ocean, to which the deep cavities of rocks are
avenues. There dwells the great spirit, Torngarsuk, and
his mother, under a joyous and perpetual summer, where a
shining sun is obscured by no night : there is a ﬁne limpid
stream abounding with ﬁne seals, ﬁsh, and fowls, easy to
be caught, and even to be found boiling alive in a great
kettle. But these seats of the gods can be approached;
only by those who have displayed great courage and
address, who have mastered many seals, and who have
undergone hardships, have been drowned in the sea, or by
women who have died in child-bed. Here is obviously the
persuasion that virtue, bravery at least, is rewarded in the
future life. Before the disembodied soul enters Torngarsuk’s'
realm, it undergoes a sort of purgation by sliding, ﬁve days
or longer, down a rugged rock, which is thereby full of
blood and gore. Unfortunate souls who perish in cold
winter, or boisterous weather, incur a risk of being utterly
destroyed on the road. Annihilation is regarded by the
Greenlanders, as by other nations, with peculiar horror;
and to prevent it, the survivors abstain for ﬁve days from
certain meats and from all noisy work. The ﬁctions of

; CH. Iv.] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 675

f, this people are not so deﬁnite as to admit of no variations
in the site and description of Elysium; some fancy it to be
; the sky, and say that the northern lights are the dances of
Sportive souls; others maintain this state of agitation in
the air to be the destiny of worthless souls, who will there I
3 be half starved and tormented by ravens. It seems, on
3 the whole, that the future state of the old Pagan Esqui-
‘ mauX, or Greenlanders, was in a great measure a state of
retribution of rewards and punishments. Happiness and
misery were at least not dispensed with indifference to
merit and demerit.

The chief of the spirits is named Torngarsuk, who
dwells in his happy subterranean mansion. His mother,
or wife, is a- mischievous being. This Proserpine of the
north lives in a great house under the ocean, where, by
magic spells, she can detain all the animals of the sea. In
the oil-jar under her lamps sea-birds swim about. Her
throne is guarded by rampant seals, or defended by a great
dog, who never sleeps but the twinkling of an eye. So
many curious traits occur in the description of this infernal
goddess and her abode which recall the Proserpine of
classical mythology, the Patala of the Hindus, and the
subterranean scenes of enchantment among the Arabs, that
we might well be inclined to derive these fables from a
common source, if the resemblance between them was not
better accounted for by referring it to the common laws of
the human mind, and to the tendency of the imagination
to create similar ﬁctions With reference to particular sub-
jects, and under the inﬂuence of corresponding feeling and
impressions. But this brings out so much the stronger
proof that the mind is the same in different countries and
in different races of men.

The Greenlanders likewise believe that the souls of the
dead are sometimes seen near the places of burial. The
sun and moon have their tutelary genii; water, air, and
ﬁre, mountains and caves, are the abodes of Nereids and
salamandrine spirits; giants and pigmies, and monsters

676 ‘ NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

with dogs’ heads, ﬁnd their place in this as in so many -

other mythologies.

The natives of Greenland were strongly imbued with
the notions so prevalent among mankind in different re-
gions, that there must be a particular class of men ﬁtted
to mediate between the people and the supernatural powers.
These persons were termed conga/6075.9, that is, sorcercrs
and diviners. Many families living together, according to

Crantz, keep an angekok as their counsellor on particular ‘

occasions; and if they cannot get one, they are despised
and pitied as miserable wretches. In order to become an
angekok, it is necessary to abandon for a long time the
intercourse of men, to macerate the body by long fasting
and by strenuous intensity of thought, and, like the
Indian sanyasis performing pujah, to distract the mind

almost into madness. When a torngak, or familiar I

spirit, is obtained by these efforts, the individual becomes
an angekok, and thenceforward is possessed of the powers
of sorcerers and magicians. On all occasions of distress
or sickness the angekoks are applied to for relief. It
is believed that they can take diseases off or lay them
on; that they can enchant, and dissolve the spell of the
enchanted arrow; that they can call blessings down or
chase spectrcs away. If they have to do with a sick

patient, they must mutter something over him, and blow ,,

upon him, to cure him; or they must fetch and implant a
healthy soul in him, or perhaps only predict if he will
recover or die. By other enchantments, they discover if
an absent man is living or dead. They cite the soul of a
man to appear before them; and if they wound such a soul
with a Spear, the man must die a lingering death. The
witches of Greenland are exactly parallel to the witches of
England, according to the belief of our ancestors.

The account of the conversion of the Esquimaux to

Christianity and t0 civilisation, as given by Crantz from

the simple and unaffected narrative of the Moravian mis-
sionaries, cannot be read without a lively interest. In the

2
s

i
a
‘7

CH. Iv] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 677

long and painful struggle, almost leading to despair of
I ultimate success, and in the event which rewarded their
‘ labours, the history of these missions affords a specimen of
what has taken place in almost every similar instance,
where the promulgators of Christianity have been sincerely
devoted to their undertaking, and have been endowed with
sufﬁcient zeal and perseverance, and with other requisite
qualiﬁcations. Among the Greenlanders, as elsewhere,
many years of patient labour were toiled through, and

many a prediction had been heard of utter failure in so
E vain and impracticable an undertaking, before a more
encouraging prospect was opened, or any perceptible effect
was produced upon the minds of the ignorant savages. In
t the resistance long made by these people to Christianity,
' as well as in the circumstances which attended its ultimate
< reception, we perceive the workings of the same mind

which has often displayed itself in other races of men. It

was in 1721 that Egede, the apostle of Greenland, esta-

blished the ﬁrst Danish mission in that country. He was

followed by missionaries belonging to the Unitas Fratrum.

After an interval of ﬁfteen years, we ﬁnd Crantz, the his-

torian of this community, thus confessing the total want of
'any apparent result of their long and painful exertions.

“ Hitherto,” he says, “ they had not seen the trace of any

permanent impression from the truths they had held forth.
. The Greenlanders who came from a distance were stupid,
ignorant, and devoid of reﬂection; and the little that could
be told them in a short visit, even if it was heard with atten-
tion, died away in their perpetual wanderings. Those who
lived constantly in the immediate neighbourhood of the
missionaries, and had been instructed so many years, were
not grown better, but most of them worse ; they were dis-
gusted, tired, and hardened against the truth.” When
pressed to give a serious attention to the doctrines of
Christianity, they either showed their dislike openly, or
excused themselves in terms like the following :—“ Show
us the God whom you describe,” said they; “ then we will

 

678 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. ‘

believe in him and serve him. You represent him too ‘_
sublime and incomprehensible; how shall we come at
him? Neither will he trouble himself about us. We ,'

have invoked him when we have nothing to eat, or when
we have been sick, but it is as if he would not hear us.
We think what you say of him is not true; for if you
know him better than we, then do you by your prayers
obtain for us sufﬁcient food, a healthy body, and dry house,
and that is all we desire or want. Our soul is healthy
already, and nothing is wanting if we have but a sound
body and enough to eat. You are another sort of folk
than we: in your country, people may, perhaps, have dis-

 

1i

eased souls; and, indeed, we see proofs enough in those 2

who come here that they are good for nothing; they may
stand in need of a Saviour and of a Physician for the soul.

Your heaven, and your spiritual joys and felicities, may be It

good enough for you, but would be too tiresome for us.
We must have seals, ﬁshes, and birds ; for our soul can no
more subsist without them than our bodies. We should
not ﬁnd these in your heaven ; therefore we will leave your
heaven to you and the worthless part of the Greenlanders ;
but as for us, we will go down to Torngarsuk ; there we
shall ﬁnd an exuberance of everything without anytrouble.”

The ﬁrst individual of this nation who became a con-
vert was a man of extraordinary mental powers in such a
state of society, and one whom the missionaries always

mention as altogether a most remarkable person. His '

name was Kajarnak. They describe him as “ a man whom
they cannot but wonder at, when they consider the great
supineness and stupidity of the Greenlanders in general,
and that they can comprehend nothing except what they
are daily conversant with. But this man,” they continue,
“ scarcely hears a thing twice before he understands it and
retains it in his mind and heart. At the same time, he
shows an uncommon love to us, and a constant desire to be
better instructed; so that he seems to catch every word
out of our mouths, which we have never perceived in any

CH. IV.] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AMERICAN RACE. 679

Greenlander before.” Kajarnak had come from a remote
' part of Greenland ; he was a stranger to the missionaries,
and was immediately interested with their representations
of the Christian religion, and impressed with the narrative,
. which in a simple and emphatic manner they delivered,
of the most striking events of the evangelical history.axe

 

* I have no doubt that some of my readers will be interested with
the account which the missionaries transmitted of the manner in which
doctrines so remote from their habit of thought penetrated the minds of
the ﬁrst converts among the Esquimaux. The following is an extract
from Crantz’s work :—

 

“ In the summer of 1728, many natives of the southern country
visited the settlement. One day, when a missionary named John Beck
was employed in copying part of a translation of the Gospels, he read a
portion of it to these savages, and took an opportunity of explaining it to
them. ‘The Holy Spirit,’ say the missionaries, ‘prompted this brother
to describe the agonies and death of Christ with more and more energy,
and he exhorted them with a warm heart to think seriously how much it

‘ had cost our Saviour to redeem us, and that on that account thay should

by no means withhold their hearts from Him, which He had earned at
so dear a price; for He had been wounded, and shed His blood, and

; died to purchase them, and had endured such anguish of soul that it

made Him sweat blood. At the same time he read, out of the New Tes-
tament, the history of our Saviour’s agony on the hIount of Olives, and
of His bloody sweat. Then the Lord opened the heart of one of the
Pagans, whose name was Kajarnak, and he stepped up to the table, and
said with a loud, earnest, and affecting voice, ‘ How was that? tell me
that once more, for I fain would be saved too.’ ‘These words,’ says the

7 missionary, ‘ penetrated my very soul, and kindled in me such an ardour,

that I gave the Greenlanders a full account of our Saviour’s life and
death, and of the counsel of God for our salvation, while tears ran down
my cheeks.’ From that time Kajarnak became a disciple of the mission-
aries, and was a willing and able instrument in propagating the Christian
doctrine among his countrymen.”

In a further account of the state of the new converts, written a few
years after the transaction above related, we ﬁnd the following reﬂections :—

“Though the woful state of the heathen still grieved the brethren,
yet the fruits of grace which they discerned in Kajarnak and the rest of
the catechumens rejoiced them more and more. They evinced plain
signs not only of a true consciousness of a Divine Being, and a profound
reverence for Him, not only joy that Christ will raise the dead, and that
believers will be happy in another world, but principally a real sense of
their own misery, a joy in the love of God manifested to the fallen

6.80 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

Kajarnak became a zealous convert and disciple of the
missionaries, and was a willing and able instrument in pro-
pagating the doctrine which he had embraced among his
countrymen. A few of them soon followed his example, ,
and a small community of proselytes was formed, which in '
a few years increased to a considerable number.

When such a commencement had once been made, the
conversion of the Esquimaux of Greenland to Christianity
seems to have proceeded rapidly. In the year 1744, it was
evident that a considerable eﬂ‘ect had been produced upon
the minds of the people generally; great numbers were
interested in the subjects which the missionaries set before
them. In 1748, not less than 230 converts resided at
New Herrnhut, thirty-ﬁve of whom had been baptised
during the year. “ Though these people are not without
imperfections,” says the historian of these missions, “it
is yet evident that they are advancing. Their intercourse
with one another is become more and more characterised
by mutual kindness and the proofs of real conversion.” A
few years afterwards, it was observed that, though nearly
200 persons baptised by the missionaries had ﬁnished their
earthly career, the congregation now consisted of 400 per-
sons. “ Since 1742, when the ﬁrst general awakening of
the, natives commenced, the increase has been considerable,
in proportion to the population of the country. Several

 

human race in the atonement of Christ, and a growing desire after the
word of life. It was plainly to be seen that the work of grace had taken
deep root in their hearts, by a change of life, by a voluntary abstinence
from heathenish vanities, and by cheerfully enduring the reproach of
their inﬁdel countrymen, by whom they were forsaken, hated, and
despised. Kajarnak, after his country people had been catechised by the
missionaries, used to subjoin an exhortation, that, having been so long
ignorant, they should now embrace the truth with a willing and thankful
heart, and let it effect a true change; or he would sometimes conclude
with a short but fervent prayer. And here let it be observed, that this
was not a thing he was ordered or led to do, but of his own free impulse.
He had, at the same time, a clear head, helped his teachers to the words
they wanted in the language of the Greenlanders, and often corrected
them because he pretty well understood their meaning.”

an. IV.] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE AMERICAN RACE. 681

new colonies have now been established by the Danes, pro-
vided with missionaries from the Royal College at Copen-
hagen. These were stationed in different parts of the
country. Two additional settlements were founded by the
United Brethren in 1758 and 1774, at Lichtenfels and at
Lichtenau, near Cape Farewell, when there was soon a
congregation of 205 baptised Greenlanders. In the con-
clusion of the history, drawn up a few years ago, it is
observed that, since the commencement of the mission, a
very remarkable moral change has taken place in the state
of the country and the character of the natives. “ Along
the whole extent of the western coast, the barbarities of
savage life, and the enormities ever attending Paganism
when it is dominant, are now rarely to be met with; and
the state of the country, compared with what it was eighty
or but ﬁfty years ago, may be termed civilised. The nature
and climate of this dreary region, and the methods by
which the natives procure their subsistence, necessarily
preclude the introduction of many arts of civilised society.
The people can neither till the land nor employ themselves
in manufactures; a Greenlander can ‘ neither live in the
European manner, nor clothe himself like an European,
dwelling as he does on sterile rocks, and under the rigours
of a Polar sky. Yet it may be said with truth that the
converted Greenlanders, by the habits of industry which
they have acquired since the introduction of Christianity
among them, by their contentment amid st privations and
hardships, and by the charity of the more aﬂiuent towards
their needy brethren, strikingly exemplify the doctrine that
in everycircumstance of life, and in every station, a religious
life is great gain, having the promise of reward in this
world, and in that which is to come.”*

The particulars which I have collected relating to the
superstitious opinions and impressions of the Greenlanders

 

* “Historical Sketches,” p. 62. “ From the accounts recently published,
it appears that a. fourth mission has been established, and that the
number of Christian Greenlanders belonging to the Moravian Church,

682 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

in their primitive state, and especially the facts connected
with their conversion to Christianity and civilised habits,
are sufﬁcient, if I am not mistaken, to prove that the mind
of the Esquimaux has the same moral and intellectual con-
stitution as that of other human beings. They have the
same elements of moral feeling, the same sympathies and
susceptibilities of affection, the same conscience, or internal
conviction of accountableness, more or less obscurely or
clearly impressed, the same sentiments of guilt and self-
condemnation, the same desires of eXpiation which are
common to so many other nations in almost every degree of
mental culture. The most elevated of these principles are
only recognised in the natural or Pagan state of these men
as mere rudiments of higher and better understanding, or
as scintillations now and then shooting forth. When those
doctrines and representations are opened to them which
have been found, in so many other parts of the world, con-
genial to the human mind, and, as such, have been received
by the most polished as well as by the most barbarous
nations, they'have produced their wonted effects upon the
Esquimaux. The minds of these people appear to be, as
to all essential principles of feeling and understanding, in
harmony and in strict analogy with those of other men

Such a mind can hardly be supposed common to different
species of organised beings.

 

_ which excludes those under Danish Lutheran ministers, is 1808. In this
last account, we are informed that the effects of Christianity upon the
moral and social state of the Greenlanders has been in every respect '
cheering and most beneﬁcial. The national superstitions have almost
everywhere entirely disappeared; the practice of sorcery is almost
unknown upon the coast; cruelty and licentiousness, with a whole train
of attendant vices, have, through the inﬂuence of Christianity, given way
to brotherly kindness, good order, decorum, and such a measure of
civilisation as is compatible with peculiar circumstances. The mind of
the Greenlander has been cultivated, and his heart softened and puriﬁed,
though his mode of life is still rude, and his habits greatly at variance
with European ideas of comfort and civilisation.”

| CH. v.] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE AFRICAN RACE. 683

CHAPTER V.
PSYCHOLOGICAL HISTORY OF THE AFRICAN NATIONS.

I SHALL divide What is to be said on the mental history
of the African nations into two heads : ﬁrst, the history of
the Hottentot race ; secondly, that Of the Negro nations of
5 Western Africa.

 

1. 0f the Hottentot mid Bus/mama Race.

Writers on the history of mankind seem to be nearly
' agreed in considering the Bushmen, or Bosjesmen, Of South
Africa as the most degraded and miserable of all nations,
and the lowest in the scale of humanity. M. Bory de St.
Vincent describes them in his usual manner, as differing
most Widely from What he terms the J apetic species of men,
and as forming the transition from the genus homo to the
genera of orangs and gibbons : he even ﬁnds analogies
between them and the macacos.

“ Of all Species of men, this race, approaching as it
does in its form most nearly to the second genus of biman-
OuS animals, is still more closely allied to the orangs through
the inferiority of its intellectual faculties. Happily for
themselves,” he continues, “ these people are SO brutish,
lazy, and stupid, that the idea of reducing them to slavery
has been abandoned.” “ A peine peuvent-ils former un
raisonnement, et leur langage, aussi stérile que leurs
idées, se réduit a une sorte de glousscment qui n’a presque
plus rien de semblable a notre voiX. D’une malpropreté
révoltante qui les rend infects, toujours frottés de suif, ou
arrosés de leur propre urine, se faisant des ornemens de
boyeauX d’animauX qu’ils laissent se dessécher en brace-
lets ou en bandelettes sur leur peau huileuX, se remplissant
les cheveuX de graisse et de terre, vétus de peauX de béte
sans preparation, se nourissant de racines sauvages ou de
panses d’animaux et d’entrailles qu’ils ne lavent meme pas,
passant leur Vie assoupis ou accroupis et fumant, par foiS

684 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

ils errent avec quelques troupeaux qui leur fournissent du
lait. Isolés, taciturnes, fugitifs, se rétirant dans les cavernes,‘
ou dans les bois, a peine font-ils usage du feu, si ce n’est
pour allumer leurs pipes, qu’ils ne quittent point. Le foyer
domestique leur est a-peu-pres inconnu,etils ne batissent pas
de villages, ainsi que les Cafres, leurs voisins, qui regardent
ces misérables comme une sorte dc gibier, leur donnent la
chasse, et exterminent tous ceux qu’ils rencontrent. On les
a dit bons parce qu’ils sont apathiques, tranquilles parce
qu’ils sont paresseux, et doux parce qu ’ils se montrent laches
en toute occasion.’

No picture of human degradation and wretchedness can
be drawn which exceeds the real abasement and misery of
the Bushmen, as we ﬁnd it displayed by the most accurate
writers who describe this people. Without houses, or even
huts, living in caves and holes in the earth, these naked
and half-starved savages wander through forests, in small
companies or separate families, hardly supporting their
comfortless existence, by collecting wild roots, by a toil-
some search for the eggs of ants, and by devouring, when-
ever they can catch them, lizards, snakes, and the most
loathsome insects. It is no matter of surprise that those
writers who search for approximations between mankind
and the inferior orders of creation ﬁx upon the Bushmen
as their favourite theme.

But accurate observers, who cannot be suspected of
undue prepossession towards opposite sentiments and re~
presentations of human nature, have drawn a less unfavour-
able picture of the moral and intellectual character of the
Bushmen. Mr. Burchel], who sought and obtained oppor-
tunities of conversing with them, and observing their
manner of existence, though he fOund them in the most
destitute and miserable state, yet discovered among them
traits of kind and social feelings, and all the essential attri-
butes of humanity.

It must not be forgotten that the Bushmen are not a
distinct race, but a branch or subdivision of the once cx-

i

1 ,CH. V.] PSYCHOLOGY or TI—IE AFRICAN RACE. 685

ltensive nation of Hottentots. This was at one time denied.

1' Lichtenstein, who was followed by other writers, asserted

that the Bosjesmen are a peculiar family of men : he re-
garded them as entirely distinct from all the other in-
habitants of Southern Africa. A careful comparison of
, their language with that of the Korah and other Hottentots
convinced Professor Vater that there is an essential afﬁnity
between them; and in recent times this conclusion has
been fully established by local inquiries, and no diversity

 

i of opinion at present exists upon the subject. We are
E assured by one of the latest and best writers on South

t Africa, that the Bushmen are the remains of Hottentot
l hordes, who subsisted originally, like all the tribes of _
Southern Africa, chieﬂy by rearing sheep and cattle, but
‘who have been driven by the gradual eneroachments of
European colonists, and by internal wars with other tribes,
to seek for refuge among the inaccessible deserts and rocks
of the interior. “ Most of the hordes,” says the same
writer, “ known by the name of the Bushmen, are entirely
destitute of ﬂocks and herds, and subsist partly by hunting,
partly on the wild roots of the wilderness, on reptiles,
locusts, and the larvae of ants, or by plundering their
hereditary oppressors, the colonists of the frontier. Having
descended from the pastoral to the state of robbers and
hunters, the Bushmen, as we are assured, have necessarily
acquired, with their increased perils and privations, a more
resolute and ferocious character : from a mild, conﬁding,
and unenterprising race of shepherds, they have been gra-
dually transformed into wandering hordes of ﬁerce, suspi-
cious, and vindictive savages; by their fellow-men they
have been treated as wild beasts, until they have become
assimilated to wild beasts in their habits and dispositions.”
Difﬁcult as it may be to imagine a change from the
state of herdsmen to that of the miserable Bushmen, the
transition has been actually observed and described. Among
the Hottentot tribes, the Koranas are well knoWn to be
the most advanced in all the possessions and improvements

i

I
686 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 111,1
which belong to the pastoral life. A late traveller in
Africa, whose narrative is replete with good sense and the '
marks of accurate knowledge, has traced from observation

the process by which hordes even of the Korah race have

been reduced from the life of peaceful herdsmen to the

condition of hunters and predatory savages. The Koranas,

as visited by Mr. Thomson on the Hartcbccst river, had

actually undergone this transition; having been plundered

by their neighbours, and driven out into the wilderness

to subsist upon wild fruits, they had adopted the habits of

the Bushmen, and had become assimilated in every essential

particular to that miserable tribe.

Considering the pastoral Hottentots and the Bushmen
as one race, I shall make some remarks on their mental
character in general, in order to furnish the ground for a
comparison between this and other families of men.

We must attempt to estimate the character of the
Hottentot race, not from their present degraded condition, .
after the cruelty and oppression, which they have endured
from EurOpean colonists during so many generations, have
broken their spirit and reduced them to bondage or exile,
but from the accounts left by older writers of the condition
of these tribes soon after the ﬁrst settlement of the Dutch
colony.

The voyager Kolben has given us a full and circum-
stantial account of the Hottentots at this time, and many »
of his statements are singularly at variance with the de-
scription which late writers have drawn. The original
Hottentots were a numerous people, divided into many
tribes under the patriarchal government of chiefs or elders :
they wandered about with ﬂocks and herds, associated in
companies of three or four hundred persons, living in
kraals, or movable villages of huts, constructed of poles or
boughs covered with rush-mats, which were taken down
and carried on pack-oxen. A mantle of sewn sheep-skins
was their clothing; their arms were a bow with poisoned
arrows, and a light javelin, or assagai. They were bold

CH. v.] PSYCHOLOGY or THE AFRICAN RACE. 687

and active in the chase; and, although mild in their dis-
position, were courageous in warfare, as their European
invaders frequently experienced.

Kolben extols the good moral qualities of the Hotten-
tots. “ They are, perhaps, the most faithful servants in
the world. Though inﬁnitely fond of wine, brandy, and
tobacco, they are safely intrusted with them, and will
neither themselves take, nor suffer others to diminish, any
such articles when committed to their trust. To this
quality they add the greatest humanity and good nature.
Their chastity is remarkable, and adultery, when known
among them, is punished with death. They are dirty in
their habits, slothful and indolent ; and, though they can
think,” as he says, “ to the purpose, they hate the trouble
of thought.” Kolben considered their intellect as by no
means deﬁcient. He declares that “ he has known many
of them who understood Dutch, French, and Portuguese,
to a degree of perfection; one particularly, who learned
English and Portuguese in a very short time, and having
conquered the habits of pronunciation contracted from his
native language, was said by good judges to understand
and speak them with surprising readiness and propriety.
They are even employed by Europeans in affairs that
require judgment and capacity ; a Hottentot, named
Cloos, was entrusted by Van der Stel, the late Governor of
the Cape, with the business of carrying on a trade of barter
for cattle with the tribes at a great distance, and he gene-
rally returned, after executing his commission, with great
success.”

The internal character of the mind is best known by dis-
covering the religious ideas and impressions. It has often
been said that the Hottentots are destitute of all belief in
a Deity or a future state. Enslaved and separated from
their fellows, and scarcely able, without constant toil, to
support life, some may have lost the power and habit of
reﬂection and all traces of sentiment ; but Kolben assures
us that the Hottentots of his time had a ﬁrm belief in a

688 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

supreme power, which they termed “ Gounya Tekquoa,”
or the god of all gods, saying that he lived beyond the
moon. They paid him no adoration ; but they worshipped
the moon at the full and change, by sacriﬁces of cattle,
with distorted faces and postures, shouting, swearing, sing-
ing, jumping, stamping, dancing, and making numerous _
prostrations, repeating an unintelligible jargon of words.
“ They also pay singular veneration to a peculiar kind of
beetle, the appearance of which is supposed to be particu-
larly fortunate. They have an evil deity, called Toutouka,
whom they represent as a little crabbed, ill-natured being,
a great enemy to the Hottentots, and the author of all the
mischief in the world. They offer sacriﬁces to him in
order to soften his temper ; all sudden pain, accidents, or
sicknesses, are attributed to witchcraft. Charms and
amulets are in high esteem among them.” Kolben thinks
they have not the least notion of rewards and punishments ;
“ yet,” says he, “that they believe in the immortality of
the soul, seems evident from these particulars: ﬁrst, that
they offer up prayers to saints, or good Hottentots departed;
secondly, that they are apprehensive of the return of the
departed spirits to molest them ; for which reason, on the
death of any person, they remove their kraal, believing
that the departed souls remain about the places which they
formerly inhabited ; thirdly, they believe it is in the power
of the witches or wizards to lay these spirits.”

A faithful and correct account of the conversion of this
peOple to Christianity would not fail to display in striking
points of view many traits in their moral and intellectual
history. The early endeavours that were made to induce
them to receive the truths of Christianity were met with
the same obstinate resistance of which we hear so much in
almost every similar instance; and one writer has given us
as the summing up of his observations, that “ the Hotten-
tots, in short, seem born with a natural antipathy to all
customs, and every religion but their own.” This remark
is exempliﬁed by the account of a Hottentot boy who was

on. V.] CIVILISATION or THE HOTTENTOTS. 689

bred up by the Governor Van der Stel in the habits and
religion of the Dutch ; and, having learned several lan-
guages, and discovering a promising genius, was sent to
India, and employed in public business. After his return
to the Cape, he stripped oﬂ“ his European dress, clothed
himself in sheep-skin, and, presenting himself to the
Governor, emphatically renounced the society of civilised
men and the Christian religion, declaring that he would
live and die in the customs and religion of his forefathers.ale
In this we trace one characteristic trait of human nature
as it exists in other races of men. A sort of instinctive
and blind attachment to the earliest impressions made upon
the mind is one of our strongest intellectual propensities.
In the example above cited it appears to have been equally
powerful in the mind of the Hottentot as it is known to be
in more cultivated nations; yet this has not prevented the
spread of Christianity in the same race of people, when in-
troduced among them under different circumstances]L

 

* Kolben’s “Voyages, and Natural History of the Cape of Good Hope.”

1' Similar instances may be cited of other races of men. The case of
Bennilong, the Australian native, who returned to savage life after a resi-
dence of considerable duration1 in London, will be remembered by our
older colonists. Mallat records the narrative of a Philippine Negrito, who
was taken young, educated at a regular theological seminary, and actually
received into the Catholic church as a priest in full orders, but who, after
a long interval, returned to his original tribe and habits as a genuine
Negrito. A recent account of a Caffre woman educated in an English
family at the Cape may be also cited. The advocates of the notion that
the savage is the natural state of man, usually adduce such cases in proof of
their position, and are inclined to doubt that similar instances of a volun-
tary return to the original condition are to be found so decidedly
pronounced among the more highly civilised races. The fact, however,
seems to be that they are exhibited in all races, but are more striking in
the cases noticed. The return of a European to society after years of
sojourn among Algonquins would hardly be recorded as very extraordinary.
But, even admitting that the lowest tribes exhibit this yearning after their
old habits more frequently or more strongly than the higher races, it may
fairly be attributed to the wider interval they are suddenly required to step
over. In the instances of white children brought up from early youth by
savages, the families from whom the children were taken have usually been

YY

690 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

Of the Introduction of Christianity among the Hottcntots.

It is indeed surprising, after all we have heard of the
sloth and brutish sensuality of the Hottentots, to learn that
no other uncivilised race has given a more willing ear
to the preaching of Christianity, and that none has been
more strikingly and speedily improved by its reception, not
only in moral character and conduct, but also in outward
condition and prosperity. So rapid has been the spread of
civilisation around the settlements of the United Brethren,
by whom the task of introducing the Christian religion
among the Hottentots was undertaken, as to have given
rise to a general notion that the missionaries of that church
direct their endeavours, in the ﬁrst place, to the diffusion
of industry and. social arts, and make religion a secondary
object of attention. This, however, they uniformly deny.
It is the unvarying statement of these missionaries, deduced
'from the experience of a hundred years of patient service
and laborious exertions among the rudest and. most abject
tribes of human beings, that the moral nature of man must
be in the ﬁrst instance quickened, the conscience awakened,
and the better feelings of the heart aroused by the motives
which Christianity brings with. it, before any improvement
can be hoped for in the outward behaviour and social state;
that the rudest savages have sufﬁcient understanding to be
susceptible of such a change; and that when it has once
taken place, all the blessings of civilisation follow as a
necessary result.

The ﬁrst attempt made to spread Christianity among
the I-Iottentots was by a missionary named Schmidt, a man
of great zeal and courage, who undertook this task in the
early period of the Moravian Church. He arrived in ‘
South Africa in 1737; and, having settled at some dis-'

 

long residents in the neighbourhood of these tribes, and have probably
acquired instincts approaching those of their neighbours. White families,
moreover, make strenuous efforts to recover their children; there are also :
social difﬁculties in the way of a white man’s return to his place in society, .
which would scarcely exist in the opposite case—ED.

>
k
E:

g.

‘5
Ii
i V
t:
3'

(CH. v.] CIVILISATION or THE HOTTENTOTS. 691

tance from the Cape, soon collected a small congregation
-0f Hottentots, by whom he was much beloved. Being
obliged to sail to Holland, his return was prevented by
”adversaries under pretence of zeal for the purity of doctrine
and peace of the Church. The undertaking was suspended
during nearly ﬁfty years. It was renewed under more
favourable auspices in 1792. The new missionaries
sought out the ruins of Schmidt’s abode ; they found some

aged Hottentots, who still revered his memory, and laid
3- the foundations of the settlement of Bavian’s Kloof, since

Gnadenthal.
The school established by the missionaries was soon

2 attended by many Hottentots, both children and adults;

I and the religious instructions by reading the Bible, and

expositions, were frequented by many attentive hearers.

/ The historians of the mission say, “ The reverential still-

ness with which the Hottentots attended these meetings,
the eagerness with which they listened to the discourses,

1 and the emotion visible on their countenances, astonished

the missionaries, who had been told that they would ﬁnd
it impossible to ﬁx the attention of their hearers, even to
the shortest address of a serious nature.” The number of
scholars increased, and soon amounted to 200, who were
instructed in the open air. Many Hottentots came from a
considerable distance, bringing their families and their
cattle with them, and associated themselves to the settle-
ment. The colonial boors became alarmed at the idea of
being deprived of the service of their Hottentots, and on
many occasions threatened, and even attempted, the de-
struction of the settlement ; but these menaces were averted,
and it became at length apparent, even to this class of the
inhabitants, that the Hottentots, who had become Christ-
ianised under the instruction of the missionaries, were far
more useful and trustworthy servants than the sensual and
degraded pagans whom they had previously been obliged
to employ.

In the course of a few years the Hottentots began to

692 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300K III.

resort from all parts of the colony, and increased the pOpu-
lation of Bavian’s Kloof. The missionaries were slow and
cautious in baptising converts, until they thought that
evidences were perceptible of repentance and faith. There
were, however, in 1799, 238 Hottentot houses ; the number
of inhabitants amounted to 1234, of whom 304 were actual
members of the congregation, 84 of them having been
baptised during the year.

When the Cape colony came under the power of the
English, the beneﬁcial results of instruction imparted to
the Hottentots by the missionaries of the United Brethren
were so manifest in the improvement of manners and in-
dustry, that the missions obtained the steady and uniform
protection and favour of government. Gnadenthal had
now grown into a populous settlement, displaying the best
effects of human culture, and occupied by numerous and
thriving families of husbandmen, who obtained a rich pro-
duce from the soil over which their ancestors had wandered
for ages without attempting to improve it. In addition to
this settlement, another tract, called Greene kloof, was
given by the government to the United Brethren. In the
course of a year, from being a wilderness it was made to
bear a plentiful crop. The missionaries reported that in
conducting their temporal concerns “the Hottentots gave
evidence that they were under the inﬂuence of Christian
motives; they went diligently to work in building their
huts and cultivating their grounds, and God blessed the
labour of their hands.” Some of the Dutch farmers ex-
pressed their surprise at the change which they witnessed
in this people. “ They were astonished,” say the mission-
aries, “in seeing how the wretched drunken Hottentots,
when they get to Gnadenthal and hear the Word of God,
truly receive grace, and become quite a dzlﬂ’erent sort of
people.”

Perhaps nothing in this account is more remarkable
than the fact that so strong a sensation was produced
among the whole Hottentot nation, and even among the

3 on. V.] CIVILISATION or THE HOTTENTOTS. 693

; neighbouring tribes of different people, by the improved
E and happy condition of the Christian Hottentots, as to
i excite a desire for similar advantages. Whole families of
3 Hottentots, and even of Bushmen, set out for the borders
» of Kaﬁrland, and even performed journeys of many weeks,
: in order to settle at Gnadenthal. Individuals of the Tam-
" buki nation, and some from the Damaras beyond Great
Namaqualand, resorted to Greene kloof, and there took
up their abode. It is a singular fact in the history of these
barbarous races of men, that the savage Bushmen, of their
own accord, solicited from the colonial government, when
negotiations were opened with them with the view of putting
an end to a long and bloody contest, that teachers might
be sent among them, such as those who had dwelt among
the tame Hottentots at Gnadenthal. “ History,” says the
historian of the mission, “ probably furnishes few parallel
examples of a savage peOple, in treaty with a Christian
power, making one of the conditions of peace, that mission-
aries should be sent to instruct them in Christianity.”

I have not room to add further details from this account.
The facts which I have extracted have an important bear-
ing on the psychical history of a curious and interesting race
of human beings, and could not be omitted in connection
with the inquiry in which I am engaged. Those who will
candidly consider them, and give them their due weight,
will allow that they prove the existence of the same prin.
ciple of action, and of the same internal nature, in the
Hottentot race, as are recognised in other divisions of man-
kind; and this conviction will be increased by a careful.
perusal of all the details which the missionaries have ,
afforded of the progress of the work, and of the moral
changes which accompanied it.

___..._.._.

694i NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK 111;.

CHAPTER VI.

PSYCHOLOGICAL TRAITs OF THE NEGRO NATIONS IN
WESTERN AFRICA. .
IT is a common impression that the native religion, if
I may use that expression, or the belief of old prevalent,-
before the dawning of history and the introduction either
of Christianity or of Islam among the nations of Western
Africa, is nothing but the superstition of fetisses, or spells.
This notion, however, is not perfectly correct. The super-
stition of charms, or spells, holds a principal place in the
minds of the idolatrous Negroes; but this does not pre-
clude a very general prevalence, in their belief, of the ﬁrst
principles of natural religion. It may be observed, that
among nations enjoying a much higher degree of mental
culture, the prevalence of superstitions and practices more
or less resembling the fetishism of Africa, may be recog-
nised: such are a belief in destiny, or fatality, astrology,
necromancy, charms, spells, omens, lucky and unlucky days,
fortune, and the good and evil genius of individuals.

“ The word feat/i330,” says Barbot, in his description of
Guinea, “is aPortuguese word, signifying charm or spell.”*
It is not a native African term, though used by the Negroes
of the Gold Coast after the Portuguese. These Negroes
term their idols Bossum, or Bossefoe. Father Godfrey
Loyer, apostolical prefect of the J acobites, who made a
voyage to the kingdom of Issini, and studied the temper,
manners, and religion of the natives, says that it is a
great mistake to suppose that fetisses are the gods of the
Negroes. He declares that they have a belief in one
universally powerful being, and to him the people of the
countries visited by Father Loyer addressed prayers.

“ Every morning,” he says, “after they rise, they go
to the river-side to wash, and throwing a handful of water
on their head, or pouring sand with it to express their
humility, they join their hands, and then open them,

 

* The Portuguese word is feitz‘go, of which the primary signiﬁcation is
“ artiﬁcial.”——ED.

D CH. VI. ] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE NEGRO 1mm 695

11
§
15

.‘i
q

whisper softly the word “ Eksuvair: ” then, lifting up their
eyes to heaven, they make this prayer: -—— ‘Anghiume
mamé mar o, mamé rice, mamé shike e Okkori, mamé
akaka, mamé brcmlic, mamé unquan e aconsan ;’ that is,

My God, give me this day rice and yams, give me gold

|

' and aigris, give me slaves and riches, give me health, and

:- grant that I may be active and swift.”

The excellent missionary Oldendorp, who appears to

1 have had rare Opportunities, and to have taken great

pains to become accurately acquainted with the mental
history and character of the Negroes, assures us that he
recognised among them an universal belief in the “ existence
of a God,” whom they represent as very powerful and
beneﬁcent. “He is the maker of the world and of men :’
he it is who thunders in the air, as he punishes the wicked-
with his bolts. He regards beneﬁcent actions with com-
placency, and rewards them with long life. To him the
Negroes ascribe their own personal gifts, the fruits of the
earth, and all good things; from him the rain descends
upon the earth. They believe that he is pleased when
men Offer prayers to him in all their wants, and that he
succours them in dangers, in diseases, and in seasons of
drought. This is the chief god who lives far from them
on high ; he is supreme over all other gods.” _

“ Among all the black nations,” says Oldendorp, “ with
whom I have become acquainted, even among the utterly
ignorant and rude, there is none that did not believe in a
God, which had not learned to give him a name, which
did not regard him as the maker of the world, and ascribe
to him, more or less clearly, all the attributes which I have
brieﬂy summed up. As, however, the Negroes always
designate God and the heaven by the same term, it is
doubtful whether they do not regard heaven itself as the
Deity: but, perhaps, their notions are not so clear as to
have led them even to contemplate this distinction.

“ Besides this supreme beneﬁcent divinity, whom all
the various nations worship in some way or other, they

 

696 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK 111.

believe in many gods of inferior dignity, who are subject
to the chief Deity, and are mediators between him and
mankind. Such are the powers which they reverence in
serpents, tigers, wolves, rivers, trees, hills, and large stones.
The more stupid of the Negroes certainly imagine the ser-
pent, the tiger, and the stones, to be themselves gods,——that
the tree understands them, and the tiger gives them rain :
on the other hand, the more intelligent look upon these
objects as representations of the inferior gods, and imagine
that local deities dwell unseen under certain. trees or on
particular hills. This appears from the ﬁction which the
priests of Akkran have respecting the subordination of the
tutelar gods under the supreme divinity, and from the
notion that these gods absent themselves during a certain
season of the year while the visible objects remain.”

The objects of their worship are neither national nor
domestic. Thus the Fida, besides the great serpent which
is adored by the whole nation, have each their particular
smaller serpents, which are worshipped as household gods,
but are not esteemed so powerful by far as the great one to
whom the smaller serpents are subjected. Where the latter
are unable to assist, their worshippers have recourse to
the great serpent. The national deity of the Kanga is an
elephant’s tooth, and that of the tribe of the Wawa, atiger.
The Sember have wooden gods in human form, which they
call Zioo. The Loango also have similar carved idols of
both sexes, some clothed, some naked and painted, as well
in their dwellings as in sacred buildings. They are served
by priests, who are said to be inspired by them, and give
out the answers of the gods as oracles. Some of the Amina
call the Creator of the world and of their nation Borriborri,
and imagine that he has a wife, who is called Sankomaago,
by whom he has a son called Sankombum, who is the
mediator between man and the superior deity.

It is the opinion of these people that the inferior gods
are appointed by the chief deity as tutelar gods over cer-
tain countries, men, animals, plants, rivers, &c., and must

l
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on. VL] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE NEGRO RACES. 697

* yearly give an account of their conduct. This is done in a

general assembly of all the gods at the court of the chief

divinity. He who has given satisfaction is conﬁrmed by

Q the great god in his tutelar ofﬁce of a protecting spirit for

a year, and is marked with a red-hot iron : but those who
have permitted the evil spirit to disseminate unjust wars
among the nations, or have wilfully allowed pestilence or
ﬁres, and such evils, in the territory entrusted to them, are
deposed from their ofﬁce, expelled from the rank of gods,
and made mortals. From despair and malice such deposed
gods are accustomed to embrace the party in Opposition to
the divinity, and become maleﬁcent spirits. “ I have
taken this account,” says Oldendorp, “ of the relation of
the inferior gods to the higher deity, from the Journal of
Christian Protten,’* a native African, who had been for a
long time in the community of the brethren.”

The fetisses of the Negroes, which hold so prominent a
part in their superstition, are Of the same nature as the
Spells and charms of the northern nations, and as the
amulets and talismans of the East.

“ Fetisses, 0r schambas,” says Oldendorp, “ as they are
called by the Wawa, are sacred things which have received
a peculiar power from God, as well to drive away the evil
spirits, as to succour in all sorts Of diseases and dangers,
especially against enchantment. They have not the dignity
of gods; although it might be supposed, from the peculiar
veneration Of the Negroes for these fetisses, that they were
the objects of their national worship, as indeed many
ignorant people say. They ornament, not only themselves,
but also their idols, with these fetisses, which descend by
inheritance from parents to children, who preserve them
with the greatest care. Others are preserved in particular
houses, over which overseers are appointed. The Man-
dongo willingly receive for their fetisses anything that has
been struck by thundei. Thus we perceive that the Ne-

3“ The author of :1 Grammar Of the Accra Language, printed at Copen-
hagcn 1n the \eai 1764:. ——ED.

 

698 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.‘

groes only venerate their fetisses because they believe that
something divine has been united to them; and how could
this take place more manifestly than in the instance of
thunder, which they look upon as the peculiar attribute of
the Deity, and proceeding immediately from him?

“ The Negroes employ these fetisses especially as a means
of protection against everything which they esteem evil or
hurtful. Thus the Ibo, when they go to war, bind fetisses
with cords round the bodies, to protect them from wounds;
and the Amina expect the same advantages from a conse-'
crated cow’s tail. They make use of them particularly to
preserve them from the evil spirit and his hostile attempts.
They believe that he is the origin of all evil; he is the
enemy of the good God; he seeks to mislead men, to
injure them, destroy them, and after death to get their
souls into his power. They never consider themselves
secure from his snares.

“No African nation makes this malevolent demon an
object of worship, or calls upon him for assistance; but
they are universally afraid of this powerful agent, and seek
to appease him with favours. Thus, for example, the
priests of Amina, before they bury their dead, place some
costly things upon a place cleansed for this purpose for the
evil spirit, whom they term Didi. They call him, and
give him to understand that these gifts are for him, and
that he must be contented with them, and leave the dead
alone. When they wish ill to anyone, they curse him by
the Didi, Kaltiampemba, or by Whatever name they address
the evil spiri .” '

Religious Practices of these Nations.

We have seen that the Negro nations have agreed with
, other races of men in the belief that supernatural powers
exist to whose control all things are subject, and that they
differ not materially from other nations in their conceptions
of the nature, attributes, and relations of the gods to each
other. It seems that they further agree with European
and Asiatic nations in the methods by which they endea-

D

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I,
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,

5g

..

CH. VL] RELIGIOUS PRACTICES or THE NEGROES. 699

vour to conciliate‘ the favour of the unseen beings to whose
power they hold themselves to be subject. The principal
of these have been everywhere prayers and sacriﬁces.
“ The Negroes,” says Oldendorp, “profess their dependence
upon the Deity in different ways, especially by prayers and
offerings. They pray at different times, in different places,

and, as the Amina Negroes told me, in every time of need.

They pray at the rising and setting of the sun, on eating

and drinking, and when they go to war. Even in the
midst of the contest, the Amina sing songs to their god,

%

whom they seek to move to their assistance by appealing

to his paternal duty. The daily prayer of a Watja Negress

was, ‘0 God, I know thee not, but thou knowest me;~

thy assistance is necessary to me.’ At meals they say,

‘ O God, thou hast given us this, thou hast made it grow ;’

g and when they work, ‘0 God, thou hast caused that I
i should have strength to do this.’ The Sember pray in the
* morning, ‘ O God, help us; we do not know whether we

shall live to-morrow; we are in thy hand.’ The Man-

dongo pray also for their deceased friends. They pray in
the presence of their idols and fetisses. The solemn prayers
which are made by a tribe or nation are accompanied by
dancing to the sound of instruments, and are pronounced
with terriﬁc cries. The Akkran frequently interrupt their
dances by kneeling down.

“ The requests which they make to God refer to their
bodies, health, good weather, rich harvests, victory over-
their enemies, and such things. In a continued dry season,
the Wawa assemble in a melancholy procession, whilst they
bind leaves upon their bodies and heads, before the scham-
beo-house, in which a tiger is worshipped as a god. With
howling and lamentation they represent to him their
necessity, and pray that he will cause it to rain, since they
must all otherwise die of hunger. Among the Loango,
upon a similar occasion, an offering of cattle is brought
When this is accomplished with the customary ceremonies,
the priest, who is as well an enchanter, desires the peOple

700 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III.

to hasten home, and not to be surprised by rain. Among
the Koromanti Negroes the women go in procession to
their priest, whom they call belmn, bring him all sorts of
fruits, and beg him to procure them rain. The Watja-
beseech the new moon to give them strength for labour,
and the Amina even request their god to pay their debts.

“ The sacriﬁces, which are always performed in sacred
places by consecrated persons, constitute the most important
part of their worship. The sacred places are those where
one of their divinities dwells, visibly or invisibly, particu-
larly buildings, or hills, or trees, remarkable for their age,
height, and strength. They have also sacred groves, which
are the abodes of a deity, which no Negro ventures to
enter, except the priests.

“The oblations of the Negroes consist of oxen, cows,
sheep, goats, fowls, palm-oil, brandy, yams, 85c. Human
sacriﬁces are offered by some nations. On joyful occasions
they offer white, and on sorrowful, black animals. The
sacriﬁces take place partly at appointed seasons, and partly ‘
occasionally ; the intention of them is to gain the favour
of the deity, to procure help in sickness or in war, and
rain in dry seasons, or to manifest their gratitude for
beneﬁts received. Oblations are also brought for the dead.

“ When the young men of Temba go to war, the old,
who remain at home, seek to gain for them the pro-
tection and assistance of Sioo, their divinity, by prayers
and offerings. They fall before the image upon their
knees, offer him sheep and fowls, pour out the blood and
entrails before him ; but they dress the ﬂesh for a meal for
themselves. If the design of the sacriﬁces is not obtained,
and the expedition does not succeed well, the fault is not
laid upon Sioo : they do not doubt his willingness to assist;
he has been unable for this time to prevail against the
powerful god of the enemy. In order to obtain rain, the
Amina sacriﬁce many sheep and fowls, and beseech the
Tankoubum to cause rain to ﬂow as plentifully from heaven
as their blood has ﬂowed for him. Many oblations are

n, .CH. VL] RELIGIOUS PRACTICES or THE NEGROES. 701

made for the sick, and many presents are given to the
priests, that they may assist in restoring him to health.
If the sick person dies, the priests are persuaded that the
gods wished for his soul; against this no presents could
be of service. If he recovers, his friends prepare a great
feast, and offer for a testimony of gratitude white sheep
and fowls.”
Obsequies—Public CcZebraﬂows—Pilgrimages.

“ Even the dead are not buried without sacriﬁces. A
white hen is slain by the priest before the corpse comes to
the grave, and the bier whereon the body lies is sprinkled
with its blood. This custom was introduced by the nation
of the Kangrent. These people offer to the deity a tame
animal when they till the ground, and vow another of the
same kind if God will bless their produce. Human
sacriﬁces are very rare among the Negroes, but not entirely
unknown. In Old Kalabar a child of ten months old was
hanged upon a tree with a living fowl for the recovery of
the king, which M. Seelgrave relates‘as an eye-witness.
Thus the king of Dahomeh sacriﬁced to his god, out of
gratitude for the victory granted to him, 4000 captive
Fidans, and caused their heads to be cut off, and piled
together in a heap.

“ At the annual harvest-feast, which nearly all the
nations of Guinea solemnise, thank-offerings are brought
to the deity. These festivals are days of rejoicing which
the Negroes pass with feasting and dancing, and they prove
their gratitude to their divinities by pouring out before
them and offering to them a portion of their prepared food.
They likewise give back to their gods, in gratitude, a part
of everything they earn. The Karabari have the peculiar
custom on such feast-days of hunting the evil spirit out
of their villages before they celebrate their harvest-feast.
The Watja assemble at harvest upon a pleasant plain,
when they thank God thrice upon their knees, under the
direction of a priest, for the good harvest, and pray to him
for further blessings. When they have risen, the whole

 

702 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. ,

"assembly testify their gratitude to God and their rejoicing
.by clapping their hands. After this divine service a joyful
feast follows, for which each family kills and prepares
'white sheep and fowls.

“ Among the annual festivals is the pilgrimage of the
nation of Fida to the great serpent. The people collected
before the house of the serpent, lying upon their faces,
worship this supposed divinity, without daring to look
upon him. Except the priests, the king alone has this
favour once. In the same manner the Wawa hold an
annual service in honour of a tiger, whom they look upon
as a god, and whom a priestess serves. They do not only
then solemnly worship him, but bring him oblations of
rmaize, fowls, sheep, and such things. These are ﬁrst set
before the tiger, who is ornamented at this solemnity with
schambos or fetisses, and what he leaves is made into a
sacriﬁcial repast, which is accompanied with dances and
other amusements. A Negro also annually solemnises the
(day on which he ﬁrst shed the blood of a human being.”

0f their orders of Priests, their Oﬁices and i’ower.

Like all the nations of antiquity, the Pagan Negroes
ascribe to a particular class of men the ofﬁce of mediators
between mankind and the gods. The priests in Africa, as
elsewhere, are the only individuals who can offer acceptable
sacriﬁces to the divinity,——they alone are interpreters of the
divine will. To this function they join that of diviners,
or magicians, masters of spells and amulets. It is really
wonderful to discover so extensive an analogy in the opinions
of men and of races separated from each other from imme-
morial time, not only in the general principles of natural
religion which conscience and the internal feelings impress
upon the understanding and belief, but in all the various
phases and modiﬁcations of superstition, and in the modes
by which crafty and designing men have availed themselves
of the weakness and credulity of the people.

“ The priests and priestesses are the sacred persons

 

,CH. VL] RELIGIOUS PRACTICES or THE NEGROES. 703

upon whom the divine service of the Negroes depends, and

[ who, as they suppose, have conﬁdential intercourse with

the gods, and interpret their will. They alone understand
by what means the wrath of the deity may be appeased.
To them it belongs to present the oﬁ‘erings to the gods,
and to be the intercessors between them and the people.
They Convey the questions of the peOple to the gods, who
reply by the mouth of the priests. It is not, therefore, to
be wondered at that they are held in the greatest esteem
by the people, and exercise almost boundless authority
over them. No Negro will transgress the priest’s com-
mands. Even after death, in the performance of sacred
ceremonies at the burial of the body, the assistance of the
priest is necessary, for he alone understands how to pre-
vent the evil spirit from getting the soul into his power.

“ At times of sickness, warlike expeditions, and in
other important affairs, the Negroes desire to be assured
of the issue by a divine answer. In such cases, the Amina
bring a sheep, either entirely white or black, to the priest,
who sacriﬁces it, and with its blood sprinkles a large vessel;
whereupon he receives an answer to the question laid
before him. If a Fida Negro is sick, he causes the ser-
pent to be interrogated through the priest, whether his
disease proceeds from God or from enchantment. Toge-
ther with the answer which he receives, a remedy is shown
him, by means of which he may recover. But if the dis-
ease is fatal, he receives the melancholy intelligence that
he can be cured by no possible means. In this case, the
priest, or priestess, takes no reward for their trouble, which
is required in all other instances. The great snake,
unasked, reveals impending wars to the priestess, who does

‘ .not fail to give intelligence of it to the king. She tells

him the name of the enemy, appoints the time of the in-
vasion, and the fortunate or unfortunate issue of the affair.
In the latter case, she gives him the prudent advice to save
himself by a speedy ﬂight. She also foretells to the king
the time when ships will arrive. The priests likewise

704 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. %

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foretell death and sterility, as the effect of the anger of the 1

gods, who, however, may be appeased by presents and
sacriﬁces. Nothing is so concealed that the priests cannot
foretell it : even the fate of souls after death is known to
them, and from them it can be learned whether each indi-
vidual is gone to God or to the evil spirit.

“ The priests of the Negroes are also the physicians, as
were the priests of Apollo and Esculapius. The notions
which the Negroes entertain of the causes of diseases are
very different. The Watje attribute them to evil spirits,
Whom they call Dobbo. When these are very numerous,
they ask of their sacred cotton-tree permission, to hunt
them out. Hereupon a chase is appointed, and they do
not cease following the demons with arms and great cries
until they have chased them beyond their boundaries. This
chase of the spirits of disease is very customary among
many nations of Guinea, who universally believe that many
diseases arise from enchantment, and others by the direc-
tion of the Deity.”

Ingenions Figments by which these Pretensions are
Maintained: Angnries or Omens by Birds.

“ It is not in consequence of the unskilfulness of phy-
sicians that their remedies are of little use during the rainy
season, but, as they say, on account of the absence of their
gods, who are obliged to appear at this dangerous season
at the court of their superior Deity. Consequently, the
priests cannot get advice from them, and they can do
nothing effectually without instructions. During the ab-
sence of the protecting spirits, which lasts six weeks, the
sacred drum is not beaten, no holydays are held, and the
dead are interred without noise or songs, and without being
bewailed. Among the Fida, those who have received no
help in their sickness from small snakes or household gods,
turn to the great serpent, who discovers through the priests
a remedy, 0r reproves them for not having sufﬁciently
honoured or entirely obeyed the inferior gods; and, to regain

p

t" CH. VL] RELIGIOUS PRACTICES or THE NEGROES. 700

their favour, he advises them to offer fowls and the like,
to appoint a feast in honour of the gods, and to invite an
assembly to sing, play, dance, and make merry. In this
way the inferior gods will become favourable to them and
heal them. When the Mokko, by the instruction of the
‘ priests, have brought an offering for a sick person, they
leave a portion of the sacriﬁcial meat for the birds, and
decide upon the cure or death of the person according to
the deportment of the birds to the food. Some of the
sacriﬁcial blood is sprinkled upon the medicaments which
the sick person is to take.”

Holy Water.

“ The priests of the Akripons take of the holy water,
which ﬂows from the hole in the rock in which their god
Kinka dwells, and give it to the patients, ,who are to wash
themselves with it, and be cured of their inﬁrmities. Some
Kassenti offer for a sick person a hen at a sacred tree,
which they worship on their knees, and they pour a thick
pap of maize over it before the tree, part of which they
take to anoint the patient.

“ Of the Bliakefa, the priests of Karabani and of Sokko,
it is remarkable that they give some instruction to the
people concerning the divinity and prayer. The Negroes
come to them for this purpose, either singly or in com-
panies, when they pray with them on their knees that God,
whom they call Tschukka, will protect them from war,
captivity, and the like.

“ They promise to their priests that they will use their
slaves mildly, and give them two days in each week for
their own concerns. Some priests are likewise sorcerers;
but among several nations, the Sokko and Watje for ex-
ample, the latter oﬂice is distinguished from the former.”

Immortality 0f the Soul.

“ There is scarcely any nation of Guinea which does
not believe in the immortality of the soul, and that it con-
2 z

706 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK III.

tinues to live after its separation from the body, has certain
necessities, performs actions, and is eSpecially capable of
the enjoyment of happiness or misery. The Amina call
the soul and the shadow by the same name ; and some of
the Watje nation told me that they consider the soul to be
of as subtile a nature as is the shadow.”

State of Retribution.

“The Negroes believe, almost universally, that the souls
of good men, after their separation from the body, go to
God, and the wicked to the evil spirit; whence, at the
death of their chiefs, they make use of the expression,
‘ God has taken their souls.’ The Loango imagine the
abode of the blessed to be where Sambeau Pungo, that is,
God, dwells, but hell to be above in the air, which others,
on the contrary, suppose to be deep in the earth. They
believe that the souls which go to the evil spirit become
ghosts, and reappear; and because they preserve their
inclination to do evil, torment those whom they dislike in
sleep; and, besides, ﬂutter about in the air, and make
noises and disturbances in the bushes. If anyone, there-
fore, is said to appear on the third day after his death, it
is a proof that he is not gone to God. The body of a
Negro of whom a wicked neighbour pretends to have seen
the spirit is not buried with honour, among the Amina.
The Negroes imagine, also, that even the good souls are .
often compelled to pass by the evil spirit before they go to
God, when this wicked spirit endeavours to bring them
into his power. Hence arises a custom which the Amina
observe : survivors satisfy the claims of the Dide, as it has
been before observed. The Mokko afﬁrm that they free
themselves from the claims of the evil spirit, by proving
that they belong to God by the marks which they have
upon their bodies, to which nothing can be objected. The
Ibo say that each soul is accompanied upon the way to its
appointed place by two spirits, a good and evil one, and
has to pass a dangerous part (a wall) by which the road is

- .011. v1.] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE NEGRO RACE. 707

E,
,

divided. The good spirit helps a pious soul happily by:

on the other hand, a wicked one knocks his head against

E
a

it. After this, the road opens (a narrow one), by which

the good soul is led by his benevolent director ”to God,
and one broad, by which the wicked soul, under the guid-
. ance of the malevolent spirit, is conducted to a darker

!

‘= place. The representations which these ignorant people

give Of the situation of the blessed are very similar to their
other ideas. Their conduct towards the deceased gives, us
‘ to understand that they suppose the future condition to be
little different from the present life, and they believe them
to be affected with the same wants which they have here ;
on which account they not only place for some time food
5 upon their graves, but give them likewise their wives, ser-

vants, and slaves, 1n the other world.”

Metempsyckosis.
The Karabari, and several other black tribes, believe

, in the doctrine of the transmigration of the soul from one
2 body to another, and imagine that the soul Of a dead per-
son revives in the body of the next child born after his

death. It is fully established, by the assurances Of the
Negroes, that they believe in the transmigration of a human

_ soul into the body Of a bird, ﬁsh, or other creature. This

belief in metempsychosis has a very injurious effect upon

' many Negroes. If their slavery is too severe in the West
' Indies, they destroy themselves, with the prospect that their

souls will wander to their country, and there revive in the
body Of a child. Some fully believe that they will rise

, alive in Guinea. Murderers and such criminals are shut
: out from the privilege Of commencing a second happier
" course Of life in a strange body. Abarre, the evil spirit,

will ordain that, as a punishment, they ﬂy about as ghosts,
and by inclination torment men by frightful appearances.
I could cite other writers on the history of the African

nations who conﬁrm the statements given by Oldendorp,
though none Of them have written so clearly and distinctly,

708 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. [BOOK III.

and apparently from such full and satisfactory sources of
information. Many similar observations occur in the
accounts obtained by Fathers Loyer, Labat, and by Bos-
man. From the last-mentioned writer I shall cite some
further particulars.

Bosman mentions their superstitious fear of ghosts and
apparitions. He says “ they steadfastly believe the appari-
tions of spirits and ghosts, and that they disturb and terrify
some people. If any considerable person dies, they are
perplexed with horrid fears, fancying that he appears for
several nights successively before his late dwelling.”

“ They have long been acquainted with the division of
time into weeks, and each day of the seven has its prOper
name in their language. Their sabbath falls on our Tues-
day, except at Ante, where, like that of the Mohammedans,
it is on Friday. No person is then permitted to ﬁsh, which
is the only difference.”

In their belief of lucky and unlucky days, oracles,
omens, and the like, the Negro tribes might be supposed
to form their opinions on the model of the Greeks and
other nations of antiquity. “ The inland Negroes,” says
Bosman, “ divide time into lucky and unlucky days. The
great period of good fortune lasts in some countries nine-
teen, and the lesser seven days : between these there are
seven unfortunate days. During the unlucky days, they
neither travel, till the land, nor undertake any aﬂ'air of
consequence, but remain altogether idle. The Aquambo
people will not even willingly receive any presents made to '
them on these days. The inhabitants of some countries
differ from those of others as to the particular days which
they hold to be lucky and unlucky.”

0f the Conversion of the Negroes to Christianity.

We have seen that the Negroes of Africa display in
their original and primitive state of mind, untaught by
foreign instructors, at least Within the reach of history, the
same tendencies to superstitious belief, as well as the same

CH. VL] PSYCHOLOGY or THE NEGRO RACE. 709

moral impressions, as the rest of the human family. It only
__ remains, to ﬁll up this part of the mental history of the
Negro race, to remark that they have given a ready recep-
tion to foreign religions, both true and false. Mohammed-
anism is well known to have spread in Africa. Sudan
sends its yearly pilgrims to venerate the sacred stone; and
the sable Hadji is as highly revered on the Niger and the
Western Nile as the Syrian pilgrims among the Moslems
of Damascus. But I have not room for tracing the pro-
gress of Islam, and it will probably be more satisfactory to
my readers to observe the result of endeavours which have
been made by European teachers to bring Negroes to the
Christian religion. Of these, we have some of the most
successful examples in the efforts of the missionaries sent
out by the Church of the United Brethren. An interest-
ing account of the proceedings of these well-meaning and
devoted persons is to be found in the undisguised and
simple narrative of Oldendorp. I shall extract from it a
brief statement of such particulars as are necessary, in
order to point out the way in which the rudiments of true
and uncorrupted religion found their way into the minds of
the Africans, and .to show how far the process of their con-
version indicates an agreement of feeling and sentiment
between them and other divisions of mankind.

The ﬁrst attempts to convert the slaves of the Carib-
bean Islands to Christianity had their occasion in a meet-
ing of some followers of Count Zinzendorf with one An-
thony, a Negro from the Island of St. Thomas, who had
been baptised at Copenhagen. This man represented in
so strong colours the wretchedness and ignorance of his
countrymen and relatives, and urged so zealously his
entreaties on the brethren to undertake their conversion,
that the congregation at Herrnhut, before whom he had
been induced to appear, were disposed to make the
attempt. The difﬁculties of the enterprise were great,
and they were not lessened by Anthony, who afﬁrmed that,
in order to promote the conversion of slaves, the missionary

710 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [1300]: III.

must himself consent to become a slave. Even under
these conditions, several of the brethren were willing to
devote themselves to the task. The names of the heroical
men who voluntarily offered themselves, believing them-
selves called to the undertaking, were Leonard Dobel
and Tobias Leupold. Leupold did not go, the lot having
determined otherwise, and David Nitschmann was sub-
stituted for him, who entered on the voyage with similar
expectations.

The business was commenced under the most unfavour-
able circumstances. The work proceeded slowly at ﬁrst,
and amidst great opposition; yet a small number of hearers
were soon collected, some of whom gave signs of sincere
conversion, and of disgust at their former courses of life.
Circumstances required the return of the missionaries to
Europe, and an interval ensued, during Which the mission
was suspended. It was renewed in 1734, on the arrival of
Martin, a zealous preacher, and a man of great energy,
whose exhortations were followed With so much effect, that
when Bishop Spangenberg visited the mission, in 1736, he
. found in not less than 200 Blacks who attended the ser-
vices of the brethren a great desire to be instructed in the
Christian religion, and three individuals who, on a careful
examination, were judged to be in a ﬁt state to receive
baptism. It is impossible to read the narrative of Olden-
dorp without being cenvinced of the perfect sincerity of the
writer and the truth of his account. It proves that no
other means were used to inﬂuence the Negroes, that no
other motives were put in operation to affect their minds,
than those of which the promulgators of Christianity availed
themselves in the ﬁrst ages of the Church. “ Full of
ardour for the salvation of men,” says Oldendorp, “ Martin
declared to the poor slaves the inﬁnite kindness and con-
descension of the Saviour; what for their sakes He had
done and suﬁ‘ered ; and how worthy He was of their grati-
tude and love.” “ If he once received concerning any indi-
vidual the impression that a change had been commenced

CH. VL] PSYCHOLOGY OF THE NEGRO RACE. 711

in his mind, he never lost sight. of such a person, but with
the greatest constancy followed up his work till he gained
him over to the cause of religion. By the constant exhorta-
tions of the brethren, a perceptible change was produced
in the minds and characters of the Negroes; and notwith-
standing the unfavourable circumstances and the bad ex-
amples by which they were surrounded, it became manifest,
not only that the number of professed converts increased,
but that motives and inﬂuences were in operation capable
of effecting a moral revolution in their minds and charac-.
ter ; and so deep was the impression which had been pro-
duced, that when the colonial government, jealous of inno-
vation, threw the missionaries into prison, baptised Negroes
were found ready to carry on the work of exhortation, and
contribute greatly to increase the number of converts.
When, in the following year, 1739, Count Zinzendorf
Visited the island, he was ﬁlled with astonishment at the
greatness of the work which had been accomplished. It
seems that at this time the number of Negroes who
regularly attended the preaching of the Gospel amounted
to 800.”

The other Danish islands, St. Croix and St. Jan, were
afterwards Visited by the Moravian missionaries, whose
exertions were attended with like success. I shall not
attempt to follow the steps of their progress, which are
described by the writer so frequently cited. In his con-
clusion, he gives the summary of its results, from which
it appears that in the year 1768 the number of Negroes
who had been baptised in the three islands by the mission-
aries during thirty-four years amounted to 4711.

In this very general statement of the facts connected
with the conversion of the Negroes in these islands, the
principal evidence is yet wanting by which it may be proved
that the minds of Negroes are not otherwise than those of
Europeans capable of receiving all the impressions implied
in conversion to Christianity. This evidence can only be
fully appreciated by those who read in detail the biographi-

712 NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [BOOK III. 7

cal notices and other particulars detailed by the historians
of the community to I which Oldendorp, as well as Crantz,
‘belonged. But no part of this evidence is more conclusive
than the selection of short homilies composed by Negro
preachers or assistants, and addressed by them to congre-
gations of their countrymen. Some of these, though they
do not rival in strength of expression the reﬂections of
Pascal and Fénélon, breathe the same spirit, and were
evidently written under the inﬂuence of the same sen-
timents. A selection of these addresses has been ap-
pended by Oldendorp to his work, which I have so often
cited.

. CONCLUSION.

IT would not greatly strengthen the conclusion which I
am entitled to draw from the evidence already afforded, if
the limits of this work allowed me to survey the history of
every particular branch of the human family. The woolly-
haired races of Africa, compared with the native tribes of
the New World, and with the anciently civilised inhabitants
of the Old Continent, furnish a sufﬁciently ample ﬁeld for
induction on this subject, since among them are comprised
these human races who differ most widely from each other
in structure of body and in all their physical attributes,
and who have been represented as displaying the most
decided contrasts in their moral and intellectual endow-
ments. It would, indeed, be very easy to extend this
research, with similar results, to all the other tribes of
whose character we have yet any sufﬁcient knowledge.
" Thus the nations of the great Southern Ocean might be
shown to have had among themselves, long before their
discovery by Europeans, traits of a very similar kind.
They had social institutions resembling those of the rest
of mankind; they had universally the belief in a future

' CH. VL] GENERAL CONCLUSIONS. 713

life, in the protection and government of the world by Pro-
vidence, in the inﬂuence of good and evil genii on human
affairs, in the duty of worshipping the gods, in the efﬁciency
of sacriﬁces and obsequies, or rites performed in behalf of
the dead, in the inﬂuence of priests, or human mediators.
Similar observations may be made with respect to all the
barbarous nations of Northern Asia. The history of the con-
version of these nations to Christianity, and of the adoption
among them of the ideas and practices of civilised nations,
would furnish chapters equally striking and remarkable as
those to ‘which our attention has already been directed, in
the history of the human mind. The Australians as yet
remain of all nations the least known, since scarcely any
one has yet been able to converse with them, or to under-
stand the expression of their thoughts. But fresh evidence
is every day collected tending to raise the low estimate
which had been formed, and long maintained, of their
extreme mental degradation. Degraded they doubtless are :
the tribes with whom the colonists have principally had
intercourse are, in their external condition, perhaps the
most miserable of the human family, being destitute of the
arts which could alone enable them to live with any degree
of comfort in the region which they inhabit, or even to
support, unless Seattered in small wandering bands over a
Wide space, their physical existence. But there is reason
to believe that we have as yet seen only the most destitute
of the Whole nation ; and that there are tribes farther to
the northward, perhaps in the inland countries of the
great Austral land, who are by no means so miserable or
so savage as the people near the southern shores. But even
with respect to these, the opinion of the extreme stupidity
of the race has been shown to be unfounded, and the latest
and most authentic statements enable us to recognise
among them the same principles of a moral and intellectual
nature, which, in more cultivated tribes, constitute the
highest endowments of humanity.

We contemplate among all the diversiﬁed tribes who are

714: NATURAL HISTORY or MAN. [ BOOK III.

endowed with reason and speech, the same internal feel-
ings, appetences, aversions; the same inward convictions,
the same sentiments of subjection to invisible powers, and,
more or less fully developed, of accountableness or respon-
sibility to unseen avengers of wrong and agents of retribu-
tive justice, from whose tribunal men cannot even by death
escape. We ﬁnd everywhere the same susceptibility,
though not always in the same degree of forwardness or
ripeness of improvement, of admitting the cultivation of
these universal endowments, of opening the eyes of the
mind to the more clear and luminous views which
Christianity unfolds, of becoming moulded to the institu-
tions of religion and of civilised life : in a word, the same
inward and mental nature is to recognised in all the
races of men. When we compare this fact with the
observations which have been heretofore fully established
as to the speciﬁc instincts and separate psychical endow-
ments of all the distinct tribes of sentient beings in the
, universe, we are entitled to draw conﬁdently the conclusion
that all human races are of one species and one family.

 

INDEX.

A.

Ababdeh, notice of the, 282.

Abassians, notice of the, 260.

Abipones, account of the, 623.

Aboriginal races of India, 242.

Abyssinia, languages of, 293.

Abyssins, account of the, 289.

physical characters of, 296.

Acclimatisation, conclusions as to, 36.

Acoma, an Indian town, description of, 565.

Acra people and language, 338.

Affar, native name of the Danakil, 317.

Afghans, account of the, 171.

African ethnology, proposed scheme of, 426.

Agows, languages of the, 294.

Ahir, physical characteristics of inhabitants
of, 278.

Ainos, account of the, 227. .

Ajetas [Ajgtas, Itas] Negritos of the Philip-
pines, 464.

Akwapims, account of the, 336.

Ala, a tribe in Eastern Africa, 407.

Albinos, change of colour in, 73.

abound among the Zunis, 563.

Alforians, account of the, 483.

Algonquin-Lenape race, 520.

Alleghanian races, notice of the, 532.

Allophylian race, meaning of the term, 183.

Alphabet of the Tuarieks, 278.

Alphabetic writing, 177.

Alpine nations of South America, 594.

Amajuacas, a hunting tribe of the Antisians,
609.

 

 

Amazon tribes, account of the, 635.
Ambriz, people of, 368; country of, 360.
American races generally, 494.
' languages, 495 ; skulls, 503.
Anaiteum, inhabitants of, 471.
Anam, race of, in Tonquin and Cochinchina,
238.
Andian family of South America, 594.
Angola, people of, 372 ; language of, 367.
Angoy, people of, 368.
Autisian family of South America, 606.
Anzichi tribes of South Africa, 367, 370.
Apaches, account of the, 549.
analogy of language with Athapascan,
19

 

 

Arabs-physical characters of, 132.
Araucanian family of South America, 611.

 

Arawacs, a Caribi tribe, 639.

Arian race, 160.

Ariangulo, tribe in East Africa, 407.

Armenians, account of, 175.

Arms, comparative length of, 116.

Ashantis, account of the, 335.

Atacamos, a Peruvian tribe, 606.

Athapascas, account of the, 518.

Atnahs, notice of the, 550.

Australians, accounts of the, 486.

analogy with Tamulians, 487.

rules relating to their marriages, &c.,

491.

names of, 492.

Avars, a tribe of Lcsghians, 262.

Aymaras, account of the, 601 ; tombs of the,
603. ,

Aztecas, account of, 507, 510 ; migrations of,

 

 

 

B.

Baluchi, account of the, 173.

Barabra, account of the, 283.

Barea, a name applied to the Shangallas, 303.
Basians, a race inhabiting Caucasus, 260.
Basques, account of the, 264.

Baza, real name of the Shangallas, 303.
Bechuanas, account of the, 379.

Bedouin Arabs, shepherds, 132.

Bees, instincts of, 65, 67.

Bejas, descendants of the Blemmyes, 281.
Berberines, or Barabra, 283.

Berbers of the Northern Atlas, 269.
physical characters of the, 27 1.
Bhotiya race, account of, 216.

Bhotiyas, physical characteristics of, 218.
Bishari, account of the, 28], 282.
Blackfeet, account of the, 547.

Black nations of Africa, 319.

Bornawi, or Borniis, a real Negro race, 324. '
Boroanos, a tribe of Araucanos, 612.
Botocudos, account of the, 641.

Brahui language, the, 174.
Brasilio-Guarani family, 632.

Bugis, people of Celebes, 435.

Bunda or Angolan language, 367 .
Burmese, the, 238.

Bushman, account of, 346, 355.

— locality of the, 355.

—— psychology of the race, 683.

 

716

C.

Cabindas, people of, 369.

Cachingas, tribe northward of Cassangas, 364.

Caﬂ'raria, extent of, 374.

Cafusos, people of mixed race, 18.

Californian nations, account of the, 552.

Campas. a tribe of the Antisians, 610.

Canary islands, ancient inhabitants of the, 272.

Canichana, South American cannibals, 626.

Caribian race of South America, 638.

Casan Tartars, most anciently civilised, 212.

Cashibos, or Callisecas, atribe on the Pachitea,
610.

Cassangas, tribe east of Congo, 363.

Caucasian nations, the inhabitants of Mount
Caucasus, 259.

race, usual meaning of the term, 120.

Celts, physical characters of ancient, 192.

Central America, people of, 506.

languages of, 513.

Chaco, inhabitants of the great plain of, 619,
621.

Chaldaeans, of Semitic race, 128.

Changos, a Peruvian tribe, 606.

Charruaus, a South American tribe, 77, 619.

Chaymas, notice of the, 639.

Chepewyans, account of the, 518.

Cherokees, account of the, 532.

Chichimecas, immigration of the, 510,

Chickasas, notice of the, 534.

Chimpantsi, skull of, 103.

Chinese, account of the, 229.

Chippeways, or Ojibways, 523.

Chiquitian languages, character of, 629.

Chiquitos, account of the, 625—628.

Chitimachas, notice of the, 538.

Choktaws, notice of the, 534.

Chumyks, a tribe inhabiting the Caucasus,
260.

Circassians, account of the, 261.

Climate, effects of, on animals, 26.

Cobeus, a cannibal tribe of South America,
637.

Cochinchinese, the, 238.

Coco-Maricopas, account of the, 556.

Colour diﬂ'ers widely in the same race, 645.

depends greatly upon climate, 647.

Colouring-matter of the skin, 75, 82.

Complexion of Hindus in the North, 167.

varieties in, 71.

Conibos of South America, notice of the, 608.

Conversion of Negroes to Christianity, 708.

Hotteutots, 690.

North Americans, 670.

Copts, physical traits of the, 144.

Crania of the ancient Egyptians, 148.

Cranial admeasurements of American Indians,
582.

Creek confederacy of tribes, 534.

Crees, their progress in civilisation, 525. ’

their syllabarium, 527.

Crows, account of the, 546. ,

Cuchans, or Yumas, account of the, 561.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

INDEX.

Cumanches, or Na-uni, 548.
Cuticle, true structure of the, 80.

D.

Dahcotas, or Sioux, account of the, 539.

Dahomeh, a powerful Negro nation, 339.

Damaras, account of the, 381.

language of the, 383.

Danakil, akin to the Gallas, 310.

called by themselves Aﬁ'ar, 317.

Delaware Indians, 521.

Dogs, eﬂ'ects of climate on, 23.

varieties in the breed of, 45.

changes produced by domestication, 65.

Dokos, account of the, 305.

Domestication, its effects on the character of
animals, 65.

Domges, tribe in interior of Africa, 364.

Dougolawi, a branch of the Barabra, 285.

Duration of life, 651. .

 

 

 

 

E.

Egyptians, account of the, 137.

Egyptian type of Dr. Morton, 152.
Ekhkili language, 129.

Elliptical skulls, 100.

Endaménes, notice of the, 483.

Ethiopian race, meaning of the term, 120.
Etruscans, physical characters of the, 188.
not Indo-Germanic, 182.
Esquimaux, account of the, 516.

Europe, colonisation of, 180.

European nations, 178.

population, origin of, 186.

physical characters of, 187.
Euskaldunes, native name of the Basques, 263.

 

 

 

F.

Facial angle of Professor Camper, 102.
Fantis, allied to the Ashantis, 334.
Felatahs, identical with Fulahs, 328.
Feloops, a tribe of Guinea Negroes, 334.
Fetiss or Fetish, meaning of the word, 694.
Fiji islanders, account of the, 476 ; language
of, 479. .
Fingoes, account of the, 351, 379.
Flattened skulls of Titicaca, 604.
Fowls, eﬂ’ects of climate on, 35.
Fulahs, account of the, 327.

G.

Gaddanes of the Philippines, 465.

Gallas, account of the, 310.

religion of the, 314.

language of the, 293, 319.

Garah tribes (note), 129.

Geese, effects of climate on, 35.

Genera, meaning of, 7.

General conclusions, 644.

Georgians, account of the, 262.

Germans, physical characters of ancient, 193.

 

 

INDEX.

Ghiz, the ancient language of Abyssinia, 130,
292

Gibberish used by Circassians, 355.

Goats, eﬂ'ects of climate on, 34.

Gondwana, inhabited wholly by aboriginal
Indians, 257.

Greeks, physical characters of the, 197.

Griquas, men of mixed race, 18.

Guaiquerias, a Caribi tribe, 639.

Guanches, ancient inhabitants of the Canaries,

Guarani language, allied to the Tupi, 635.
Guaranis, account of the, 633.
Guiiraiinas, a Caribi tribe, 639.
Guiuaanes of the Philippines, 465.

H.

Hadharebe, a tribe of Nubians, 281.
Haeeltzuk, account of the, 572.

Haidas of Queen Charlotte’s Island, 570.
Hair, nature of the, 647.

structure of the, 88.

peculiarity of, among the Mandans, 545.
Haraforas, account of the, 483.

Haussa, native of, 324.

Head, form of the, 101.

Hebrew language, 128.

Hiaus, account of the, 405.

Himyaritic inscriptions, 130.

Hindus, account of, 163.

-— skull of, 168.

Hocanguas, tribe in interior of Africa, 364.
Horses, effects of climate on, 34.
varieties in the breed of, 42.
Hottentots, account of the, 343.
Hottentot race, psychology of the, 683.
language, account of, 421.

Hurons, physical character of, 530.
Hybrids never perpetuated, 16.
Hybridity, phenomena of, 11.

 

 

 

 

I.

Iberiaus, the modern Basques, 263.

their language formerly spoken through-

out Western Europe, 258.

and Lybians anciently conterminous,
258, 263, 264.

Ichthyophagi of Northern Asia, 221.

Idéns of Borneo, probably Dayaks, 485.

Igorrotes [Igolotes], account of the, 464, 465.

Imam of Muscat, possessions of the, 395.

Inca-Peruvians, account of the, 595.

physical characters of, 596.

India, aboriginal races of, 242.

Indian [American] tribes, synopsis of, 583.

Indo-Chiuese Peninsular races, account of
the, 236.

languages, afﬁnity of the, 238.

Indo-European race, 178.

Indo-Malayans, account of, 432.

Ingushi, inhabitants of the Caucasus, 262.

Iroquois tribes, account of the, 528.

Itetapanes of the Philippines, 465.

 

 

 

 

 

717

J.

J agas, ancient accounts of, 361.
— recent notices of the, 406.
Japanese, account of the, 234.
Javanese, physical features of, 434.
Jews, physical traits of, 131.

K.

Kabyles of North Africa, 270.

Kaﬁrs of the Hindu-Knish, 161.

Kaﬁr tribes, 372 ; agriculturists and manu-
facturers, 377, 380. .

Kaﬁrs, eastern tribes of, 371, 383.

Kaﬁrlaud, extent of, 374.

Kalmuks, physical features of the, 213.

Kambas, account of the, 401.

Kambojans, the, 238.

Kamchadales, account of the, 224.

Karalit, or Esquimaux, 516.

Kashmirians, complexion of, 167.

Kenous, a branch of the Barabra, 285.

Khonds, an Indian race, human sacriﬁces of
the, 253.

Kirghis, physical characteristics of the, 209.

Knisteneaux, physical traits of the, 529.

Koldagi Negroes, speak a Barabra dialect, 286.

Konghini, a race dwelling in the Kolyma, 225.

Kongo, people of, 364, 367.

geography of, 360.

Konza warrior, portrait of a, 547 .

Koreans, or Koorai', account of the, 230.

Kosa Kaﬁrs, account of the, 378.

Kurds, account of the, 174.

Kurile islanders, account of the, 227.

Kwolla, low country surrounding Abyssinia,
291 ; inhabitants of the, 238.

 

L.

Language the main basis of ethnology, 119.
value of, as evidence of afﬁnity, 409.
comparison of, generally, 178 ;
Languages, African, allied to Semitic in the
north, 268, 275 ; unity of Congo and Kaﬁr
languages, 411 ; Kaﬁr grammar, 413;
vocabulary, 418 ; Hottentot grammar, 422;
Bushman language, 354.
American, peculiar structure of, 496 ;
variety of, in Oregon, 522; Othomi mono-
syllabic, 512.
Tupi and Guarani allied, 635; Apache
and Athapascan allied, 519 ; Cherokee,
written with a peculiar alphabet, 533 ; Cree,
ditto, ditto, 527; Mexican sounds in the
words of the Nootka languages, 578.
Asiatic: Aino language, 228 ; Indo-
Chinese, 238 ; Tamulian, 245 ; Tuda, 254;
Syriac still spoken, 131; Ekhkili language,
129; Zend allied to Sanskrit, 163.
Indo-European languages, 181 ; opinion
as to‘their European origin, 186 ; Ossete
language of this class, 176; Bulgarian lan-

 

 

 

 

 

 

718

gauge retains traces of Ugrian, 207 ; of the
Allophylian nations, 183.

Languages, Oceanic: Fiji, 479; Madecassian,
455 ; Papuan and Polynesian, 431-3, 460 ;
vocabularies, 481.

Laos, notice of the, 238.

Layers, membranous, between the cutis and
cuticle, 75.

Lee Panis, notice of the, 550.

Lenni-lcnape race, 521.

Lesghi, inhabitants of the Caucasus, 262.

Life, duration of, 651.

Lifu, inhabitants of, 473.

Lingoa Geral of South America, 635.

Linguistic division of Africa, 408.

Longevity, instances of, in Negroes, 653.

Loyalty islanders, account of the, 472.

Lybians, the modern Berbcrs, 2'67.

conterminous with Iberians, 258, 263,

264.

 

M.

Macquaina, a wealthy tribe of Kaﬁrs, 380.

Madecasses, account of the, 454.

M ahrah tribes (note), 129.

Malays, account of the, 432.

Malayan race and its subdivisions, 429.

Malayo-polynesian race, 432.

Mambookies, a Kaﬁr tribe, 378.

Mandans, account of the, 544.

Maudingos, account of the, 325.

Mani-Kongo, dominicns of the, 359.

Mare, one of the Loyalty Islands, 473.

Marquesas islanders, 438.

Marut, or Idan, of Borneo, 485.

Maya language, analogies of, 513.

Mbundas of South Africa, 372.

Membrauous layers between the cutis and the
cuticle, 75.

Metempsychosis, belief of, amongNegroes,707.

Mexicans, physical characters of, 511.

Miao-tseu, a' barbarous tribe in China, 230.

Minetari, account of the, 541.

Mingrelians, a Georgian race, 262.

Missouri Indians, characters of, 542.

Mixed races, instances of, 18.

Mizjeghi, inhabitants of the Caucasus, 262.

Mohavis, notice of the, 563.

Mohawks, a tribe of Iroquois, 530.

Mongolian race, account of, 212.

meaning of the term, 120.

traditions, 203.

Mcquis, account of the, 563.

Moravian mission at New Salem, 671.

Mortality, comparative table of, 652.

Morton (Du), Egyptian ethnology of, 148.

Moxos, account of the, 626.

Mozambique tribes, 374, 386.1

Mpongwe grammar, 426.

Mucarongas, a Kaﬁr tribe, 390.

Mulattoes, their tendency to increase, 17.

Mﬁluas, tribe in Central Africa, 364.

Mummies of the Guanch’es, 273.

Mundrucus, notice of the, 632.

 

 

 

INDEX.

Mﬁrﬁtsi, an industrious Kaﬁr tribe, 380.

Muscogulges, or Muskhogees, physical traits
of, 536.

Musgows, tribe in Central Africa, 321.

Muskhogees, account of the, 533.

N.

Nagas of Assam, account of the, 255.
Nahuatlas, or Seven Tribes, in Mexico, 510.
Namaaqua language, grammar of the, 421.
Namollos, account of the, 221.

Navajos, account of the, 567.

N egritos of the Philippine Islands, 461, 463.
Negro races, psychology of the, 694.

type of Dr. Morton, 153.

Negroes, meaning of the word, 319.

change in colour of, 79.

of Guinea, 333.

Nengone, inhabitants of, 473.

New Caledonians, account of the, 469.
Californian race, 555.

Hebrideans, account of the, 470.
Hollanders, account of the, 486.
Zealanders, account of the, 440.
Nikas, a Kaﬁr tribe, account of the, 401.
Nobatae, the valley of the Nile, 283.
Nomadic races, ﬁve divisions of the, 200.
Nootka-Columbian tribes, 571.

N orth-west American races, 569.

Nuba, a branch of the Barabra, 285.
Nubians of the Nile, 283, 286.

of the Red Sea, or Eastern Nubians, 281 .
Nyassa Lake, dwellers near the, 389, 405.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

O.

Ojibways, or Chippeways, 523.

Olmecas, an ancient people of America, 512.
Opates, account of the, 562.

Orang, skull of, 103.

Ossetines, an Indo-Germanic race, 176, 259.
Othomi, peculiar language of the, 512.
Ottoe warrior, portrait of, 547.

Outcasts, origin of, in Africa, 350.

Oxen, effects of climate on, 30.

varieties in the breed of, 44.

 

P.

Paducas, account of the, 549.

Papuas, people supposed of mixed race, 20.
Papuans, or Pelagian Negroes, 459.

Papuan islanders, divers languages of the, 469.
Parbatiya, or mountain tribes of India, 250.
Patagonians, account of the, 618.

Peguans, or Mdn, 238.

Pelagian Negroes, account of the, 459.
races, 427. .

proposed ethnology of, 431.

Pelasgic type of Dr. Morton, 151.

Persians, account of the, 169.

_ earliest seat of the race, 162.
Peruvian branch of the Andian family, 595.

 

 

INDEX.

Pesherais of Tierra del Fuego, account of the,

—— religion of, 617.

Physiological comparison, 648, &c.

varieties in the internal constitution of
animals, 60. '

Pigment-membranes and pigment-cells, 81, &c.

'Pigs, effects of climate on, 26.

Pinios, account of the, 556.

Pirros of South America, notice of the, 608.

Pokomos, account of the, 404.

Polyuesians, account of the, 436.

on the civilisation of the, 452.

Population (aboriginal) of the United States,
5 9

 

 

Porcupine-man and family, 86.
Potowatomies, physical characters of, 529.
Prakrit dialect, 161.

Prognathous form of head, 99, 101.
Psychological comparisons, 657, &c.
characteristics of animals, 61.
Psychology of African races, 683.
American races, 663.

Puberty, period of, same in all climates, 655.
Pueblo Indians, 564.

Puelches, inhabitants of the Pampas, 622.
Pyramidal skulls, 100, 111.

Q.

Quichuas, or Peruvians, account of the, 595.

 

 

R.

Rajamahal hill men, account of the, 255.
Rasennians. See Etruscans.

Remos of South America noticed, 608.
Rate mucosum, 75, 81.

Rotumans, physical characters of, 478.

S.

Saabs, or Hottentots, 343.

Sahos, or Shohos, account of the, 294.
language of the, 296.

Samang, description of a, 459.

Samharas, account of the, 405.

Samhar, inhabitants of, 288.

Samoan islanders, account of the, 444.
Samoiedes, account of the, 225.

Sandwich islanders, physical features of, 439.
Seedees of India, descended from Kaﬁrs, 387.
Semitic race, 126. ‘

type of Dr. Morton, 152.

Sencis, a tribe of the Antisians, 609.
Senegambian nations in West Africa, 324.
Shangalla, account of the, 302.

Sheep, eﬁ'ects of climate on, 34.

varieties in the breed of, 38.

Shcgya Arabs, 136.

Shipebos of South America noticed, 608.
Shohos, account of the, 288, 294.
Shoshonees, notice of the, 548.

Shuluk of the Atlas, 269.

Siamese, or T’hay, 238.

 

 

 

 

719

Singhalese, account of the, 243.

Sioux, or Dahcotas, account of the, 539.

Skin, texture of, 75.

Skull, varieties in the shape of the, 98, 101.

Skulls of the ancient Egyptians, 145—148.

—— comparison of Congo, with Chinese and
American, 424.

of Americans, 503.

— of 'l‘iticaca, ﬂattened by compression,
604.

Slavonic tribes, physical characters of, 195.

Snake Indians, Shoshonees, 548.

Society islanders, physical traits of, 438.

Solomon Islands, people of the, 474.

Somali, akin to the Gallas, 310.

Soonees, or Zunis, account of the, 563.

Souakiny, a Nubian tribe, 281.

Soudanian races, 319.

South African nations, geography of, 340.

race, little, 343.

—— race, great, 358.

South American races, 586.

division into groups, 588.

—— migrations of, 591.

numbers of, 591.

physical characters of, 592.

Species, meaning of, 8—9.

Strength, relative, of the civilised and savage
man, 116.

Sumali, account of the, 394.

Sumatra, people of, described, 434.

Suaheli, account of the, 396—400.

Syriac language, 127.

still spoken, 131.

Syro-Arabian race, 126.

 

 

 

 

 

 

T.

Tahitians, physical features of the, 436.

Tamanacs, a Caribi tribe, 639.

Tambookies, a Kaﬁr tribe, 378.

Tamulian race, account of the, 247.

Tana, inhabitants of, 471.

Tarascas, an independent American people,
513

Tartars or Tatars, allied to the Mongols, 207.
Tasmanians, or natives of Van Diemen’s Land,

Tchuktchi, account of the, 222.

Tikopia, inhabitants of, 452.

Tinguianes of the Philippines, 466.

Tiri’m, or Tidong. of Borneo, 484.

Titicaca, ﬂattened skulls of, 604.

Toltecas, immigration of the, 509.

Tonga islanders, physical features of, 442.

Tuarick alphabet, 278.

idioms, all dialects of the Berber language,
277-278.

Tuaryks of the Sahara, 270—276.

Tudas of the Neilgherries, 253.

Tumuli in Siberia, 189.

Tungusian race, account of, 215.

Tupi language, allied to the Guarani, 635.

Turkish traditions, 202; race, 207.

Turks, originally from Central Asia, 210.

 

720

U.

Uaupés tribes, account of the, 636.
Ugrian race, 204.

V.

Vaidas, or Vaddahs, a Wild tribe of Ceylon,
244—246.

Van Diemen’ 5 Land, natives, 467.

Variation of races, phenomena 0', 24.

in physical characteristics, instance of,
27 7 , argument relative to, 237.

— all proceed by insensible gradation,
644, &c

in animals, concluding observations on,

 

 

Varietir in organic structure of animals, 55.
Variety of colour among Hindus, 166.

among Afghans, 173.

Vote, inhabitants of, 471.

Viti islanders, account of the, 476.
Vocabularies of Oceanica, 481.

 

 

INDEX.

W.

White American race, 575.
Witchcraft among the Kaﬁrs, 402.
Wool of sheep, rabbits, &c., 93.
Woolly hair of the Negro, 92.

Y.
Yaguas, a tribe of Antisians, 610.

_Yaquis, account of the, 562.

qugaos of the Philippines, 465.

Yukagirs, account of the, 224.

Yumas, account of the, 561.

Yuracarés, white race of South America, 607.

Z.

Zanzibar tribes, 393.

Zend language, allied to Sanskrit, 163.
Zulus, account of the, 378.

Zunis, or Soonees, account of the, 563.

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