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XV. MONTHLY FINANCIAL AND COMMERCIAL ARTICLE
XVI. THE NEW BOOKS OF THE MONTH

Tennyson's Poems-Bryant's "Fountain and other Poems"
-Sterling's Poetical Works-Dr. Forry's Climate of the
United States and its Endemic Influences-Forest Life, by
the Author of "A New Home"-Professor Johnston's
Elements of Agricultural Chemistry and Geology-Dr.
Francis's Discourse before the New York Lyceum of
Natural History-Perkins's Treatise on Algebra-Trea-
tise on the Right of Suffrage, by Samuel Jones-Facts on
the Rhode Island Controversy; Dr. Wayland's Discourse
on the Affairs of Rhode Island; and Review of Dr. Way-
land's Discourse by a Member of the Boston Bar-Mr.
Cooley's American in Egypt-Little Coin, Much Care,
by Mary Howitt—General Harlan's Memoir of India and
Avghanistaun.

XVII. MONTHLY LITERARY BULLETIN

American—English-Continental-Miscellaneous.

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THIS NUMBER CONTAINS SEVEN SHEETS, ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE PAGES.

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DO THE VARIOUS RACES OF MAN CONSTITUTE A SINGLE SPECIES ?*

In surveying the globe in reference to the different appearances of mankind, the most extraordinary diversities are apparent to the most superficial observer. The Patagonian and Caffre, compared with the Laplander and Esquimaux, are real giants, the stature of the latter being generally two feet less than that of the former. What a striking contrast does the coarse skin and greasy blackness of the African, present to the delicate cuticle and the exquisite rose and lily that beautify the face of the Georgian! Compare the head of the Circassian having those proportions which we so much admire in Grecian sculpture, with the flat

skull of the Carib or that of the Negro with its low retreating forehead and advancing jaws! Or behold in the one the full development of intellectual power, as displayed in arts, science, and literature, and in the other a mere instinctive existence! Hence arises the question-Have all these diverse races descended from a single stock? But notwithstanding these extremes would seem, at first view, to forbid the supposition of a common origin, yet we find them all running into each other by such nice and imperceptible gradations, not only in contiguous countries but among the same people, as to render it often impracticable to determine, in

Researches into the Physical History of Mankind. By James Cowles Prichard, M.D., F.R.S., M.R.I.A., etc. London: 3 vols. 8vo., 1836, 1837, and 1841, pp. 376, 373, 550.

Crania Americana; or a Comparative View of the Skulls of various Aboriginal Nations of North and South America. Illustrated by seventy-eight plates and a colored map. By Samuel George Morton, M.D., Professor of Anatomy in the Medical Department of Pennsylvania College at Philadelphia. Philadelphia: 1839. Folio pp. 296.

Lectures on Physiology, Zoology, and the Natural History of Man, delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons. By W. Lawrence, F.R.S., etc. Salem 1828. 8vo. pp. 495. (American Edition.)

De Generis Humani Varietate Nativa. Gött. 3d edit. 1795, 8vo. Collectio Craniorum Diversarum Gentium, Decades I--VII. Gött. 1790--1826, 4to. By John Frederick Blumenbach, M.D., Aulic Counsellor to his Britannic Majesty, Professor of Physic in the University of Göttingen, etc.

An Essay on the Causes of the variety of Complexion and Figure in the Human Species. By Samuel Stanhope Smith, D.D., LL.D., President of the College of New Jersey, etc. New Brunswick: 1810. 8vo. pp. 410.

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dependent of the individual's locality, to what family of the human race he belongs.

Any one who allows himself to speculate upon this subject, will at first view be inclined to adopt the opinion that every part of the world had originally its indigenous inhabitants "autochthones,"-adapted to its physical circumstances. Voltaire, for example, ridicules the idea of referring such different beings as the Circassian and the Negro to the same original. By this hypothesis, a ready solution is afforded of some of the most difficult questions presented in the investigation of the physical history of mankind; for instance, the remarkable diversity in figure and complexion observed among different nations-their difference of moral and intellectual character-and their peculiarity of language and even dialectic differences, observed as far back in antiquity as the days of Jacob and Laban. We might thus explain the fact that the oldest records, ever since Cain went to the land of Nod, seldom allude to an uninhabited country; or the no less surprising fact that in many parts of the world, as for instance, Central America, we discover vestiges of a primeval population, who, having dwelt there for ages and brought the civil arts to a comparatively high degree of cultivation, swept away before the dawn of his

tory.

were

On the opposite side of the question, an argument thought by many to be conclusive as to the point at issue, is the inference deduced from the scriptural history of man, which ascribes to him a single origin. But such an application of the Sacred Records is manifestly contrary to their spirit and design; for the most sincere believers in Reve lation now freely admit the deduction of the geologist, that the period of the creation of the earth extends far beyond 6000 years. However, as truth can never be in opposition to truth, the investigation of any subject which does not transcend the scope of the human faculties, cannot possibly detract from the authority and importance of the Sacred Writings. Indeed, many investigations into the laws of natural science which were thought at first to conflict with Holy Writ, have even been found in the end, as will be shown in

inquiry into the unity of the human

family, to afford confirmation and elucidation of its divine truths.

One of the most interesting problems in history is, the geographical distribution of the human family; but history, if we exclude the Mosaic account, affords no data for determining this great problem. In the introduction to his great work on language, Adelung remarks as follows:-" Asia has been in all times regarded as the country where the human race had its beginning, received its first education, and from which its increase was spread over the rest of the globe. Tracing the people up to tribes, and the tribes to families, we are conducted at last, if not by history, at least by the traditions of all old people, to a single pair, from which, families, tribes, and nations, have been successively produced. The question has been often asked,-What was this first family, and the first people descending from it? where was it settled? and how has it extended so as to fill the four large divisions of the globe? It is a question of fact, and must be answered from history. But history is silent; her first books have been destroyed by time; and the few lines preserved by Moses are rather calculated to excite than to satisfy our curiosity."

Assuming that the earth's surface was formerly covered to a certain depth with water-an opinion warranted by physical facts as well as the Mosaic records-the portions which first became dry and habitable, would of course be those which are now the most elevated. Hence the region of Central Asia, which in respect to elevation can be compared only to the lofty plain of Quito in South America, has been with good reason pointed out as the spot on which the Creator planted the first people-a point from which the human race gradually dispersed as new lands became habitable. This great table-land, when it first became dry, was but an island in the watery expanse, with vegetable productions so entirely different from its present Alpine class, that it may have combined all the characters of the Garden of Eden. But Adelung, forgetting the influence of physical geography on climate, speaks of its "snowy mountains and glaciers."

History then points out the East as the earliest or original seat of our spe

cies, as well as of our domesticated animals and of our principal food; but as historical sources of testimony are considered inadequate to determine the question whether the globe has been peopled from one or more original stocks, it has been found necessary to seek for satisfactory evidence through the medium of researches into the natural history of the organized world. Hence the inquiry has been resolved by the learned Dr. James Cowles Prichard, in his "Researches into the Physical History of Mankind," into the two following problems :

"1. Whether through the organized world in general it has been the order of nature to produce one stock or family in each particular species, or to call the same species into existence by several distinct origins, and to diffuse it generally and independently of propagation from any central point; in other words, whether all organized beings of each particular species can be referred respectively to a common parentage?

"2. Whether all the races of men are of one species? Whether, in other words, the physical diversities which distinguish several tribes are such as may have arisen from the variation of one primitive type, or must be considered as permanent and therefore specific characters ?"-Vol. i., p. 9.

In our researches into the origin of the varieties of mankind, it is, therefore, necessary to dismiss all argument à priori. Let us repudiate that speciousness of argumentation which maintains that it is much more consonant with the wisdom of the Deity that each region of the earth should teem ab initio with vegetable and animal productions adapted to its physical circumstances, than that immense tracts, while a single species is slowly extending its kind, should remain for ages an unoccupied waste. The question belongs to the domain of natural history and physiology, as based upon the observation of facts. Hence, too, it is obviously improper to set out, as most writers on the subject have done, with a distribution of the human family into certain races, as this is in fact a premature anticipation of the result. It is only by proceeding in the analytical method, surveying the ethnography of various countries, and deducing conclusions from the phenomena col

lected, that the subject can be legitimately investigated.

Before proceeding to the details connected with the question, whether the various races of man belong to a single species, it may be well to state that by the term species in natural history is understood a collection of individuals, whether plants or animals, which so resemble one another that all the differences among them may find an explanation in the known operation of physical causes; but if two races are distinguished by some characteristic peculiarity of organization not explicable on the ground that it was lost by the one or acquired by the other through any known operation of physical causes, we are warranted in the belief that they have not descended from the same original stock. Hence, varieties, in natural history, are distinguished from species by the circumstance of mere deviation from the character of the parent stock; but to determine whether tribes characterized by certain diversities, constitute in reality distinct species, or merely varieties of the same species, is often a question involving much doubt-a doubt which can, however, be generally removed by a comprehensive survey of the great laws of organization.

As the natural history of man in regard to his origin may receive valuable elucidation from comparative physiology and the diversities observed among inferior animals, our attention will be first directed to this branch of the subject.

In regard to the question whether all the existing plants and animals, of each species, can be referred respectively to a common stock, Linnæus maintained the affirmative, averring that in every species of plants as well as of animals, only one pair was originally produced. Now if in tracing the dispersion of the genera and species of organized beings, (plants and animals,) it should appear that they exist in those regions only to which they may have wandered or been conveyed by accidental means, from some single point regarded as the primitive or original seat, the inference that each species has descended from a single origin is warranted; but if, on the contrary, the same species are found in localities so separated by natural barriers or vast distauces as to forbid the supposition of

their passage, the opinion of their distinct and separate origins is equally authorized.

In regard to the dispersion of plants and of the primary habitations of individual species, Prichard refers to three hypotheses:-1. That all the species of plants in every country, had their primary seat in one particular region, from which they have spread as from a common centre. 2. That every species had a particular centre or birthplace, but that different regions of the earth afforded the primary habitations of different species. 3. That the vegetable tribes, independent of any centres of propagation, have sprung into existence wherever the physical circumstances favorable to their de velopment obtain. The first of these hypotheses is now considered irreconcilable with established facts. The second has many powerful advocates, among whom is Prichard. But the third, in our opinion, is gradually gaining ground, in proportion as the science of botanical geography is being developed by the accumulation of new facts.

In proportion as naturalists have explored the botany of remote countries, the distinguishing characters, on a comparison of their respective aggregates of plants, have become more apparent. Many important results have been deduced from the researches of Mr. Robert Brown, and MM. de Humboldt and de Candolle. In relation to the distribution of plants in reference to the three great classes, we find that the dycotyledonous family diminishes as we proceed from the equator towards the poles; that this law is reversed in respect to the acotyledonous class; whilst the monocotyledonous plants, in which De Candolle includes the ferns, exhibit but little variation of number in different zones. "If we now," says Humboldt, "in any counder the temperate zone, the numracea or of Compositæ, it will be possible e estimate that of the Graminer or of the Laminosa." But, notwithstandin zaverin dogy in the character of vegeta

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the species, notwithstanding the genus may be common to two or even all three of them, are in each very dissimilar. It has been remarked by M. de Humboldt, as was before observed by the Count de Buffon in relation to the distribution of animals, that it is chiefly in the Arctic regions where the two continents approximate, that we discover the same identical species of the vegetable kingdom common to both. Proceeding south, as for example in the United States, we meet these common plants more rarely; and in their travels in equinoctial America, MM. de Humboldt and Bonpland found only twenty-four species, (all of which belong to the monocotyledonous tribes,) identical with those of any part of the Old World. In ascending a lofty mountain of the torrid zone, we also find that the parallel temperatures of more northern latitudes display a general botanical analogy. Hence several attempts have been made to divide the surface of the earth into botanical provinces or distinct regions of vegetation.

But as Nature seems to have provided means for the dispersion of plants, it is necessary to consider the bearing of these facts upon the present inquiry. Of these means, one of the most obvious is human agency. Animals in general, more particularly birds, also contribute to their dispersion. The same end is promoted by means of atmospheric currents; for we often find the smallest seeds provided with winglets and feathery appendages, which facilitate their transportation by winds. Lastly, we know from actual observation that plants have migrated from distant coasts by means of the great oceanic currents.

From a consideration of these various facts, Prichard arrives at the inference, "that the vegetable creation was originally divided into a limited number of provinces,"-a conclusion which he thinks strongly corroborated by the fact that in the northern continents, where their near approach affords facilities for migration, many plants are common to both, whilst in proportion as the continents become widely separated the amber diminishes. "On the whole," he says, 66 we may conclude, with a reat degree of probability, that each tribe of plants, and especially of the more perfect plants, had on the earth one original habitation, from which it

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