lation of wives or concubines ; but while I could entertain
no doubt, from my own observation, that the present bead
of the family was a pure Arab of unmixed blood, I was also
assured, that both the males and females of the present and
former generations were all pure Arabs d>y déscen’t and
marriage ; and that a negress had never been known, either
as a wife or slave, in the histofy of the family; It iS certainly
a very marked peculiarity of the Arabs that inhabit
the valley of the Jordan, that they have flatteri features,
darker skins, and coarser hair, than any other tribes; a
peculiarity rather attributable, I conceive, to thé constant
and intense heat of that region than to any other cause.’
If all the facts and circumstances here given can be con-;
sidered as s uffi eiently verified, we have, certainly, a very
striking instance of approximation iff individuals^of one5
family to the distinctive characters of another, and of these*
being transmitted by descent.”*
The only further comment which I think* necessary to add
to this observation is the following account which was Communicated
to me by Mr. Hodgson, thelSiWed a u th o r^ tin
excellent memoir on the Berber race, which was oneof tfeèf
first publications that drew the attention of the world ^to'
that interesting subject. In the vast wilderness occupied
or wandered over by the Berber Tuaryk there are great
variation of climate and situation. The natives of particu-:
lar oases in the Great Desert are like the inhabitants of
islands in the ocean. They never move in any considerable
numbers from their native spot, nor are they visited by
many strangers. They acquire, consequently, characteristics
of physiognomy, through the agency of external
conditions, the effect of which accumulates- !!]rough many
generations. In one of these oases, namely, that of Wa-
dreag, Mr. Hodgson discovered that the people, though
Berbers by the evidence of their language which they speak
with purity and correctness, were not only black, as many of
* Thi s relationAs given by.Mr. Buckingham in the Narrative of his Travels
among the Arab tribes of Syria and Palestine. I extract the passage in the
text from the Right Reverend Dr. Wiseman’s admirable Lecture on the Connexion
between Science and Revealed Religion.
the genuine Arabs of the country are known to be,* but have
features approaching those of Negroes, and hair like that
which is characteristic of the Negro race. It was the opinion
of Mr; Hodgson that these characteristics had been
acquired, not as the result of intermixture of races, which
the circumstances of the tribe seemed to him to preclude,
but through the long continued agency of physical causes
upon a tribe, of genuine Tuaryk origin, though the ordinary
type of that race is almost similar to the Arabian.
* Rozet, Voy. dans la Régence . d’Alger.-^-See Physical Researches, voi. 2,
p. 259.
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