Mound Sculptures: upper left-hand figure from a shell-heap near Mobile, Ala., the others from Tennessee mounds.
The Menominees, sometimes called the “White Indians,” formerly occupied the region bordering on Lake Michigan, around Green Bay. The whiteness of these Indians, which is compared to that of white mulattoes, early attracted the attention of the Jesuit missionaries, and has often been commented upon by travellers.[280] While it is true that hybridity has done much to lighten the color of many of the tribes, still the peculiarity of the complexion of this people has been marked from the first time a European encountered them. Almost every shade, from the ash color of the Menominees, through the cinnamon red, copper and bronze tints, may be found among the tribes formerly occupying the territory east of the Mississippi—the remnants of some of which are now in the Indian Territory and others in the North-west—until we reach the dark-skinned Kaws of Kansas, who are nearly as black as the negro. The Indians in Mexico are known as the “black people,” an appellation designed to be descriptive of their color. Viollet le Duc is of the opinion that the builders of the great remains in Southern Mexico and Yucatan belonged to two different branches of the human family, a light-skinned and dark-skinned race respectively.[281] The variety of complexion is as great in South America as among the tribes of the northern portion of the continent.
Probably one of the most incontrovertible arguments against American ethnic unity is that which rests upon the unparalleled diversity of language which meets the philologist everywhere. The monosyllable and the most remarkable polysyllables known to the linguist; synthetic and analytic families of speech, simplicity and complexity of expression, all seem to have sprung up and developed into permanent and in some cases beautiful and grammatical systems side by side with each other until the Babel of the Pentateuch is realized in the indescribable confusion of tongues. The actual number of American languages and dialects is as yet unascertained, but is estimated at nearly thirteen hundred, six hundred of which Mr. Bancroft has classified in his third volume of the Native Races of the Pacific States. It is true that the American languages present a few features quite peculiar to themselves (which will be treated hereafter), but as language is never constant, is not a pyramid with its unchanging architectural plan, but is a plant which passes through such transitions in the process of its growth as to lose entirely some of the elements which it possessed at first, so we may as reasonably expect that in the course of time certain peculiarities incident to certain climatic conditions, certain phases of nature and certain types of civilization, should develop themselves as distinguishing features of the speech of the continent. The very fact that language is unstable—is a matter of growth—renders the argument that these peculiarities indicate unity of the American race valueless; while, on the other hand, the fact that here we have a greater number and variety of languages than is to be found in any of the other grand divisions of the earth, is strong evidence of a diversity more radical than that which simply arises from tribal affiliations. In view of the wide differences existing between the native Americans themselves in every feature which admits of being subjected to a scientific test, we are forced to the conclusion, solely resting on the evidence in the case, that the theory of American ethnic unity is a delusion, an infatuating theory which served only to blind its advocates as to the plain facts, and led them into grave errors which will become all the more palpable as scientific investigation progresses.
As yet no substantial reason for considering the ancient occupant of this continent as peculiar in himself, and as unlike the rest of mankind, has been set forth. Nothing in the American’s physical organization points to an origin different from that to which each of the species of the genus homo may be assigned. Whatever truth there may be in the diverse origin of the black and white race, the separate creation theory, in so far as it maintains that the Creator originated upon the soil of this continent a peculiar and separate race of men, must in the eyes of this age of criticism lack evidence, and be assigned to its place with thousands of others which from time immemorial have been contributing to the construction of a foundation reef which will ultimately rise like a bold headland above the dark waters of uncertainty into the realm of truth.
A few students of American Anthropology have solved the question of the origin of the ancient population upon the hypothesis of its having developed from a lower order in the animal kingdom, itself indigenous to the Western Continent. One of the most distinguished representatives of this school, perhaps, is Frederick von Hellwald of Vienna, who states his views as follows: “I am unable to give in my adhesion to the theory which assumes that the original seat of the human races must be sought in higher Asia or somewhere else, whence mankind are supposed to have spread themselves gradually over the whole globe; an assumption which is contradicted in the most decisive manner by the peopling of the new world. It is impossible to enter here into all the hypotheses which have been framed for the explanation of a fact so perplexing to the Biblical students of the sixteenth century, and of course later times; it is enough to say that thus far not one of them have been found to correspond even approximately to the demands of science, and that theory is probably in every point of view the most tenable and exact which assumes that man, like the plant, a mundane being, made his appearance generally upon earth when our planet had reached that stage of its development which unites in itself the conditions of man’s existence. In conformity with this view, I regard the American as an Autochthon.”[282] This subject resolves itself into two questions: (1) Is the origin of the human race by the processes of development from a lower order of animal an ascertained fact? (2) If so, does the American continent furnish any species of ape or any known fauna from which man could have developed? It is taken for granted that the reader is fully familiar with Darwinism (the origin of species by means of natural selection, the joint result of the independent researches of Darwin and Wallace) and Lamarckism (the theory of man’s descent from the ape),[283] both of which have been so enthusiastically advocated by Spencer, Huxley, Hæckel and many others. Their works and the magnificent array of facts which their patient researches have accumulated command our admiration, even if full assent cannot be given to all their conclusions.
The first question: Is the origin of the human race by the processes of development from a lower order of animal an ascertained fact? would at first seem to require a lengthy discussion at our hands. But in a special work on a subject altogether foreign to the question, such a discussion would certainly be out of place. Even if this were not true, the above question as stated requires no discussion. We believe that no advocate of the hypothesis of evolution could be found so sanguine or so unguarded, who would come forward and answer the question in the affirmative. On the contrary, we believe the question would call forth an honest negative from the great body of scientists who hold to the hypothesis of evolution. Obstinacy alone could deny that the groups of facts which have been brought to our knowledge, the occasional well-marked transitional forms[284] which are turning up, the unquestionable tendency in species to vary, and possibly of their varieties slowly to form new species under modified surroundings, point to a principle, a law in nature, which may be characterized as the law of development or evolution. But on the other hand, the hypothesis that such a law exists, or, if you please, the fact that it exists, does not imply that it is universal in its application or that it has extended through all the realm of nature. Indeed, pure justice to the advocates of the hypothesis requires the statement that they have never made such a claim.[285] The fact that such eminent scientists as Mivart and Wallace deny the development of man from a lower order, is sufficient evidence that the hypothesis in its widest bearing is not accepted by all, much less is an ascertained “fact.” It appears, therefore, that the first question being unsettled, and as yet incapable of solution, the argument turns upon the second question: Does the American Continent furnish any species of ape or any known fauna from which man could have developed? Before answering the question in the light of present knowledge, it will be of interest to note the reply made by the late Professor Joseph Henry to the view of Frederick von Hellwald, quoted on a preceding page. His estimate of the probabilities of man developing from the lower orders of animals in more than one locality on the globe is expressed as follows: “The spontaneous generation of either plants or animals, although a legitimate subject of scientific inquiry, is as yet an unverified hypothesis. If, however, we assume the fact that a living being will be spontaneously produced when all the physical conditions necessary to its existence are present, we must allow that in the case of man, with his complex and refined organization, the fortuitous assembly of the multiform conditions required for his appearance would be extremely rare, and from the doctrine of probabilities could scarcely occur more than at one time and in one place on our planet; and further, that this place would most probably be somewhere in the northern temperate zone. Again, the Caucasian variety of man presents the highest physical development of the human family; and as we depart either to the north or south, from the latitude assumed as the origin of the human race in Asia, we meet with a lower and lower type until at the north we encounter the Esquimaux, and at the south the Bosjesman and the Tierra Fuegian. The derivation of these varieties from the original stock is philosophically explained on the principle of the variety in the offspring of the same parents, and the better adaptation and consequent chance of life of some of these to the new conditions of existence in a more northern or southern latitude.”[286] As a direct answer to the question, however, we can do nothing more than refer to the opinions of the two greatest advocates of evolution. “In order to form a judgment on this head,” says Mr. Darwin, “with reference to man, we must glance at the classification of the Simiadæ. This family is divided by almost all naturalists into the Catarhine group, or old world monkeys, all of which are characterized (as the name expresses) by the peculiar structure of the nostrils, and by having four pre-molars in each jaw; and into the Platyrhine group or new world monkeys (including two very distinct sub-groups), all of which are characterized by differently constructed nostrils and by having six molars in each jaw. Some other small differences might be mentioned. Now man unquestionably belongs, in his dentition, in the structure of his nostrils, and in some other respects, to the Catarhine or old world division; nor does he resemble the Platyrhines more closely than the Catarhines in any characters, excepting in a few of not much importance and apparently of an adaptive nature. Therefore, it would be against all probability to suppose that some ancient new world species had varied, and had thus produced a man-like creature with all the distinctive characters proper to the old world division, losing at the same time all its own distinctive characters. There can, consequently, hardly be a doubt that man is an offshoot from the old world Simian stem, and that under a genealogical point of view he must be classed with the Catarhine division.”[287] Such was Mr. Darwin’s opinion in 1871; and that the views of evolutionists have not changed since that time as to this question, we call attention to the words of the distinguished Professor Hæckel in his History of Creation, which are as follows: “Probably America was first peopled from North-eastern Asia by the same tribe of Mongols from whom the Polar men (Hyperboreans and Esquimaux) have also branched. This tribe first spread in North America, and from thence migrated over the isthmus of Central America down to South America, at the extreme south of which the species degenerated very much by adaptation to the very unfavorable conditions of existence. But it is also possible that Mongols and Polynesians emigrated from the west and mixed with the former tribe. In any case the aborigines of America came over from the old world, and did not, as some suppose, in any way originate out of American apes. Catarhine or narrow-nosed apes never at any period existed in America.”[288] The same argument holds good if it be ascertained that both man and apes developed from a common ancestor. With these authoritative utterances from the most celebrated representatives of the development school, we shall rest the fanciful hypothesis of the autochthonic origin of the ancient American population. Some who may not concur in our opinion as to the question of man’s development from lower animal forms, may be willing to admit that the Americans had an old world origin, which certainly, in the light of facts, is the only rational view.[289] The unity of the human family is a theory, if not a fact, which is supported by a mass of testimony of the most diversified character. The habits and customs, the sympathies, the wants and fears, the simpler arts, as well as most bodily proportions, point to a relationship which finds its easiest explanation in a unity of origin. It is chiefly, however, in the ruder arts that this correspondence of style or type is observable. No better illustration of this offers itself than the similarity of form or forms in which flint arrow-heads are found in all parts of the world. It would be impossible for the most expert archæologists to assign a promiscuous collection of flint weapons to the various quarters of the globe from which they may have been gathered, simply on the ground of characteristic forms.[290] The common methods of producing fire by means of friction, employed with but slight variation among people the most remotely separated,[291] is an inexplicable fact, except on the ground of an early community of residence or identical inventive genius. The universality of certain architectural forms such as the pyramid, and the singular fact that they have generally been used for places of sepulture, offers an argument in the same direction. The fact indicates either an early community of residence or identity of mental organization. The physical resemblances of all races in certain stable features which have never been known to change, indicate a divergence from a common centre—from one type. The slight differences in the type of skull which characterize some nations from others, is no argument against original unity, since those peculiarities are certainly of more recent origin than the unknown events which at a remote period scattered men over the face of the earth.[292] Probably no difference between the races of men has been considered so essential as that of color, for none has furnished such reasonable ground for the views of polygenists as the marked contrast between the African and Caucasian types. Years ago the view that color was the result of tropical climate was abandoned,[293] for the Eskimo and Lapps are almost as dark as many Africans, and their residence under the arctic circle has continued from a remote antiquity. Upon the other hand every variation in color, from the darkest to the lightest possible shades, exist among African tribes. The antiquity of the negro type as we now see it, is unquestionably considerable. As proof of this we have the oft-referred to argument from Egyptian paintings. In a temple at Beyt-el-Welee, in Nubia, constructed in the reign of Rameses II, is a painting which has been reproduced by Bonomi, in which a negro kneels at the feet of Sethos I, father and predecessor of Rameses II. All the peculiarities of the Negroid type are conspicuous; the blackness of the color, the thickness of lips, flatness of nose and woolliness of hair which pertain to the African of to-day are unquestionably present.[294] The painting representing this remarkable ethnic fact is 3200 years old, dating from 1400 years before Christ. The Duke of Argyll, on the authority of Prof. Lepsius, states that in earlier representations of the negro, referable to the “Twelfth Dynasty” or about 1900 B. C., the negro color is strongly marked, but not the negro features.[295] It is a question whether this fact indicates a transition from one type to another, or whether the painting is a true representation of the Nubians, who are known not to have flat noses or projecting lips. It is supposed also that the unskillfulness of the artists may account for the absence of the typal lines.[296] Hieroglyphic writings have been found dating about 2000 years B. C., in which mention is made of the employment of Negro or black troops by an Egyptian king in the prosecution of a great war.[297] At that remote period, when Abraham was almost the sole representative of the Jewish race, the negro type had multiplied and developed into strong tribes, which were important factors in the military contests of the oldest of powers—the Egyptian.
Notwithstanding this seeming permanence of type, it is well known that of all physical conditions, color is the most liable to change in every organism. Many animals under domestication change their color entirely.[298] In our Southern States it was observed that house-slaves of the third generation presented quite a markedly different appearance from field slaves.[299] This was owing as much, no doubt, to different food and different habits of life as to protection from the sun, though many different races have quite the same color while their habits of life are as different as well could be imagined. Of this class, the Eskimo, Chinese, and Fuegeans are examples. However, the fact that color is variable even in a slight degree, indicates that considerable if not radical changes might be brought about during a great length of time. Mr. Darwin has furnished the most rational solution of the question, which he describes briefly as follows: “Various facts which I have elsewhere given, prove that the color of the skin and hair is sometimes correlated in a surprising manner with a complete immunity from the action of certain vegetable poisons and from the attack of parasites. Hence it occurred to me that negroes and other dark races might have acquired their dark tints by the darker individuals escaping during a long series of generations from the deadly influence of the miasmas of their native countries.”[300] This doctrine of the survival of only the fittest, while all the weaker and perhaps lighter complexioned individuals of a race gradually succumbed to the deadly influence of climate, no doubt will explain the origin of the dark races, known to enjoy a special immunity against yellow and other fevers.[301] At all events, the formation of the distinctive features of races requires a great lapse of time. The geologist asks for time in which to account for the formation of strata, and the intelligent world now grants it to him without limit, and just as reasonably may the ethnologist ask for time in which to account for the formation of racial types.[302] Nor need the most literal interpreter of Genesis object to this demand on the ground of any conflict with the letter even of the historic narrative of the Pentateuch. The accepted chronology, based on Archbishop Usher’s interpretation, is no part of the text of Genesis. It is purely the product of his inadvertence and the blindness of many others of his school of Biblical chronologists. It is evident that the rules of interpretation applied to the tenth chapter of Genesis, according to which the names of the descendants of Noah’s sons are taken to represent individuals only, cannot hold. The probabilities are that they represent considerable tribes or nations. This probability is an established fact in the sixteenth and subsequent verses. In the fifteenth verse we learn that Canaan, the grandson of Noah, “begat Sidon, his first-born, and Heth.” Here the writer seems to refer to individuals, but it is probable that he alludes even to the origin of tribes. In the sixteenth verse we are not left in doubt on the subject, for there he no longer speaks of individuals or generations but of the growth of nations. He immediately adds after the above quotation, “and [begat] the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the Girgasite, and the Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite,” etc., etc.[303] The account makes no pretensions at chronology or at furnishing data for any system, and the constructions put upon its condensed account of the origin and growth of nations during an indefinite lapse of time by short-sighted interpreters, are unwarranted and certainly do injustice to the oldest of our histories. When we go back of the birth of Christ two thousand years—to the time of Abraham—this is as far as we can tread with certainty in the light of History. This period has been aptly designated by the Duke of Argyll as “Time absolute.” But when we go back of 2000 B. C., we are compelled to walk in a twilight glimmer, with only the dim rays from occasional cuneiform inscriptions, and the condensed accounts contained in Genesis, falling across our uncertain pathway. This period the above able writer has chosen to call “Time relative,” and the probabilities are that its measure is double if not treble that of the portion of “Time absolute” which precedes the Christian Era. An additional fact in this connection which strengthens the preceding is, that the three most ancient versions of the Pentateuch—the Hebrew, the Samaritan and the Septuagint—vary considerably in their statements as to the ages of many of the patriarchs at the birth of their sons. So wide is the difference in this respect between the Hebrew and Septuagint versions that their chronologies cannot be reconciled at all, the latter allowing a period of eight hundred years more than the former from Adam to Abraham; such being the case, it is impossible to arrive at the time of the flood or the origin of the race. These contradictions in versions, however, do not in any way impeach the historic authority of the Pentateuch, since it is in no sense a chronology any more than it is a work on geographic or astronomic science. The known antiquity of Egypt and China, to say nothing of the facts revealed by geology concerning man’s antiquity, can never be reconciled with Usher’s system, which is in no sense the true chronology of any known version of the Pentateuch.[304]
In this chapter we have seen that there is nothing to indicate that the Americans owe their origin to a special act of creation, and further, if they originated by the process of development (for which there is no sufficient evidence), that it was not upon the American continent. We are supported in these conclusions by the most respectable writers on American Ethnology[305] and Antiquities. That the American population is of old world origin there can be little doubt; but from whence it came, and to what particular people or peoples it owes its birth, is quite another question.[306] That view seems open to least objections which maintains that the Western Continent received its population at a comparatively early period in the history of the race, before the peoples of Western Europe and Eastern Asia had assumed their present national characteristics or fully developed their religious and social customs.[307]