Cosmos: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe Part 42

The distribution of mankind is therefore only a distribution into 'varieties', which are commonly designated by the somewhat indefinite term 'races'. As in the vegetable kingdom, and in the natural history of birds and fishes, a cla.s.sification into many small families is based on a surer foundation than p 356 where large sections are separated into a few but large divisions; so it also appears to me, that in the determination of races a preference should be given to the establishment of small families of nations. Whether we adopt the old cla.s.sification of my master, Blumenbach, and admit 'five'

races (the Caucasian, Mongolian, American, Ethiopian, and Malayan), or that of Prichard, into 'seven races'* (the Iranian, Turanian, American, Hottentots and Bushmen, Negroes, Papuas, and Alfourons), we fail to recognize any typical sharpness of definition, or any general or well-established principle in the division of these groups.

[footnote] *Prichard, op. cit., vol. i., p. 247.

The extremes of form and color are certainly separated, but without regard to the races, which can not be included in any of these cla.s.ses, and which have been alternately termed Scythian and Allophyllic. Iranian is certainly a less objectionable term for the European nations than Caucasian; but it may be maintained generally that geographical denominations are very vague when used to express the points of departure of races, more especially where the country which has given its name to the race, as, for instance, Turan (Mawerannahr), has been inhabited at different periods* by Indo-Germanic and Finnish, and not by Mongolian tribes.

[footnote] *The late arrival of the Turkish and Mongolian tribes on the Oxus and on the Kirghis Steppes is opposed to the hypothesis of Niebuhr, according to which the Scythians of Herodotus and Hippocrates were Mongolians. It seems far more probable that the Scythians (Scoloti) should be referred to the Indo-Germanic Ma.s.sagetae (Alani). The Mongolian, true Tartars (the latter term was afterward falsely given to purely Turkish tribes in Russia and Siberia), were settled, at that period, far in the eastern part of Asia. See my 'Asie Centrale', t. i., p. 239, 400; 'Examen Critique de l'Histoire de la Geogr.', th. ii., p. 320. A distinguished philologist, Professor Buschmann, calls attention to the circ.u.mstance that the poet Firdousi, in his half-mythical prefatory remarks in the 'Schahnameh', mentions "a fortress of the Alani" on the sea-sh.o.r.e, in which Selm took refuge, this prince being the eldest son of the King Feridun, who in all probability lived two hundred years before Cyrus. The Kirghis of the Scythian steppe were originally a Finnish tribe; their three hordes probably const.i.tute in the present day the most numerous nomadic nation, and their tribe dwelt, in the sixteenth century, in the same steppe in which I have myself seen them. The Byzantine Menander (p. 380-382, ed. Nieb.) expressly states that the Chacan of the Turks (Thu-Khiu), in 569, made a present of a Kirghis slave to Zemarchus, the emba.s.sador of ustinish II.; he terms her a [Greek word]; and we find in Abulgasi ('Historia Mongolorum et Tatarorum') that the Kirghis are called Kirkiz. Similarity of manners, where the nature of the country determines the princ.i.p.al characteristics, is a very uncertain evidence of ident.i.ty of race. The life of the steppes produces among the Turks (Ti Tukiu), the Baschkirs (Fins), the Kirghis, the TorG.o.di and Dsungari (Mongolians), the same habits of nomadic life, and the same use of felt tents, carried on wagons and pitched among herds of cattle.

p 357 Languages, as intellectual creations of man, and as closely interwoven with the development of mind, are, independently of the 'national' form which they exhibit, of the greatest importance in the recognition of similarities or differences in races. This importance is especially owing to the clew which a community of descent affords in treading that mysterious labyrinth in which the connection of physical powers and intellectual forces manifests itself in a thousand different forms. The brilliant progress made within the last half century, in Germany, in philosophical philology, has greatly facilitated our investigations into the 'national' character* of languages and the influence exercised by descent.

[footnote] *Wilhelm von Humboldt, 'Ueber die Verschiedenheit der menschlichen Sprachbaues', in his great work 'Ueber die Kawi-Sprache auf der Insel Java', bd. i., s. xxi., xlviii., and ccxiv.

But here, as in all domains of ideal speculation, the dangers of deception are closely linked to the rich and certain profit to be derived.

Positive ethnographical studies, based on a thorough knowledge of history, teach us that much caution should be applied in entering into these comparisons of nations, and of the languages employed by them at certain epochs. Subjection, long a.s.sociation, the influence of a foreign religion, the blending of races, even when only including a small number of the more influential and cultivated of the immigrating tribes, have produced, in both continents, similarly recurring phenomena; as, for instance, in introducing totally different families of languages among one and the same race, and idioms, having one common root, among nations of the most different origin.

Great Asiatic conquerors have exercised the most powerful influence on phenomena of this kind.

But language is a part and parcel of the history of the development of mind; and however happily the human intellect, under the most dissimilar physical conditions, may unfettered pursue a self-chosen track, and strive to free itself from the dominion of terrestrial influences, this emanc.i.p.ation is never perfect. There ever remains, in the natural capacities of the mind, a trace of something that has been derived from the influences of race or of climate, whether they be a.s.sociated with a land gladdened by cloudless azure skies, or with the vapory atmosphere of an insular region. As, therefore, richness and grace of language are unfolded from the most luxuriant p 358 depths of thought, we have been unwilling wholly to disregard the bond which so closely links together the physical world with the sphere of intellect and of the feelings by depriving this general picture of nature of those brighter lights and tints which may be borrowed from considerations, however slightly indicated, of the relations existing between races and languages.

While we maintain the unity of the human species, we at the same time repel the depressing a.s.sumption of superior and inferior races of men.*

[footnote] *The very cheerless, and, in recent times, too often discussed doctrine of the unequal rights of men to freedom, and of slavery as an inst.i.tution in conformity with nature, is unhappily found most systematically developed in Aristotle's 'Politica', i., 3, 5, 6.

There are nations more susceptible of cultivation, more highly civilized, more en.o.bled by mental cultivation than others, but none in themselves n.o.bler than others. All are in like degree designed for freedom; a freedom which, in the ruder conditions of society, belongs only to the individual, but which, in social states enjoying political inst.i.tutions, appertains as a right to the whole body of the community. "If we would indicate an idea which, throughout the whole course of history, has ever more and more widely extended its empire, or which, more than any other, testifies to the much-contested and still more decidedly misunderstood perfectibility of the whole human race, it is that of establis.h.i.+ng our common humanity -- of striving to remove the barriers which prejudice and limited views of every kind have erected among men, and to treat all mankind, without reference to religion, nation, or color, as one fraternity, one great community, fitted for the attainment of one object, the unrestrained development of the physical powers. This is the ultimate and highest aim of society, identical with the direction implanted by nature in the mind of man toward the indefinite extension of his existence. He regards the earth in all its limits, and the heavens as far as his eye can scan their bright and starry depths, as inwardly his own, given to him as the objects of his contemplation, and as a field for the development of his energies. Even the child longs to pa.s.s the hills or the seas which inclose his narrow home; yet, when his eager steps have borne him beyond those limits, he pines, like the plant, for his native soil; and it is by this touching and beautiful attribute of man -- this longing for that which is unknown, and this fond remembrance of that which is lost -- that he is spared from an exclusive attachment to the present.

p 359 Thus deeply rooted in the innermost nature of man, and even enjoined upon him by his highest tendencies, the recognition of the bond of humanity becomes one of the n.o.blest leading principles in the history of mankind."*

[footnote] *Wilhelm von Humboldt, 'Ueber die Kawi-Sprache', bd. iii., s.

426. I subjoin the following extract from this work: "The impetuous conquests of Alexander, the more politic and premeditated extension of territory made by the Romans, the wild and cruel incursions of the Mexicans, and the despotic acquisitions of the incas, have in both hemispheres contributed to put an end to the separate existence of many tribes as independent nations, and tended at the same time to establish more extended international amalgamation. Men of great and strong minds, as well as whole nations, acted under the influence of one idea, the purity of which was, however, utterly unknown to them. It was Christianity which first promulgated the truth of its exalted charity, although the seed sown yielded but a slow and scanty harvest. Before the religion of Christ manifested its form, its existence was only revealed by a faint foreshadowing presentiment.

In recent times, the idea of civilization has acquired additional intensity, and has given rise to a desire of extending more widely the relations of national intercourse and of intellectual cultivation; even selfishness begins to learn that by such a course its interests will be better served than by violent and forced isolation. Language more than any other attribute of mankind, binds together the whole human race. By its idiomatic properties it certainly seems to separate nations, but the reciprocal understanding of foreign languages connects men together on the other hand without injuring individual national characteristics."

With these words, which draw their charm from the depths of feeling, let a brother be permitted to close this general description of the natural phenomena of the universe. From the remotest nebulae and from the revolving double stars, we have descended to the minutest organisms of animal creation, whether manifested in the depths of ocean or on the surface of our globe, and to the delicate vegetable germs which clothe the naked declivity of the ice-crowned mountain summit; and here we have been able to arrange these phenomena according to partially known laws; but other laws of a more mysterious nature rule the higher spheres of the organic world, in which is comprised the human species in all its varied conformation, its creative intellectual power, and the languages to which it has given existence. A physical delineation of nature terminates at the point where the sphere of intellect begins, and a new world of mind is opened to our view. It marks the limit, but does not pa.s.s it.

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p 361

ADDITIONAL NOTES

TO THE PRESENT EDITION. MARCH, 1849.

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GIGANTIC BIRDS OF NEW ZEALAND. -- Vol. i., p. 287.

An extensive and highly interesting collection of bones, referrible to several species of the 'Moa' (Dinornis of Owen), and to three or four other genera of birds, formed by Mr. Walter Mantell, of Wellington, New Zealand, has recently arrived in England, and is now deposited in the British Museum.

This series consists of between 700 and 800 speciments, belonging to different parts of the skeletons of many individuals of various sizes and ages. Some of the largest vertebrae, tibiae, and femora equal in magnitude the most gigantic previously known, while others are not larger than the corresponding bones of the living apteryx. Among these relics are the 'skulls' and 'mandibles' of two genera, the 'Dinornis' and 'Palapteryx'; and of an extinct genus, 'Notornis', allied to the 'Rallidae'; and the mandibles of a species of 'Nestor', a genus of nocturnal owl-like parrots, of which only two living species are known.*

[footnote] *See Professor Owen's Memoir on these fossil remains, in 'Zoological Transactions', 1848.

These osseous remains are in a very different state of preservation from any previously received from New Zealand; they are light and porous, and of a light fawn-color; the most delicate processes are entire, and the articulating surfaces smooth and uninjured; 'fragments of egg-sh.e.l.ls', and even the bony rings of the trachea and air tubes, are preserved'.

The bones were dug up by Mr. Walter Mantell from a bed of marly sand, containing magnetic iron, crystals of hornblende and augite, and the detritus of augitic rocks and earthy volcanic tuff. The sand had filled up all the cavities and cancelli, but was in no instance consolidated or aggregated together; it was, therefore, easily removed by a soft brush, and the bones perfectly cleared without injury.

The spot whence these precious relics of the colossal birds that once inhabited the islands of New Zealand were obtained, is a flat tract of land, near the embouchure of a river, named Waingongoro, not far from w.a.n.ganui, which has its rise in the volcanic regions of Mount Egmont. The natives affirm that this level tract was one of the places first dwelt upon by their remote ancestors; and this tradition is corroborated by the existence of numerous heaps and pits of ashes and charred bones indicating ancient fires, long burning on the same spot. In these fire-heaps Mr. Mantell found burned bones of 'men, moas', and 'dogs'.

The fragments of egg-sh.e.l.ls, imbedded in the ossiferous deposits, had escaped the notice of all previous naturalists. They are, unfortunately, very small portions, the largest being only four inches long, but they afford a chord by which to estimate the size of the original. Mr. Mantell observes that the egg of the Moa must have been so large that a hat would form a good egg-cup for it. These relics evidently belong to two or more species, perhaps genera. In some examples the external p 362 surface is smooth; in others it is marked with short intercepted linear grooves, resembling the eggs of some of the Struthiouidae, but distinct from all known recent types. In this valuable collection only one bone of a mammal has been detected, namely, 'the femur of a dog'.

An interesting memoir on the probable geological position and age of the ornithic bone deposits of New Zealand, by Dr. Mantell, based on the observations of his enterprising son, it published in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London (1848). It appears that in many instances the bones are imbedded in sand and clay, which lie beneath a thick deposit of volcanic detritus, and rest on an argillaceous stratum abounding in marine sh.e.l.ls. The specimens found in the rivers and streams have been washed out of their banks by the currents which now flow through channels from ten to thirty feet deep, formed in the more ancient alluvial soil. Dr.

Mantell concludes that the islands of New Zealand were densely peopled at a period geologically recent, though historically remote, by tribes of gigantic brevi-pennate birds allied to the ostrich tribe, all, or almost all, of species and genera now extinct; and that, subsequently to the formation of the most ancient ornithic deposit, the sea-coast has been elevated from fifty to one hundred feet above its original level; hence the terraces of s.h.i.+ngle and loam which now skirt the maritime districts. The existing rivers and mountain torrents flow in deep gulleys which they have eroded in the course of centuries in these pleistocene strata, in like manner as the river courses of Auvergne, in Central France, are excavated in the mammiferous tertiary deposits of that country. The last of the gigantic birds were probably exterminated, like the dodo, by human agency: some small species allied to the apteryx may possibly be met with in the unexplored parts of the middle island.

THE DODO. -- A most valuable and highly interesting history of the dodo and its kindred* has recently appeared in which the history, affinities, and osteology of the 'Dodo, Solitaire', and other extinct birds of the islands Mauritius, Rodriguez, and Bourbon are admirably elucidated by H. G.

Strickland (of Oxford), and Dr. G. A. Melville.

[footnote] *'The Dodo and its Kindred'. By Messrs. Strickland and Melville. 1 vol. 4to. with numerous plates. Reeves, London, 1848.

The historical part is by the former, the osteological and physiological portion by the latter eminent anatomist. We would earnestly recommend the reader interested in the most perfect history that has ever appeared, of the extinction of a race of large animals, of which thousands existed but three centuries ago, to refer to the original work. We have only s.p.a.ce enough to state that the authors have proved, upon the most incontrovertible evidence, that the dodo was neither a vulture, ostrich, nor galline, as previously anatomists supposed, but a 'frugiverous pigeon'.

This section from pp 363-379 of:

COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 by Alexander von Humboldt

END OF VOL. I.