CHAPTER III.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF MAN AND THE PROPER NAMES OF THE SPECIES.

THE names by which things are designated are of much importance. Not that the name must always signify, by the clear etymological import of the word, the thing to be designated,-a thing always desirable when it can be done; but that it should designate the thing distinctly from others, even if the name should be arbitrarily chosen. The importance of a clear distinction of things, by the names applied to them, cannot fail to have impressed every one familiar with the violent contests which have taken place in the learned world, which might have been avoided if the word expressing the idea had been clearly understood between the parties.

The names hitherto used by philosophers in treating of the Natural History of Man, are not sufficiently distinct in their significations to avoid a confusion of ideas, and are therefore objectionable. Cuvier's and Blumenbach's divisions and names are generally followed. Cuvier divides all mankind into three varieties, and calls them Caucasian, Mongolian, and Ethiopian; Blumenbach retains the Caucasian and Mongolian, but subdivides the Ethiopian into the American, Negro, and Malay, making five varieties of mankind. If authors had used these words

technically, to express the single idea that these geographical names were only to be understood as typi cal of the races, they would not be objectionable. Such has not been the fact; for they either directly say, or leave an unavoidable inference on the mind, that, by the use of these words, they desire to be understood that the different races sprang up, or origi nated in the countries the names of which are given to them. In this sense these geographic names are objectionable; because they take for granted that permanent races of men may originate from other causes than by the creation of God,-by climatic influences, or accidental generation,-as though it was an ascertained fact that such things had taken place. Besides they are either too limited or too extensive. Too limited in referring all the white varieties of men to a Caucasian, all the yellow varieties to a Mongolian, and all the black varieties to an Ethiopian, origin; and too extensive, by embracing all the Africans as blacks, Blumenbach's division of the Ethiopian race into three varieties, while it obviates the objection to Cuvier's Ethiopian division, takes for granted what is not yet settled,-that the Americans and Malays are distinct races. Whether the aborigines of America are of one or many races, or a distinct race at all, is a contested matter. Whether the Malays are a distinct race, a variety of the Negro, or of the yellow race, is not yet settled. Besides, the reasons which governed Blumenbach in dividing the Ethiopian, should have directed him also to divide the Caucasian variety; because a latitude has been given to this name, by which it has been made to

embrace one half of Asia, by a line drawn north and south, from the eastern limits of Afghanistan; giving nearly all the nations and tribes west of this line to the Caucasians, and all east of it to Mongolians. A geographic division embracing nations and tribes so remarkably dissimilar, that, if it is true, it shows, conclusively, that a science upon which so much talent and industry have been expended is of very little practical value, however much it may amuse the learned. The word Caucasian is also objectionable because it is not emblematical of the white races in the progressive development of the mind, although it may be in regard to complexion and features. The name Mongolian is, on every account, still more objectionable than that of Caucasian. It is the name of a nation of robbers, in eastern Central Asia, who are, for anything we know, a people of yesterday, compared with the Chinese, Japanese, and part of the Hindus. The Chinese, in par ticular, are the oldest nation upon the earth, having undergone fewer vicissitudes from invasion, or change of manners and customs. Excluding their own histories, which extend back with considerable certainty for two thousand years before our era, we know from the Roman history, that, in the first century of the Christian era, they were precisely the people they are now. That these very populous and ancient nations were originally derived from a nation of pastoral wanderers and robbers of Central Asia, appears to be so highly improbable, that we should rather suppose that China, pressed by population, or the intestine wars which prevailed about

Confucius's time, poured forth the surplus from her own bosom, and that they degenerated by the expulsion, if they were not so before. However this may be, and although the features, and other physical characteristics of the Mongols and Chinese do approximate, yet the manners, habits, customs, and propensities of the two people are so very dissimilar, that we feel some reluctance in designating these peaceable, contented, unambitious, and industrious people, by a name which is synonymous with everything destructive and cruel.

The name of Mongolian is also objectionable by reason of its uncertainty. Writers frequently use it very loosely. Sometimes a latitude is given to it embracing almost all of the Tartars, many of whom are as distinct, in every respect, from the true Mongols, as these are from the Caucasians. "The Tartars," says Malte Brun, "differ as much from the Mongols, in their features, physical constitution and language, as the Moors do from the Negroes. A slender figure, an European visage, though somewhat yellow in complexion, curled hair and long beard, distinguish the Tartar from the squat, shapeless monster, with a flat nose, prominent cheeks, almost beardless chin, and lank hair, who inhabits the deserts of Mongolia. The countries of these two races of men constitute two distincts physical regions. The Mongols, of whom the Calmucks are a branch, occupy all the central plateau of Central Asia, from the Beloor Mountains and lake Palcati to the great wall of China, and to the Siolki Mountains which separate them from the Mantchoos, a tribe of the great race of the Ton

gooses. The Tartars are the possessors of that extensive country which lies between the Beloor Mountains on one side, and the lake Aral, and the Caspian Sea on the other."

Dr. Prichard's proposed nomenclature is more objectionable than either of the others. By dividing the races of men by the color of the hair into Melanic, Xanthous, and Albino, he has, in effect, made but two divisions of the human family; because the Albino is not a variety in a scientific sense. It is an accidental, not a uniform production, similar to mutes, the porcupine family, six-fingered and toed people, &c., who never constitute a race, but disappear in a few generations.

His two chief divisions, Melanic and Xanthous, particularly the first, are objectionable for want of that certainty which names should always possess. At least seven tenths of mankind are black haired; embracing a majority of Europeans, and nearly all of the remainder of the human family. A variety including so large a sweep of nations, differing in everything but the mere color of the hair, is far too indefinite to answer a useful purpose; because it leaves out of view those peculiar distinctive characteristics which give point and value to science, unless many subdivisions should be made, each more important than the primary division, and therefore better entitled to a primary position. His Xanthous division is liable to the same objections, though not to the same degree.

Other divisions have been made, by, other authors of less note than these, which we pass without notice.