Page:A general history for colleges and high schools (Myers, 1890).djvu/17

Rh the Lapps, and the Basques, in Europe; and (by some) the Esquimaux and American Indians.

The peoples of this race were, it seems, the first inhabitants of Europe and of the New World; but in these quarters, they have, in the main, either been exterminated or absorbed by later comers of the White Race. In Europe, however, two small areas of this primitive population escaped the common fate—the Basques, sheltered among the Pyrenees, and the Finns and Lapps, in the far north while in the New World, the Esquimaux and the Indians still represent the race that once held undisputed possession of the land.

The polished stone implements found in the caves and river-gravels of Western Europe, the shell-mounds, or kitchen-middens, upon the shores of the Baltic, the Swiss lake-habitations, and the barrows, or grave-mounds, found in all parts of Europe, are supposed to be relics of a prehistoric Turanian people.

Although some of the Turanian peoples, as for instance the Chinese, have made considerable advance in civilization, still as a rule the peoples of this race have made but little progress in the arts or in general culture. Even their languages have remained undeveloped. These seem immature, or stunted in their growth. They have no declensions or conjugations, like those of the languages of the Caucasian peoples.

The White Race and its Three Families.—The White Race embraces the historic nations. This type divides into three families,—the Haniitic, the Semitic, and the Aryan, or Indo-European (formerly called the Japhetic).

The ancient Egyptians were the chief people of the Hamitic branch. In the gray dawn of history we discover them already settled in the Valley of the Nile, and there erecting great monuments so faultless in construction as to render it certain that those who planned them had had a very long previous training in the art of building.