Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/768

 found in two such widely separated areas, and, with very few exceptions, nowhere else in the world. In Africa they occupy the larger portion of the continent, extending over all the tropical and southern regions; while in the East they are found only in a group of islands of which New Guinea is the center, extending westward as far as Flores and eastward to the Feejees. There are also a few outlying groups of woolly-haired people, which are of great importance as indicating that this type once had a wider extension than now. In the Pacific we have the now extinct Tasmanians; and far to the east, in the midst of the brown Polynesians, we find the inhabitants of Penrhyn's Island and Mangaia, in about 158° west longitude, to be of the Melanesian or dark race. In the Philippines there is an aboriginal race of woolly-haired dwarfs—the Aëtas or Negritos; and a similar descriptive term may be applied to the Semangs of the Malay Peninsula, and to the natives of the Andaman Islands in the bay of Bengal. These various Eastern tribes differ among themselves quite as much as do those of Africa. Both agree, however, in being usually very dark-skinned, and examples may be found in which negroes and Papuans are in all respects very much alike. But this is exceptional, and there is almost always a characteristic difference which would cause most of the Eastern negroes to appear out of place on the continent of Africa. The woolly hair, however, combined with the dark skin and almost always with a dolichocephalic or long skull, so markedly distinguishes all these people from the rest of the inhabitants of the globe, that it is impossible not to look upon them as being really related to each other, and as representing an early variation if not the primitive type of mankind, which once spread widely over all the tropical portions of the eastern hemisphere. Successive incursions of the lighter-colored, smooth-haired races seem to have exterminated them in many of the areas they once inhabited, while in some widely scattered spots a few scanty remnants continue to exist. Two important groups, however, remain predominant in regions very far apart, but each well suited to their vigorous development. The negro of Africa has been made the servant of the more civilized races from the earliest periods of history, and is better known to us than any other uncivilized people; while the Papuan or Melanesian, inhabiting a group of tropical islands on the other side of the globe, still remains a mere shadowy name to the great majority of English readers. We proceed now to point out the chief physical and mental characteristics, habits, and customs of this interesting race as it exists in New Guinea, with occasional references to such modifications of it as occur in the other islands.

We now possess trustworthy descriptions of the Papuans as they exist at numerous localities scattered all round the extensive island they inhabit; and the substantial agreement of these descriptions renders it pretty certain that all belong to one race, exhibiting, it is true, considerable variations, and occasionally presenting undoubted