Fundamental Conceptions.
The beginnings of anthropology may probably be traced to what Professor Giddings (1896) has termed the “consciousness of kind,” but what Dr. McDougall (1898) has more definitely recognised as showing the gregarious impulse. He says (pp. 299-300):—
The gregarious impulse of any animal receives satisfaction only through the presence of animals similar to itself, and the closer the similarity the greater is the satisfaction.... Just so, in any human being the instinct operates most powerfully in relation to, and receives the highest degree of satisfaction from the presence of, the human beings who most closely resemble that individual, those who behave in like manner and respond to the same situations with similar emotions.
Andree, Parallelen. N. r. Tafel. III.
Bushmen Raiding Kafir Cattle.
(After R. Andree.)
Race Portraiture of the Ancient Egyptians
on the tombs of the Kings at Biban-el-Molouk (XVIIIth-XXIst Dynasty).
Race Discrimination.
The recognition of degrees of likeness implies the recognition of unlikeness. This may be termed the stage of race discrimination. Ancient literature and the pictorial art of certain uncivilised peoples abound in examples of race discrimination. The crude representations of human beings discovered in caves in France and elsewhere were probably intended to portray the people themselves, who lived in the palæolithic period. These drawings or carvings, like those of most modern savages, exhibit much greater skill in delineating animals than human beings; consequently it is dangerous to rely on them as representing the physical characteristics of the then existing populations. Very different is the famous Bushman pictograph of a fight between Bushmen and Kafirs. Here relative size, the difference in colour, and the employment of different implements of war by these two races, are strikingly exemplified; but as a general rule the Bushmen themselves exaggerate certain features and minimise others—for example, the head is invariably too small and featureless.