SECTION" n .
ON THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE SIMIJE IN RELATION TO
THAT OF SOME INFERIOR TYPES OF MEN.
( With a Map containing 54 Monkeys, and 6 human portraits.)
% The monkeys are entirely tropical. But here again we notice a very
intimate adaptation of their types to the particular continents; as the monkeys
of tropical America constitute a family altogether distinct from the
monkeys of the old world, there being not one species of any of the genera
of Quadrumana, so numerous on this continent, found either in Asia or Africa.
The monkeys of the Old World, again, constitute a natural family by themselves,
extending equally over Africa and Asia; and there is even a close
representative analogy between those of different parts of these two continents—
the orangs of Africa, the Chimpanzee and Gorilla, corresponding to
the red orang of Sumatra and Borneo, and the smaller long-armed species of
continental Asia. And what is not a little remarkable, is the fact that the
black orang occurs upon that continent which is inhabited by the black
human race, while the brown orang inhabits those parts of Asia over which
the chocolate-colored Malays have been developed.” (A g a s s iz . ) 596
I first read the above paragraph at Portland, Maine,—where
chance threw me in the way of Prof. Agassiz, within a week or two
after its publication.
Time passed" away. I was then occupied with other pursuits;
until, in March 1853, another, to myself most welcome, chance
again cast us together as fellow-travellers by car and steam-boat from
Atlanta, G-a., to 'Mobile, Ala.; — the Professor to deliver a course
of Lectures at the latter city,—myself to continue, at our®9 “ ritiro”
over that bay, those studies which resulted in the issue, one year
afterwards, of the precursory volume to the present.
Distance, and my own avocations, precluded my enjoying the
advantage of listening to more than three of those six discourses
which will, for a long time, render the Professor’s name a “ household
word” among Mobilians; but, I made it a point to attend the
last; inasmuch as Prof. Agassiz had kindly forewarned Dr. Nott
and myself, that this lecture was to be “ for you.” Pencil and notebook
in hand, I went prepared to take down some memoranda for
individual reminiscence: but,,very few minutes elapsing before, entranced,
so to say, by his easy flow of language and swiftness of
black-board demonstration, whilst uncoiling a chain of facts, in
Natural History, such as no other man can link together through an
598 Christian Examiner, Boston, July, 1850: — Types of Mankind, p. 75.
599 Capt. Howard’s — Daphne, Mobile Bay— where Mrs. Giiddon, our little boy and myself,
enjoyed for many months a most delightful residence.
equal number of English words,—what I heard became photographed
upon the leaves of memory instead of being scribbled simultaneously
upon paper; and, next day, I re-crossed the bay, . . . . to muse.
This was on the 13th April, 1853.
On the 14th idem, some gifted penman (unknown to me even by
name, although known to Dr. Nott) published “ The Lecture of
Agassiz”600 in a form, —as to mere verbal utterance condensed, but
as to accuracy of fact so extraordinary (even to a “ lecturer” blasé like
myself).—that I feel it to be no injustice to Prof. Agassiz to subjoin [ ]
a citation, just as if the “ reporter’s” phraseology had been literally
his own : —
“ My own views on this subject differ widely from those of others, who have before maintained
an original diversity of races. In my opinion not only did different races, or types
of mankind, as the five races, so called, have a distinct origin,—but each distinct nationality,
which has played an important part in history, had a separate origin. Men were created
in nations.™1 * * * If there was such a community of origin among men, why had each
region peculiar animals,—why did they not transmit the same domestic animals which they
had already subdued ? On the contrary, these animals are as distinct as the races among
whom they were found. * * * If then we compare the physical facts in respect to the
different races—giving each its proper value— if we consider that in the earliest times,
different languages were in simultaneous use—as unlike as the notes of different species of
animals; if we regard the subject of hybridity in all its bearings, allowing the dissimilarity
of species in animals in different localities its proper weight, we shall be drawn
inevitably towards the conclusion of a diversity of origin and separate centres of creation.
* * * Diversity has marks and evidence of plan and gradation among races as among
animals. We find an original physical type distinguishing the races, at the same time
showing a community from the lowest to the highest.
“ There is no such resemblance between the ape and man. Animality and humanity are
entirely distinct. While, then, there are traits of resemblance between the colored races
and these animals, they never could have arisen from apes. But we see in the races a
gradation parallel to the gradations of animals up to man. Yet the colored races, though
separated from animals entirely, in many traits resemble them more than they do the
highest types of man. The inferior races, by successive gradations, are linked to a higher
humanity. How could climatic influences produce these results? How could all physical
causes combined ? It would be to make an accident produce a logical result ; in short, an
absurdity. - viS?!,
“ In the whole world of life we find this gradation. It is not alone in the animal kingdom
as it now exists, but in the antecedent ages, as far back as the oldest fossils, we see the same
distinct order and gradation ; and we find evidence that, in those early ages, a plan was
already laid out : we find the first expression of the same thought developed in the successive
structures of all animals and plants.”
Tbe next enlargement (known to me) of this fundamental idea
occurs in Prof. Agassiz’s “ Provinces of the Animal World.”602
“ The East Indian realm is now very well known zoologically, thanks to the efforts of
English and Dutch naturalists ; and may be subdivided into three faunae, that of Dukhun,
600 Mobile Daily Tribune, April 14, 1853.
601 Types of Mankind, pp. 74, 82.
602 Op. cit., p. lxxi-ii.