A Hand-book to the Primates, Volume 2 (of 2)

by Henry O. Forbes

Notwithstanding the enormous differences presented between the highest and lowest races of mankind, and widely as they are separated geographically, these dissimilar characters are not considered sufficient to constitute more than one species, since throughout the series one form graduates into another, and all of them are fertile with each other. Although there is but one species of Man, he is distinguishable, however, according to Sir William Flower, into three main races.

A. The Ethiopian Race.

Under this heading are included all the dark-skinned negroes, with black frizzly hair, long heads (i.e., whose breadth is less than four-fifths of its length), moderately broad faces, flat nasal bones, prominent legs, thick everted lips, protruding jaws, and long fore-arms. To this race belong (1) the Negroes, inhabiting Central Africa, of which there are numerous tribes: (a) the yellowish-brown Hottentots of the South African plains, and (b) the dwarfed straight-faced Bushmen, living outcast among the mountains and rocks, remarkable for their tufted hair, their great fatty buttocks, and the peculiar "click" in their speech; (2) the Negrillos, of Central and West Africa, with short heads (i.e., whose breadth is greater than four-fifths of its length); (3) the Melanesians, composed of the Papuans of New Guinea, New Caledonia, and the Solomon Islands, with strong supra-orbital ridges, and a narrow and prominent nose: the "hyper-typical" mountaineers of Fiji, the Tasmanians, and the Australians, especially of the northern portion of that continent, all belong to this race; (4) the round-headed Negritos of the Andamans, the Philippines, and the Malay Archipelago.

B. The Mongolian Race.

These are short in stature, have the skin yellow or brown, the hair black and straight, abundant on the head, but sparse elsewhere; the skull low and intermediate between long and broad; the face broad, flat, and with large cheek-bones; the eye-sockets high and round. To this stock belong (1) the Eskimo of Greenland and all the sub-arctic regions of Eurasia and N. America; (2) the Mongols, of whom the Japanese, the nomad Lapps, the Finns, both of mixed Caucasian and Mongol blood, and those descendants of the Mongols, the Magyars and the Turks, form a northern and much modified group, while the Chinese, the Thibetans, the Burmese, and the Siamese constitute a southern, more civilised, group; (3) the Malays of the Malayan Peninsula and Sumatra, in which the Mongolian features are very apparent; (4) the Brown Polynesians, inhabiting Samoa, Tonga, the Eastern Polynesian islands, and New Zealand; (5) the native American races inhabiting the continent from Terra del Fuego in the south, to the sub-arctic regions occupied by the Esquimo.

C. The Caucasian Race.

Of this stock there are two very distinct groups: (1) the tall, blond, straight, fair-haired, blue-eyed, light-skinned, well-bearded peoples of N. Europe, Scandinavia, Scotland, N. Germany—named Xanthochroi ("yellow-haired" and pale of complexion) by Huxley: these have extended, as a mixed race, also into N. Africa and Afghanistan; and by intermingling with the Mongols have produced the Finns and the Lapps; and (2) the Melanochroi ("black-haired") people, shorter in stature, with long heads, pale skins, prominent noses, but with black wavy hair and beards and dark eyes, who inhabit S. Europe, N. Africa, and S.W. Asia, and are found also in the British islands. They are known as Kelts, Iberians, Romans, Pelasgians and Semites. The Dravidians of India, the Veddahs of Ceylon, and probably the Ainos of Japan and the Maoutze of China belong to the Caucasian stock. The ancient Egyptians, of whom the Kopts and the Fellahs of Egypt of to-day are the descendants, are pure Melanochroi. (Flower.)

EXTINCT ANTHROPOIDEA.

As we have seen above (vol. i., p. [110]) the earliest Lemuroids appeared in the Lower Eocene division of the Tertiary period in the New World, and in the Old World in its upper strata; they continued during the whole of the Eocene in the Western Hemisphere, and are last seen in the Lower Miocene of North America.

Fossil Apes, on the other hand, appear first in South America, in the Santa Cruz beds of Patagonia, in strata of Upper Eocene or Oligocene age. In the Old World they come on the scene only during the tropical ages of the Miocene epoch. When the middle and upper strata of the latter period were being deposited in Europe, Anthropoid Apes ranged from the Mediterranean shores to further north than the present northern limit of the Old World Apes.