Without being blinded by self-conceit, we may protest against this conclusion. Doubtless we no longer raise towers of Babel, nor do we build pyramids. Gigantic works which are useless, or undertaken for the glorification of a single man, do not belong to our time. But when some generally useful work arises, do we recoil before the magnitude of the task? The time truly has been badly chosen to accuse us of feebleness. The Suez Canal has been made on a different scale to the small trench of the Pharaohs, and in tunnelling the Alps for a railway, we have accomplished what antiquity had never dared to dream of.
It is still true that, taken en masse, we are less artistic than the Athenians. But without leaving the domain of the arts, there are points in which we surpass them. To judge from the anecdotes which throw light upon the nature of the talent of their greatest artists, painting and music among the Greeks were not up to the level of sculpture. If we have not our Phidias, they had not their Raphael, their Michael Angelo, their Beethoven, nor their Rossini.
But, when he condemns us to a radical inferiority, M. de Gobineau especially forgets the most striking character of modern times. He disregards the scientific development, which is without example or analogy in the past, and which gives an absolutely fresh appearance to our civilization. We who are sprung from races crossed a hundred times, are at least the equals of our forefathers, but no longer resemble them. Inferior in some respects, we make up for it thoroughly in other respects. We manifest human power under different aspects.
Highly gifted though man may be, he cannot at once reach all the limits of the field which is open to his activity. For this reason, in time as well as in space, we find by the side of inferior peoples and races, other peoples and races which are superior, equal among themselves, but different. Such is the real information gained by a comparison of the present and past condition of mankind.
II. M. Perrier is a polygenist and an autochthonist; he makes use of the expression pure race as equivalent to the term species. Being a physician, and a learned one, he touches upon anatomical and physiological questions, and upon the limited fertility and sterility of half-breeds, and reproduces some of the opinions which I have already attacked. He pays particular attention to present populations, and endeavours to prove the superiority of those which he regards as pure. He quotes the Arabs in particular, and praises their ancient and modern civilizations. But on this point I make the same objection to him which I made to M. de Gobineau. We know very little of the Himyarites and the Adites. Caussin de Perceval shows them to have played at different times the part of conquerors; but they were conquerors who were barbarians, and whose manners were thoroughly savage. When they left their deserts under the impulse of Islamism, did they appear with the marks of civilized peoples? Certainly not. It was only after their conquests, and in consequence of the crossings which they underwent, that we find the great Arabian civilizations rise in Africa, Asia, and in Spain. Was the civilization, which was developed upon the spot, and which has been brought to light by Palgrave, equal to that of the Almohades, the Almoravides, or the Abassides? Evidently not. Here, again, crossing is found to have given rise to most striking progress.
M. Perrier lays especial stress upon physical perfection, and particularly upon that of women. Let us accept this criterion. Is purity of blood the sole cause of this beauty? If this were so, in the same country, the purest populations should show the fairest women. But in France, for example, the inhabitants of Auvergne, secluded among their mountains, are undoubtedly of a purer race than the inhabitants of the plains in Southern France, where so many different races have come in contact. Well, can the women of Upper Auvergne dispute the prize with the grisette of Arles, Toulouse, or of Montpellier? These three feminine types are very distinct; they clearly point to a mixture of blood. They are not the less remarkable in the matter of beauty, and are undoubtedly superior to the women of Auvergne. In Sicily, where all the Mediterranean populations are confused together, I have observed analogous facts at Taormina, Palermo, Trapani, etc.
As to the possibility of meeting with women remarkable for their personal attractions among mixed races, even when the Negro enters as an element in their composition, the reputation of women of colour, mulattoes and quadroons, is a sufficient proof. All travellers bear witness to the charm which they exercise upon Europeans. Taylor is most explicit upon this point, and it is at Tristan d’Acunha, a distant island half-way between the Cape and South America, that he makes his observations. In this isolated spot, a mixed population of Whites and Negroes has settled. The English traveller speaks as follows: “All who are born in the island are mulattoes, though of a very slightly pronounced type, and of very fine proportions. Almost all have the European, much more than the Negro type. I do not recollect ever having seen such splendid heads and figures as among their young girls. And yet I know all the coasts of the earth: Bali and its Malays, Havana and its Creoles, Tahiti and its nymphs, and the United States with their distinguished women.” It is evident that we here have a most impartial judgment in favour of mulattoes, and given by an experienced judge.
Thus female beauty is met with among certain mixed races, and is wanting among other races which are rightly regarded as the purest, the Bosjesmans and the Esquimaux. The adversaries of human crossings cannot then regard it as an argument in their favour.
III. Although modern crossings only go back three centuries, they have already produced results which make it certain that races remarkable from every point of view may be produced by crossing. The Paulists of Brazil are a striking example of the fact. The province of Saint Paul has been peopled by Portuguese and inhabitants of the Azores from the old world, who have formed alliances with the Gayanazes, a hunting and pacific tribe, and with the Carijos, who are warlike and agricultural. From these unions, which have been regularly contracted, there has sprung a race whose men have always been remarkable for their fine proportions, their physical power, indomitable courage, and endurance of fatigue. As for the women, their beauty has given rise to a Brazilian proverb which proves their superiority. This population shows its pre-eminence in every respect. If it was once remarkable for the expeditions of adventurers in search of gold or slaves, it was also the first to plant the sugar-cane in Brazil, and to breed immense herds of cattle. “In the present day,” says F. Denis, “the highest moral development as well as the most remarkable intellectual movements appear to come from Saint Paul.”
Such praises paid to a population which is almost entirely the result of a mixture of races, by a sagacious observer, who has long lived in Brazil, form a contrast to the reproaches cast upon American half-breeds by an immense majority of travellers. As a general rule they are painted in the blackest colours. Although they are allowed to possess physical beauty, and perhaps also a prompt and ready intelligence, they are said to be almost entirely without morality. Let us admit that they differ as much from the Paulists in this respect as has been stated: the explanation of the contrast is not difficult to find.