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Susan Fenimore Cooper - "The Lumley Autograph"

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George Meredith - "Poems"

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The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex

C >> Charles Darwin >> The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex




Independently of fusion from intercrossing, the complete absence, in a
well-investigated region, of varieties linking together any two closely-
allied forms, is probably the most important of all the criterions of their
specific distinctness; and this is a somewhat different consideration from
mere constancy of character, for two forms may be highly variable and yet
not yield intermediate varieties. Geographical distribution is often
brought into play unconsciously and sometimes consciously; so that forms
living in two widely separated areas, in which most of the other
inhabitants are specifically distinct, are themselves usually looked at as
distinct; but in truth this affords no aid in distinguishing geographical
races from so-called good or true species.

Now let us apply these generally-admitted principles to the races of man,
viewing him in the same spirit as a naturalist would any other animal. In
regard to the amount of difference between the races, we must make some
allowance for our nice powers of discrimination gained by the long habit of
observing ourselves. In India, as Elphinstone remarks, although a newly-
arrived European cannot at first distinguish the various native races, yet
they soon appear to him extremely dissimilar (1. 'History of India,' 1841,
vol. i. p. 323. Father Ripa makes exactly the same remark with respect to
the Chinese.); and the Hindoo cannot at first perceive any difference
between the several European nations. Even the most distinct races of man
are much more like each other in form than would at first be supposed;
certain negro tribes must be excepted, whilst others, as Dr. Rohlfs writes
to me, and as I have myself seen, have Caucasian features. This general
similarity is well shewn by the French photographs in the Collection
Anthropologique du Museum de Paris of the men belonging to various races,
the greater number of which might pass for Europeans, as many persons to
whom I have shewn them have remarked. Nevertheless, these men, if seen
alive, would undoubtedly appear very distinct, so that we are clearly much
influenced in our judgment by the mere colour of the skin and hair, by
slight differences in the features, and by expression.

There is, however, no doubt that the various races, when carefully compared
and measured, differ much from each other,--as in the texture of the hair,
the relative proportions of all parts of the body (2. A vast number of
measurements of Whites, Blacks, and Indians, are given in the
'Investigations in the Military and Anthropolog. Statistics of American
Soldiers,' by B.A. Gould, 1869, pp. 298-358; 'On the capacity of the
lungs,' p. 471. See also the numerous and valuable tables, by Dr.
Weisbach, from the observations of Dr. Scherzer and Dr. Schwarz, in the
'Reise der Novara: Anthropolog. Theil,' 1867.), the capacity of the lungs,
the form and capacity of the skull, and even in the convolutions of the
brain. (3. See, for instance, Mr. Marshall's account of the brain of a
Bushwoman, in 'Philosophical Transactions,' 1864, p. 519.) But it would be
an endless task to specify the numerous points of difference. The races
differ also in constitution, in acclimatisation and in liability to certain
diseases. Their mental characteristics are likewise very distinct; chiefly
as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in their intellectual
faculties. Every one who has had the opportunity of comparison, must have
been struck with the contrast between the taciturn, even morose, aborigines
of S. America and the light-hearted, talkative negroes. There is a nearly
similar contrast between the Malays and the Papuans (4. Wallace, 'The
Malay Archipelago,' vol. ii. 1869, p. 178.), who live under the same
physical conditions, and are separated from each other only by a narrow
space of sea.

We will first consider the arguments which may be advanced in favour of
classing the races of man as distinct species, and then the arguments on
the other side. If a naturalist, who had never before seen a Negro,
Hottentot, Australian, or Mongolian, were to compare them, he would at once
perceive that they differed in a multitude of characters, some of slight
and some of considerable importance. On enquiry he would find that they
were adapted to live under widely different climates, and that they
differed somewhat in bodily constitution and mental disposition. If he
were then told that hundreds of similar specimens could be brought from the
same countries, he would assuredly declare that they were as good species
as many to which he had been in the habit of affixing specific names. This
conclusion would be greatly strengthened as soon as he had ascertained that
these forms had all retained the same character for many centuries; and
that negroes, apparently identical with existing negroes, had lived at
least 4000 years ago. (5. With respect to the figures in the famous
Egyptian caves of Abou-Simbel, M. Pouchet says ('The Plurality of the Human
Races,' Eng. translat., 1864, p. 50), that he was far from finding
recognisable representations of the dozen or more nations which some
authors believe that they can recognise. Even some of the most strongly-
marked races cannot be identified with that degree of unanimity which might
have been expected from what has been written on the subject. Thus Messrs.
Nott and Gliddon ('Types of Mankind,' p. 148), state that Rameses II., or
the Great, has features superbly European; whereas Knox, another firm
believer in the specific distinctness of the races of man ('Races of Man,'
1850, p. 201), speaking of young Memnon (the same as Rameses II., as I am
informed by Mr. Birch), insists in the strongest manner that he is
identical in character with the Jews of Antwerp. Again, when I looked at
the statue of Amunoph III., I agreed with two officers of the
establishment, both competent judges, that he had a strongly-marked negro
type of features; but Messrs. Nott and Gliddon (ibid. p. 146, fig. 53),
describe him as a hybrid, but not of "negro intermixture.") He would also
hear, on the authority of an excellent observer, Dr. Lund (6. As quoted by
Nott and Gliddon, 'Types of Mankind,' 1854, p. 439. They give also
corroborative evidence; but C. Vogt thinks that the subject requires
further investigation.), that the human skulls found in the caves of
Brazil, entombed with many extinct mammals, belonged to the same type as
that now prevailing throughout the American Continent.

Our naturalist would then perhaps turn to geographical distribution, and he
would probably declare that those forms must be distinct species, which
differ not only in appearance, but are fitted for hot, as well as damp or
dry countries, and for the Artic regions. He might appeal to the fact that
no species in the group next to man--namely, the Quadrumana, can resist a
low temperature, or any considerable change of climate; and that the
species which come nearest to man have never been reared to maturity, even
under the temperate climate of Europe. He would be deeply impressed with
the fact, first noticed by Agassiz (7. 'Diversity of Origin of the Human
Races,' in the 'Christian Examiner,' July 1850.), that the different races
of man are distributed over the world in the same zoological provinces, as
those inhabited by undoubtedly distinct species and genera of mammals.
This is manifestly the case with the Australian, Mongolian, and Negro races
of man; in a less well-marked manner with the Hottentots; but plainly with
the Papuans and Malays, who are separated, as Mr. Wallace has shewn, by
nearly the same line which divides the great Malayan and Australian
zoological provinces. The Aborigines of America range throughout the
Continent; and this at first appears opposed to the above rule, for most of
the productions of the Southern and Northern halves differ widely: yet
some few living forms, as the opossum, range from the one into the other,
as did formerly some of the gigantic Edentata. The Esquimaux, like other
Arctic animals, extend round the whole polar regions. It should be
observed that the amount of difference between the mammals of the several
zoological provinces does not correspond with the degree of separation
between the latter; so that it can hardly be considered as an anomaly that
the Negro differs more, and the American much less from the other races of
man, than do the mammals of the African and American continents from the
mammals of the other provinces. Man, it may be added, does not appear to
have aboriginally inhabited any oceanic island; and in this respect, he
resembles the other members of his class.

In determining whether the supposed varieties of the same kind of domestic
animal should be ranked as such, or as specifically distinct, that is,
whether any of them are descended from distinct wild species, every
naturalist would lay much stress on the fact of their external parasites
being specifically distinct. All the more stress would be laid on this
fact, as it would be an exceptional one; for I am informed by Mr. Denny
that the most different kinds of dogs, fowls, and pigeons, in England, are
infested by the same species of Pediculi or lice. Now Mr. A. Murray has
carefully examined the Pediculi collected in different countries from the
different races of man (8. 'Transactions of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh,' vol. xxii, 1861, p. 567.); and he finds that they differ, not
only in colour, but in the structure of their claws and limbs. In every
case in which many specimens were obtained the differences were constant.
The surgeon of a whaling ship in the Pacific assured me that when the
Pediculi, with which some Sandwich Islanders on board swarmed, strayed on
to the bodies of the English sailors, they died in the course of three or
four days. These Pediculi were darker coloured, and appeared different
from those proper to the natives of Chiloe in South America, of which he
gave me specimens. These, again, appeared larger and much softer than
European lice. Mr. Murray procured four kinds from Africa, namely, from
the Negroes of the Eastern and Western coasts, from the Hottentots and
Kaffirs; two kinds from the natives of Australia; two from North and two
from South America. In these latter cases it may be presumed that the
Pediculi came from natives inhabiting different districts. With insects
slight structural differences, if constant, are generally esteemed of
specific value: and the fact of the races of man being infested by
parasites, which appear to be specifically distinct, might fairly be urged
as an argument that the races themselves ought to be classed as distinct
species.

Our supposed naturalist having proceeded thus far in his investigation,
would next enquire whether the races of men, when crossed, were in any
degree sterile. He might consult the work (9. 'On the Phenomena of
Hybridity in the Genus Homo,' Eng. translat., 1864.) of Professor Broca, a
cautious and philosophical observer, and in this he would find good
evidence that some races were quite fertile together, but evidence of an
opposite nature in regard to other races. Thus it has been asserted that
the native women of Australia and Tasmania rarely produce children to
European men; the evidence, however, on this head has now been shewn to be
almost valueless. The half-castes are killed by the pure blacks: and an
account has lately been published of eleven half-caste youths murdered and
burnt at the same time, whose remains were found by the police. (10. See
the interesting letter by Mr. T.A. Murray, in the 'Anthropological Review,'
April 1868, p. liii. In this letter Count Strzelecki's statement that
Australian women who have borne children to a white man, are afterwards
sterile with their own race, is disproved. M. A. de Quatrefages has also
collected (Revue des Cours Scientifiques, March, 1869, p. 239), much
evidence that Australians and Europeans are not sterile when crossed.)
Again, it has often been said that when mulattoes intermarry, they produce
few children; on the other hand, Dr. Bachman, of Charleston (11. 'An
Examination of Prof. Agassiz's Sketch of the Nat. Provinces of the Animal
World,' Charleston, 1855, p. 44.), positively asserts that he has known
mulatto families which have intermarried for several generations, and have
continued on an average as fertile as either pure whites or pure blacks.
Enquiries formerly made by Sir C. Lyell on this subject led him, as he
informs me, to the same conclusion. (12. Dr. Rohlfs writes to me that he
found the mixed races in the Great Sahara, derived from Arabs, Berbers, and
Negroes of three tribes, extraordinarily fertile. On the other hand, Mr.
Winwood Reade informs me that the Negroes on the Gold Coast, though
admiring white men and mulattoes, have a maxim that mulattoes should not
intermarry, as the children are few and sickly. This belief, as Mr. Reade
remarks, deserves attention, as white men have visited and resided on the
Gold Coast for four hundred years, so that the natives have had ample time
to gain knowledge through experience.) In the United States the census for
the year 1854 included, according to Dr. Bachman, 405,751 mulattoes; and
this number, considering all the circumstances of the case, seems small;
but it may partly be accounted for by the degraded and anomalous position
of the class, and by the profligacy of the women. A certain amount of
absorption of mulattoes into negroes must always be in progress; and this
would lead to an apparent diminution of the former. The inferior vitality
of mulattoes is spoken of in a trustworthy work (13. 'Military and
Anthropological Statistics of American Soldiers,' by B.A. Gould, 1869, p.
319.) as a well-known phenomenon; and this, although a different
consideration from their lessened fertility, may perhaps be advanced as a
proof of the specific distinctness of the parent races. No doubt both
animal and vegetable hybrids, when produced from extremely distinct
species, are liable to premature death; but the parents of mulattoes cannot
be put under the category of extremely distinct species. The common Mule,
so notorious for long life and vigour, and yet so sterile, shews how little
necessary connection there is in hybrids between lessened fertility and
vitality; other analogous cases could be cited.

Even if it should hereafter be proved that all the races of men were
perfectly fertile together, he who was inclined from other reasons to rank
them as distinct species, might with justice argue that fertility and
sterility are not safe criterions of specific distinctness. We know that
these qualities are easily affected by changed conditions of life, or by
close inter-breeding, and that they are governed by highly complex laws,
for instance, that of the unequal fertility of converse crosses between the
same two species. With forms which must be ranked as undoubted species, a
perfect series exists from those which are absolutely sterile when crossed,
to those which are almost or completely fertile. The degrees of sterility
do not coincide strictly with the degrees of difference between the parents
in external structure or habits of life. Man in many respects may be
compared with those animals which have long been domesticated, and a large
body of evidence can be advanced in favour of the Pallasian doctrine (14.
The 'Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication,' vol. ii. p. 109.
I may here remind the reader that the sterility of species when crossed is
not a specially-acquired quality, but, like the incapacity of certain trees
to be grafted together, is incidental on other acquired differences. The
nature of these differences is unknown, but they relate more especially to
the reproductive system, and much less so to external structure or to
ordinary differences in constitution. One important element in the
sterility of crossed species apparently lies in one or both having been
long habituated to fixed conditions; for we know that changed conditions
have a special influence on the reproductive system, and we have good
reason to believe (as before remarked) that the fluctuating conditions of
domestication tend to eliminate that sterility which is so general with
species, in a natural state, when crossed. It has elsewhere been shewn by
me (ibid. vol. ii. p. 185, and 'Origin of Species,' 5th edit. p. 317), that
the sterility of crossed species has not been acquired through natural
selection: we can see that when two forms have already been rendered very
sterile, it is scarcely possible that their sterility should be augmented
by the preservation or survival of the more and more sterile individuals;
for, as the sterility increases, fewer and fewer offspring will be produced
from which to breed, and at last only single individuals will be produced
at the rarest intervals. But there is even a higher grade of sterility
than this. Both Gartner and Kolreuter have proved that in genera of
plants, including many species, a series can be formed from species which,
when crossed, yield fewer and fewer seeds, to species which never produce a
single seed, but yet are affected by the pollen of the other species, as
shewn by the swelling of the germen. It is here manifestly impossible to
select the more sterile individuals, which have already ceased to yield
seeds; so that the acme of sterility, when the germen alone is affected,
cannot have been gained through selection. This acme, and no doubt the
other grades of sterility, are the incidental results of certain unknown
differences in the constitution of the reproductive system of the species
which are crossed.), that domestication tends to eliminate the sterility
which is so general a result of the crossing of species in a state of
nature. From these several considerations, it may be justly urged that the
perfect fertility of the intercrossed races of man, if established, would
not absolutely preclude us from ranking them as distinct species.

Independently of fertility, the characters presented by the offspring from
a cross have been thought to indicate whether or not the parent-forms ought
to be ranked as species or varieties; but after carefully studying the
evidence, I have come to the conclusion that no general rules of this kind
can be trusted. The ordinary result of a cross is the production of a
blended or intermediate form; but in certain cases some of the offspring
take closely after one parent-form, and some after the other. This is
especially apt to occur when the parents differ in characters which first
appeared as sudden variations or monstrosities. (15. 'The Variation of
Animals,' etc., vol. ii. p. 92.) I refer to this point, because Dr. Rohlfs
informs me that he has frequently seen in Africa the offspring of negroes
crossed with members of other races, either completely black or completely
white, or rarely piebald. On the other hand, it is notorious that in
America mulattoes commonly present an intermediate appearance.

We have now seen that a naturalist might feel himself fully justified in
ranking the races of man as distinct species; for he has found that they
are distinguished by many differences in structure and constitution, some
being of importance. These differences have, also, remained nearly
constant for very long periods of time. Our naturalist will have been in
some degree influenced by the enormous range of man, which is a great
anomaly in the class of mammals, if mankind be viewed as a single species.
He will have been struck with the distribution of the several so-called
races, which accords with that of other undoubtedly distinct species of
mammals. Finally, he might urge that the mutual fertility of all the races
has not as yet been fully proved, and even if proved would not be an
absolute proof of their specific identity.

On the other side of the question, if our supposed naturalist were to
enquire whether the forms of man keep distinct like ordinary species, when
mingled together in large numbers in the same country, he would immediately
discover that this was by no means the case. In Brazil he would behold an
immense mongrel population of Negroes and Portuguese; in Chiloe, and other
parts of South America, he would behold the whole population consisting of
Indians and Spaniards blended in various degrees. (16. M. de Quatrefages
has given ('Anthropological Review,' Jan. 1869, p. 22), an interesting
account of the success and energy of the Paulistas in Brazil, who are a
much crossed race of Portuguese and Indians, with a mixture of the blood of
other races.) In many parts of the same continent he would meet with the
most complex crosses between Negroes, Indians, and Europeans; and judging
from the vegetable kingdom, such triple crosses afford the severest test of
the mutual fertility of the parent forms. In one island of the Pacific he
would find a small population of mingled Polynesian and English blood; and
in the Fiji Archipelago a population of Polynesian and Negritos crossed in
all degrees. Many analogous cases could be added; for instance, in Africa.
Hence the races of man are not sufficiently distinct to inhabit the same
country without fusion; and the absence of fusion affords the usual and
best test of specific distinctness.

Our naturalist would likewise be much disturbed as soon as he perceived
that the distinctive characters of all the races were highly variable.
This fact strikes every one on first beholding the negro slaves in Brazil,
who have been imported from all parts of Africa. The same remark holds
good with the Polynesians, and with many other races. It may be doubted
whether any character can be named which is distinctive of a race and is
constant. Savages, even within the limits of the same tribe, are not
nearly so uniform in character, as has been often asserted. Hottentot
women offer certain peculiarities, more strongly marked than those
occurring in any other race, but these are known not to be of constant
occurrence. In the several American tribes, colour and hairiness differ
considerably; as does colour to a certain degree, and the shape of the
features greatly, in the Negroes of Africa. The shape of the skull varies
much in some races (17. For instance, with the aborigines of America and
Australia, Prof. Huxley says ('Transact. Internat. Congress of Prehist.
Arch.' 1868, p. 105), that the skulls of many South Germans and Swiss are
"as short and as broad as those of the Tartars," etc.); and so it is with
every other character. Now all naturalists have learnt by dearly bought
experience, how rash it is to attempt to define species by the aid of
inconstant characters.

But the most weighty of all the arguments against treating the races of man
as distinct species, is that they graduate into each other, independently
in many cases, as far as we can judge, of their having intercrossed. Man
has been studied more carefully than any other animal, and yet there is the
greatest possible diversity amongst capable judges whether he should be
classed as a single species or race, or as two (Virey), as three
(Jacquinot), as four (Kant), five (Blumenbach), six (Buffon), seven
(Hunter), eight (Agassiz), eleven (Pickering), fifteen (Bory St. Vincent),
sixteen (Desmoulins), twenty-two (Morton), sixty (Crawfurd), or as sixty-
three, according to Burke. (18. See a good discussion on this subject in
Waitz, 'Introduction to Anthropology,' Eng. translat., 1863, pp. 198-208,
227. I have taken some of the above statements from H. Tuttle's 'Origin
and Antiquity of Physical Man,' Boston, 1866, p. 35.) This diversity of
judgment does not prove that the races ought not to be ranked as species,
but it shews that they graduate into each other, and that it is hardly
possible to discover clear distinctive characters between them.

Every naturalist who has had the misfortune to undertake the description of
a group of highly varying organisms, has encountered cases (I speak after
experience) precisely like that of man; and if of a cautious disposition,
he will end by uniting all the forms which graduate into each other, under
a single species; for he will say to himself that he has no right to give
names to objects which he cannot define. Cases of this kind occur in the
Order which includes man, namely in certain genera of monkeys; whilst in
other genera, as in Cercopithecus, most of the species can be determined
with certainty. In the American genus Cebus, the various forms are ranked
by some naturalists as species, by others as mere geographical races. Now
if numerous specimens of Cebus were collected from all parts of South
America, and those forms which at present appear to be specifically
distinct, were found to graduate into each other by close steps, they would
usually be ranked as mere varieties or races; and this course has been
followed by most naturalists with respect to the races of man.
Nevertheless, it must be confessed that there are forms, at least in the
vegetable kingdom (19. Prof. Nageli has carefully described several
striking cases in his 'Botanische Mittheilungen,' B. ii. 1866, ss. 294-369.
Prof. Asa Gray has made analogous remarks on some intermediate forms in the
Compositae of N. America.), which we cannot avoid naming as species, but
which are connected together by numberless gradations, independently of
intercrossing.

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