Once too, there was only one kind of man. He probably lived somewhere in southern Asia, and spread out from there, till he possessed the whole earth. Some of him went south-east into the Pacific Islands, and changed into Malays and Australians. Some of him went south-west into Africa and became Negroes. Some became Persians, Egyptians, Hindus, and Arabs. Those that kept on further and entered Europe turned various shades of white and became us. For very few white men are really white—only certain Swedes and Norwegians and Danes. The rest of us, who call ourselves white, are merely not quite so black as our very-many-times-great-grandfathers and our somewhat distant cousins, the Negroes.
Most of these early men, however, started north-east; and because they couldn’t very well cross the great mountains and deserts in central Asia, they ran round the eastern end, and then came back on the other side. On their way, they turned to Chinamen and Japanese. Those that got way up to the north under the Arctic circle became Eskimos. Some of them crossed over by way of Siberia and Alaska (for these countries have not always been as cold as they are now) and turned into American Indians.
Then, after these people had got north of the great Asian mountains, others of them turned west, and came clear across into Europe. In fact, they came near to overrunning Europe during the last days of the Roman Empire so that the famous Charlemagne had to fight them in the eighth century, as you will learn when you study history in school, or still better when you read stories of knights and paladins of the early Middle Ages. So part of us white men came to Europe, and then to America, directly from southern Asia. And part of us came round by way of China and Tartary and Russia; tho now we are all mixt up together so that no one can tell which from t’other. Yet even now, whenever you get up in the gallery and look down on the people’s heads, you can see that some white men have long, egg-shaped heads and narrow faces, and some have round bullet-shaped heads and broad faces. The long sort of head came straight up from India, by way of Asia Minor; and the round sort came round the end of the mountains and across central Asia. That’s the reason why, tho we are all white men, we can’t wear one another’s hats.
That’s about the way it is with all kinds of animals and plants. Each one starts somewhere, and spreads out in all directions as far as it can, gradually changing as it goes, until from being one sort of pine or oak, there come to be dozens, and instead of one kind of cat or dog there are a score. On the whole, too, the latest kinds of animals and plants are better than the earlier ones and there are a great many more of them. This is what we call Evolution—but why it all happens or what it is all for, Is just precisely “one of those things that no fellah can find out.”
Still one can’t help thinking that if we men can make as many things as we do out of iron—knives and saws and locomotives and bridges and sky-scrapers and battle-ships and all sorts of wonderful machinery, and make them better and better all the while, some wiser being than ourselves might make other and still more wonderful machines out of the life-jelly which we call protoplasm, and keep making them better and better and more and more kinds of them as the ages have gone on.
INDEX
Air, importance of clean, [276].
Ambidexters, [121]-122.
Amoeba, [40];