Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 28.djvu/329

Rh round in section, on all other parts of the surface except the scalp, scanty and late in appearing; a skull of variable form, mostly mesocephalic (though extremes both of dolichocephaly and brachycephaly are found in certain groups of this type); a broad and flat face, with prominent anteriorly projecting malar bones (platyopic face); nose small, mesorhine or leptarhine; orbits high and round, with very little development of glabella or supraciliary ridges; eyes sunken, and with the aperture between the lids narrow; in the most typical members of the group with a vertical fold of skin over the inner canthus, and with the outer angle slightly elevated; jaws mesognathous; teeth of moderate size (mesodont); the proportions of the limbs and form of the pelvis have yet to be worked out, the results at present obtained showing great diversity among different individuals of what appear to be well-marked races of the group, but this is perhaps due to the insufficient number of individuals as yet examined with accuracy.

The last type, which, for want of a better name, I still call by that which has the priority, Caucasian, or "white," has usually a light-complexioned skin (although in some, in so far aberrant cases, it is as dark as in the negroes); hair fair or black, soft, straight, or wavy, in section intermediate between the flattened and cylindrical form; beard fully developed; form of cranium various, mostly mesocephalic; malar bones retreating; face narrow and projecting in the middle line (pro-opic); orbits moderate; nose narrow and prominent (leptorhine); jaws orthognathous; teeth small (microdont); pelvis broad (pelvic index of male 80); fore-arm short, relatively to humerus (humeroradial index 74).

In endeavoring further to divide up into minor groups the numerous and variously modified individuals which cluster around one or other of these great types, a process quite necessary for many practical or descriptive purposes, the distinctions afforded by the study of physical characters are often so slight that it becomes necessary to take other considerations into account, among which geographical distribution and language hold an important place,

I. The Ethiopian or Negroid races may be primarily divided as follows:

A. African or typical negroes—inhabitants of all the central portion of the African Continent, from the Atlantic on the west to the Indian Ocean on the east, greatly mixed all along their northern frontier with Hamitic and Semitic Melanochroi, a mixture which, taking place in various proportions, and under varied conditions, has given rise to many of the numerous races and tribes inhabiting the Soudan.

A branch of the African negroes are the Bantu—distinguished chiefly, if not entirely, by the structure of their language. Physically indistinguishable from the other negroes where they come in contact in the equatorial regions of Africa, the Southern Bantu, or Caffres, as they are generally called, show a marked modification of type, being