The negro skin is black; that is, it does not separate the sun's light into the elementary colours. When, by the admixture of the coloured races with the negro, we find coloured skins, they always tend to the yellow, as in the various mulatto shades of the West Indies, and especially in the Southern States of America; and the same is true of the "half-castes" of British India, though with a distinct darkness or blackness, which the descendant of the negro does not generally show.
Though I have, in accordance with the usual language of philosophers, spoken of blue as an element in the colour of the skin, I have some doubt whether it be a "true blue" or not. It is quite as likely to arise from a partial participation in the quality of the negro skin—that of absorbing a large portion of the light without any analysis whatever. This may be called darkness.
However, to return to the Query: the term pale is applied to the yellow-tinted skin; fair, to the red or pink; brown, to the mixture of red and yellow, with either blue or such darkness as above described; sallow, to yellow and darkness; and the only close approach to whiteness that we ever see, is in the sick room of the long-suffering fair complexion. In death, this changes to a "blackish grey," a mixture of white and darkness.
The pale complexion indicates a thick, hard, dry skin; the fair, a thin and soft one; and all the shades of dark skin render a large amount of ablution essential to health, comfort, or agreeableness to others. If any of your readers should feel curious about the characters of the wearers of these several skins, they must inquire of Lavater and his disciples.
D.V.S.
Home, April 1. 1850.
BALLAD OF DICK AND THE DEVIL.
Looking over some of your back numbers, I find (No. 11. p. 172.) an inquiry concerning a ballad with this title. I have never met with it in print, but remember some lines picked up in nursery days from an old nurse who was a native of "the dales." These I think have probably formed a part of this composition. The woman's name was curiously enough Martha Kendal; and, in all probability, her forebears had migrated from that place into Yorkshire:—
"Robin a devil he sware a vow.