Part 2

There is in the human mind a tendency to personify abstractions. These ideal types have usurped a place in the domain of facts, so that a real existence has been given to them. The monogenists had, strictly speaking, a right to do so without any violence to their principles; but the polygenists, who have followed their example, have sinned against logic. The former attribute all varieties of the human species to the numerous modifications of five _principal_ races, issued themselves from one common stock, and the same influences which, according to then, have in the origin produced fundamental races, have afterwards by an analogous process produced the _secondary_ races. All this is sufficiently clear; and such stood the question when the polygenists appeared in the arena. Their first efforts were directed to attack the doctrine in its essential foundations, and to demonstrate that by no natural causation could Whites be transformed into Negroes, or Negroes into Mongolians; they therefore proclaimed the multiplicity of human origin and the plurality of species. Be it that they have shrunk from the idea of causing too great a revolution in science, or that they thought that it would conduce sooner to the triumph of their doctrine, they retained as far as possible the number of species, and confined themselves to assume a primitive stock for each of the five races described by the Unitarians. I do not assert that all polygenists followed this course, as some proceeded in a more independent manner. Bory de Saint-Vincent, Desmoulins, P. Bérard, Morton, had the courage to break entirely with the past, and to remodel the classical divisions. They found, however, but few imitators; and many polygenists are to this day content to assign a distinct origin to each of the five principal trunks, which constitute for the monogenists the five fundamental races, but which are to us only natural groups formed by the union of races or species of the same type. They continue also very often to use the term _race_ to designate the _ensemble_ of all individuals of each group, adopting thus by a sort of transaction the language of those whose system they reject; and thus they speak of the white or Caucasian race, the yellow or Mongolian race, the black or Ethiopian race, etc., as if all these individuals of a Caucasian type resembled each other to constitute one race; as if, for instance, the brown Celts and the fair-haired Germans had descended from the same primitive stock. This contradiction has given a handle to the monogenists; for if climate and mode of life may cause a German to become a Celt, there is no reason why, under certain influences, a Celt might not become a Berber, a Berber a Foulah, a Foulah a Negro, and a Negro an Australian.

I easily comprehend how careful we ought to be to employ in Anthropology the term _species_. It can scarcely be used with certainty until science has clearly circumscribed the limits of each species of men. This moment is not come yet, and may, perhaps, never arrive, for, in the midst of constant changes produced by crossing, migrations, and conquests, and with the certainty that several races, or a great number of them, have disappeared within historical time,[15] it seems impossible to appreciate the degree of purity of certain races, to discover their origin, to know whether they are autochthonic or exotic, whether they belonged originally to this or that Fauna, and re-establish the Ethnology of our planet as it was in the beginning. To fix the number of primitive species of men, or even the number of actual species, is an insoluble problem to us, and probably to our successors. The attempts of Desmoulins et Bory de Saint Vincent have only produced imperfect sketches, which have led to contradictory classifications, where the number of arbitrary divisions is nearly equal to more natural divisions.

The term species has, in classical language, an absolute sense, implying both the idea of a special conformation and special origin, and if some races--the Australians, for instance--unite these conditions in a sufficient degree, to constitute a clearly marked species, many other pure or mixed races escape, in this respect, a rigorous appreciation. It is for these reasons that many polygenists, after having proclaimed the multiplicity of the origins of humanity, and having recognised the impossibility of determining the number and the characters of the primitive stocks, have justly avoided methodically to divide the human genus into species. Many among them, however, who thought that they were, nevertheless, bound to establish divisions, have committed the error to accept the basis of the classification of the monogenists, and, like them, to establish five chief human families, and, like them, to admit that the individuals of each family are issued from a common trunk, with this difference, that, whilst the monogenists assume that the five primary trunks have proceeded from the same stock, and have the same roots, the pentagenists (if we may use this term) assume five distinct and independent stocks. Logically speaking, it would have been requisite to term the five fundamental races of the monogenists _species_, but it is easy to perceive that, for many reasons, the term species cannot be employed here in an absolute sense. The pentagenists have felt this, and, for want of a better term, use the word _race_, which has thus been diverted from its real acceptation.

The word _race_ has thus, in the language of authors, two very different significations; one is particular and exact, the other general and misleading. Taken in the first sense, it designates individuals sufficiently resembling each other, that we may, without prejudging their origin, and without deciding whether they are the issues of one or several primitive couples, admit, if necessary, as theoretically possible, that they have descended from common parents. Such are, for instance, among the white races, the Arabs, the Basques, the Celts, the Kimris, the Germans, the Berbers, etc.; and among the black races, the Ethiopian Negroes, the Caffres, the Tasmanians, Australians, Papuans, etc.

In the second, that is to say, in a general sense, the term race designates the _ensemble_ of all such individuals who have a certain number of characters in common, and who, though differing in other characters, and divided, perhaps, in an indefinite number of natural groups or races, have to each other a greater morphological affinity than they have with the rest of mankind.

Every confusion in words exposes us to errors in the interpretation of facts, and this rather long digression in relation to the origin of a denomination, borrowed by certain polygenists from the language of monogenists, enables us to understand the denial of the existence of mixed races, and why Prichard could only oppose to this idea the doubtful and fictitious examples of the Cafusos, the Griquas, and the mop-headed Papuans.

If, indeed, it were true that there are only five races of men on the globe, and if it were capable of demonstration that either of them, in mixing with another, produced eugenesic Mulattos capable of constituting a mixed race enduring by itself, without the ulterior concurrence of the parent races, the embarrassment would not yet be at an end. After having succeeded to establish such a demonstration for two of the chief races, it would by no means necessarily result that the intercrossings of the nine other combinations are eugenesic like the first. We should then be obliged to prove (what is evidently impracticable), by ten successive examples, that the ten possible intercrossings between the five fundamental races are all equally and completely prolific. The difficulty is such, that Dr. Prichard, after much research, could only find the three instances already cited and refuted. These facts having proved inconclusive, and other facts which we shall mention presently having induced the theory that _certain_ intermixtures are imperfectly prolific, the pentagenists were led to the opinion that the possibility of a definitive intermixture of races is by no means established, and that, on the contrary, this possibility may be denied.

The pentagenists occupied themselves at first chiefly with the intermixture of the five chief races; but even from this point of view, and taking the term race in a general sense, their negation, though, it must be admitted, far from being justifiable, is still founded upon a more solid basis, and less removed from the truth than the opposed affirmation. Hence it was considered valuable _ad interim_. But the principle of non-intermixture of races being once promulgated, the confusion of terms soon became apparent. The negation which was at first applied merely to the artificial groups formed by the reunion of races of the same type was applied to natural races, and thus arose that frightful proposition, that _no mixed races can subsist in humanity_.

It is noteworthy how this excessive and exclusive theory differs from the first, which it has displaced. There is such a gap between the starting point and the conclusion, that it could never have been cleared had not the ambiguous term _race_ concealed the distance. The fact is established that affinities of organisation may exercise some influence on the results of crossing. In studying the phenomena of hybridity in quadrupeds and birds, we have already stated that homœogenesis, without being _always_ proportionate to the degree of the proximity of species, decreases _ordinarily_ in comparison with more removed animals, and that probability induces us to expect similar phenomena in the intermixture of human beings. But what have been the bases of the monogenists and of the pentagenists in forming the five ethnological groups, which constitute the five fundamental races? Why have all Caucasian races been united by them in one family, and called by them _the white_ or the Caucasian race? It has been already stated because the races with a skin more or less white possess between themselves a greater affinity than with any of the other races. In other terms, the zoological distance is less between Celts, Germans, Kimris, etc., compared with that existing between them and the Negroes, Caffres, Lapps, Australians, Malays, etc.

Supposing now that it has been demonstrated--which it has not--that the races of any group can _never_ engender a durable and permanent line by an intermixture with any of the others, can we infer from this that the races of the same group are equally incapable of producing by their intermixture mongrels indefinitely prolific? Just as little as the sterility of the union between the dog and the fox would enable us to infer the sterility between the wolf and the dog; these conclusions would be as little physiological as the former. Such as deny the fecundity of the reciprocal cross-breeds of the five chief primary races might err in some points, and be right as to others. But those who extend this by far too general negation in applying it to the intermixture of secondary races of the same group commit a more serious error. They have reasoned like the monogenists, who knowing from experience that _certain_ human races may become mixed without limitation, have affirmed that _all_ the races, without exception, are in a similar condition. There obtains thus a strange contradiction in these two schools; the one maintains resolutely that all races may intermix, and that their offspring and their descendants will be as prolific as if they were of a pure race, whilst the second as firmly sustains that no mixed race can have any other but an ephemeral existence.

Between these opposite assertions we may well ask where lies the truth? Facts must answer the question. We shall endeavour to examine a few. Some of the facts are in favour of the monogenists, others support the opinion of their adversaries, from which we shall be enabled to infer that in the _genus homo_, as in the genera of their mammalia, there are different degrees of homœogenesis, according to the races or species; that the cross-breeds of certain races are perfectly eugenesic; that others occupy a less elevated position in the series of hybridity; and finally, that there are human races the homœogenesis of which is still so obscure, that the results even of the first intermixture are still doubtful.

SECTION II.

OF EUGENESIC HYBRIDITY IN MANKIND.

If the opinion I wish to combat were not supported by authors of acknowledged talent, it might, perhaps, be superfluous to demonstrate that there exists in the human species _eugenesic hybrids_. Most of the readers of these pages must reconcile themselves to this qualification, for assuredly men of a pure race are very rare in the country they inhabit. Nothing is, in fact, more clear than that many modern nations, to commence with the French, have been formed by the intermixture of two or more races. My excellent teacher, Gerdy,[16] has devoted a long chapter, in his Physiology, to this subject, and has, after great research, arrived at the conclusion that all, or nearly all, actual races have been crossed more than once, and that the primitive types of mankind, altered and modified by so many crossings, are no longer represented upon the earth. There is here much exaggeration: for there are races who, by a peculiar geographical situation, and the prejudices of caste or religion, have remained in a state of purity; and on the other hand, as M. P. Bérard[17] remarks, it is not sufficient for the production of a mongrel race, that two groups of different races should become allied and fused. If in either of the groups there exists too great a numerical inequality, the mongrels resume, after the lapse of a few generations, nearly all the traits of the more numerous race, and are fused in it. It is for this reason that, despite of numerous crossings, many races have preserved all their characters from remote antiquity. I have already had occasion to observe that the _Fellahs_ of present Egypt are exactly like the figures represented upon the Pharaonic epoch.[18] No country has, however, been so frequently conquered as Egypt, which from Cambyses to Mehemet-Ali, for more than twenty-three centuries has been governed and oppressed by peoples of foreign races, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Turks, and Mamelukes. The Macedonian colonies, founded by Alexander and his successors, soon lost their ethnological character.[19] Southern Italy has not preserved the impress of the Norman race. It would be vain to search in Asia Minor for the descendants of the Gauls with fair hair,[20] who once established themselves in Galatia; and though the Visigoths possessed Spain for more than two centuries, and have never been expelled from it, and we may without exaggeration compute the number of the conquerors at several hundred thousand, and though their blood, mitigated by intermixture, runs to this day in the veins of an immense number of Spaniards, the latter have preserved no trace of their Germanic origin.

But when the intermixture of races is effected in nearly equal proportions, or if it be the result, not of one invasion, but of a constant and abundant immigration, the case is altogether different, and the fusion of the ethnological elements gives rise to a hybrid population, in which the number of individuals of a pure race is constantly diminishing, so that at the termination of a few centuries the representatives of the two primitive types become the exceptions. In a long Memoir “On the Ethnology of France,” which I lately read before the Anthropological Society of Paris, I have shown to what extent intermixture may modify the physiognomy of a people. Examining in the first place the records of history on hand, the origin of the populations of our departments, and appreciating as much as possible the proportion of the elements which we find in combination; determining, also, for each region the principal and the accessory stocks, I have been enabled to find in the present French nation, in the midst of the innumerable variations of stature, complexion, hair, eyes, cephalic shapes, etc., which may everywhere be expected in mixed races; I have been able to detect, I repeat, the characters of these different races, and to recognise the more or less marked and dominant impress of the Celts, Kimris, Romans, and Germans. I was even enabled, on the statistics of recruiting, to give to my inquiries, in regard to stature, a rigorous precision. I cannot in this place enter into any details: I am obliged to refer the reader to the Memoir, which is published by the Anthropological Society. In point of fact, it was merely because eminent men have for some years doubted the existence of eugenesic hybridity in mankind, that it became necessary to demonstrate so evident a proposition, that the population of France in at least nineteen-twentieths of our territory, presents in unequal degrees the characters of mixed races.

This single example might suffice; but I have no doubt that by examining in a similar manner the historical origin and the actual condition of the peoples of Northern Italy, Southern Germany, Great Britain--not to speak of the United States, where the fusion of blood is probably inexplicable--it might be demonstrated with equal certainty, that these different races have given birth, by their intermixture, to ethnological modifications still recognisable. In all these countries is the instability of anthropological characters in contrast with the fixity which is the mark of pure races; and we might say, without fear of error, that the greater part of Western Europe is inhabited by mixed races.

Moreover, the authors who have denied the existence of mixed races, have not denied that there are in Europe and elsewhere, numerous vivacious populations, formed by the intermixture of two or several distinct races. They merely asserted that mongrel breeds, whatever their origin, were necessarily inferior in reference to fecundity to individuals of pure blood, and that their direct descendants would become extinct after a few generations, unless they contracted new alliances with the mother races, or at least with one of them. If we object to this, that the mixed populations possess everywhere, as those of France and Great Britain, a vitality and fecundity which leaves nothing to be desired, they reply that this proves nothing; that the cross breeds are prolific in a collateral line, as is observed in cases of paragenesic hybridity, and they add that two cases may present themselves:

1. If among the two primitive races these obtain a very large numerical inequality, the predominant race soon absorbs the other. After two or three generations, the less numerous race counts scarcely one representative, and the cross-breeds are fused in the more numerous race. The latter thus returns to a state of original purity. The mixed race has only a transitory duration, and leaves no trace of its existence.

2. If, on the contrary, the two races, though numerically unequal, are in sufficient proportion that neither can absorb the other, both persist indefinitely beside each other upon the same soil. The hybrid race which they engender, seems also to persist indefinitely; but only in appearance, for they constantly intermarry with the pure races, while the latter marry between themselves. The mixed race gains thus, in every generation, a contingent equal to what it loses, those which represent it at present are not the descendants of those who represented the mixed race five or six generations back. It is not maintained by itself: existing only under the condition of being sustained by the races from which it is issued, and if there arrived a time when it is completely isolated from these two races, and reduced to its own forces, it would necessarily become extinct after a few generations.

I might urge some objection against the first point, for it does not seem to me to be demonstrated, that in a mixture of very unequal proportions, the less numerous race exercises _no influence_ upon the other race. I acknowledge, however, that this influence, if it exists, is sufficiently slight to be set aside.

The second point is much more serious, for if accepted without restriction, we must admit that eugenesic hybridity does not exist in mankind, and that all cross-breeds, whatever their origin, whether they are issued from nearly approaching or distant races, not merely the descendants of whites and negroes, but also of Celts and Kimris, are incapable of engendering a durable posterity. For my part, I believe that such is actually the case with certain mongrel-breeds; I believe that in the genus _Homo_, there are very unequal degrees of eugenesic hybridity; but after having recognised that eugenesic hybridity does exist between dog and wolf, hare and rabbit, goat and sheep, camel and dromedary, I am permitted to say that it also exists between certain races of men.