In this melancholy picture, nature is seen warring with herselt.
A people forced to protect themselves against the severity of an excessive
climate by the consumption of a highly carbonaceous and
stimulant diet, which, sooner or later, begets plethora and its attendant
hemorrhagic tendencies, can scarcely be regarded as a normal
people, harmoniously adapted to the circumstances by which they
are surrounded. Yet such is the condition of hyperborean man.
But here a singular question presents itself. Have the Arctic tribes
of men always been subjected to the inhospitable climate which,
at the present day, characterizes the North ? Was there, in other
words, a time when they enjoyed a climate as mild as that which
surrounds their cranial analogues — the Hottentots — who roam the
plains of Kafirland in temperate Southern Africa ? To the recent
speculations of climatologists, concerning the distribution of temperature
about the pole, and the probable existence of an open Polar
Sea; to the observations of the physical geographer relative to the
gradual and progressive upheaval of the Arctic coast, and the climatic
changes which necessarily accompanied such alterations in the
relation of land and water; and, finally, to the facts and theories
adduced by the geologist to account for the presence, in very high
latitudes, of fossil remains, both animal and vegetable—whose living
representatives thrive in tropical climates only,—must we look for a
solution of the above curious question, which I introduce here merely
as one of a connected series of facts and arguments which seem to
indicate that the Eskimo are an exceedingly ancient people, whose
dawn was probably ushered in by a temperate climate, but whose
dissolution now approaches, amidst eternal ice and snow; that the
early migrations of these people , have been from the north southwards,
from the islands of the Polar Sea .to the continent and not
from the mainland to the islands; and that the present geographical
area of the Eskimo may be regarded as a primary centre of human
distribution for the entire Polar Zone.
To this subject I hope to return, in a more detailed manner, hereafter.
We are now in Europe, upon the terra damnata, so graphically
described by Linnseus, where the Laplander offers himself for our
inspection, as the only European who in any way represents the
Arctic type of cranium.
The exact position of the Lapps in classification, is still an open
question. Prof. A gassiz classifies them with the Eskimos and
Samoiedes.
“ Within the limits,’ says he, “ of this (Arctic) fanna we meet a peculiar race of men,
known in America under the name of Eskimaux, and under the names of Laplanders,
Samoiedes, and Tchuktshes in the north of Asia. This race, so well known since the
voyage of Captain Cook, and the Arctic expeditions of England and Russia, differs alike
from the Indians of North America, from the Whites of Europe, and the Mongols of Asia,
to whom they are adjacent. The uniformity of their characters along the whole range
of the Arctic seas forms one of the most, striking resemblances which these people exhibit
to the fauna with which they are so closely connected.” 120
P richard, relying: upon philological evidence — a very unsafe
guide when taken alone — maintains that the Lapps are Finns
who have acquired Mongolian features from a long residence in
Northern Europe.
.“ On considère souvent les Lapons,’’ observes D’Hailoy, “ comme appartenant à la
famille finnoise, à cause des rapports que l’on a observés entre leur langue et celle des
Finnois ; mais les caractères naturels de ces deux races sont si différents, qu’il me semble
indispensable de les séparer. D’un autre côté, tous les linguistes ne sont pas d’accord sur
l’analogie de ces langues, et il est probable que les ressemblances se réduisent à l’introduction,
dans le langage des Lapons, d’un certain nombre de mots finnois; effet qui a
ordmairement Heu quand un peuple sauvage se trouve en relation avec un peuple plus
avancé.” 1?0
L atham arranges them, along with Finns, Magyars, Tungus, &c.,
under the head of Turanian Mongolidæ.131 Dr. M orton objects to
this association of Lapps and Finns, and very appropriately inquires
“ how it happens that the people of Iceland, who are of the unmixed
Teutonic;;: race, have for six hundred years inhabited their polar
region, as far north, indeed, as ' Lapland itself, without approximating
in the smallest degree to the Mongolian type, or losing an
iota of their primitive Caucasian features ?” 132 Indeed, the fact that
the Lapps, at a remote pej-iod, lived in Sweden, and even as far
south as Denmark,133 in close juxtaposition with the Finns, is sufficient
to account for any resemblances in physical characters, which
may be detected between the two. According to Mr. Brooks, the
Laplanders and Finns “ have scarcely a single trait in common.
The general physiognomy of the one is totally unlike that of the
other ; and no one who has ever seen the two, could mistake a Finlander
for a Laplander.”134 He proceeds to state that they differ in
mental and moral characters; in the diseases to which they are
129 Sketch of the Natural Provinces of the Animal World, and their relation to the dif-
ierent Types of Man, in Types of Mankind, p. Ixi.
130 Des Races Humaines, &c., p. I l l , note. i3i Op. cit., p. 101
132 On the Origin of the Human Species, Types of Mankind, p. 322. '
Us (les Lapons) forment une. petite peuplade éparse dans la Laponie, mais il paraît
quils ont été beaucoup plus développés, car on trouve dans la Suède et dans le Danemark
oes ossements d’hommes qui se rapprochent plus des Lapons que des Scandinaves.”
XiALLOT, Op. cit., p. 111.
1« A Winter in Lapland and Sweden. By Arthur de Capell Brooks, M. A., &c Lon-
<*on, 1827, pp. 686-7.