The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-12-11

found the people in those parts very kind, but in
their fury no less valiant"
'Without entering into the question of an origi-
nal diversity of human races" says Mr.. Palfrey,
DIT is safe to say that the superficial indications
extend the rule from the inferior sorts to the para
"gon of animals" That the native American is one
of those separate races, he offers the following
Superficial Indications"
The symmetrical Frame the cinusmon-color of
the skin, tho long, black, coarse hair, the scant
beard, the high cheek bones, the depressed and
square forehead, set upon triangular conforma
ton of the lower features, the small deep.set shin
ing, snaky eyes, the protuberant lips, the broad |
nose, the small skull with its feeble frontal devel- |
opment, &c.
Mr.. Pallrey thinks that this people held very |
low rank, relatively, among human types. Their
forms superb but not robust. Supple and agile |
rather than strong, they could perform astonishing
journeys yet "sank under continuous labor"
Their lymphatic temperament indicated the
same prepCnderance in them of "vegetatiye ma
ture'' which marked other animals ofthe same
continent. They scarcely wept or smiled
If they were continent, it only be to GOODNESS
of constitution that this due but instance
is recorded of their Offering insult to female cap
tive " and the coyness of their women repealed
approach on the part OF European visitors
For the remarkable exemption from "physi-
deal deformtics," Mr.. Palfrey's benevolent phioso
ply suggests reason altogether Independent of
popularity of race-a reason which, it rests no
authority that we know of,must be considered as de-
pending entirely on his prior views of the fitness
of things That reason is, that defOrmed child
being too burdensome to be reared, and, according
to a savage's estimate of usefulness and enjoyment,
not likely to pay for his keep, ga sort OF com
"passion' would suggest its relief from the misery
OF existence. Again, what has been heretofore mis-
taken for dignity and self respect in the Indian de-
mcanor is Susceptible of being Interpreted be.
"tokenng a mere stolid vacuity of emotion and
'phought." There have been other great mistakes
about this race.
"There has been disposition to attribute to the
red man the power of eloquent speech. Never was
| reputation cheaply earned. A few illusions
to familiar appearances in nature, and to habits OF
animals, constitute nearly all his topics for oratori
| cal illustration. Take array his common.pldces of
the mountain and the thunder, the sunset and the
waterfall, the eagle and the buffalo, the burying of
| the hatchet the smoking of the calumet and the
| lighting of the council fire, and the material
for his pomp of words is reduced within contcmpti-
| BILE dimensions. or numbers the ew
England native scarcely knew than he could
| tell Off on his fingers; his frequently recurring
rhetoric respecting the sands the beach and the
leaves in the forest was the natural shift of his
| arithmetical unskilfulness. + 81 He showed
no daring and constancy in the field, but it was
great glory to him to bear the most horrible tor
| lures without complaint or sign of anguish. His
brave endurance, however studied and scenic, or in
| whatever degree the symptom of a ruder nervous
organization, presented the bright side of his char
| acer.
"But," says Mr.. Palfrey, concluding his chapter
on the aboriginal inhabitants of New England
it remains true of the normal representative OF
this peculiar race, that his temper sullen eal-
ous passionate, intensely vindictive and ferocous
cruel. Good faith and good offices can never be
uh lv nnov lint lie
red men of New England should ever become Other
than bad neighbours certain it is that all their history
shows them to have been race singularly unsus-
ceptible of the influences OF a humane civllIZa-
ton.
The descendants of these $1,000 Engishmen of
'Epeculiar type now number, have seen, somC
seven or eight millions, whereas of the 50,O 900 Dab
original inhabitants of New England, who wer
in possession-ift their history were written by Mr.
Palfrey or anybody else, there would be loun'
scarce a man for every chapter. The grey Norwa,
rat has not more entirely supplanted the old blacl
rat, wherever the two species have come into con
tact, than the wbite-skinned Puritan has ''rubbe
ont' the red skinned heather. 1t was purely a re
suit of stirpetic rivalry. The native male was, per
haps too continent" and the female too ''coy 70
prolific race. Nor had they the means for feed
ing numerous families Their list of vegetables wa
neither long choice.
For food they raised maize or Indian corn, tn
} sqdash the pumpkin, the bean, now called seiva
, bean and a species of sun-lOwer, whose eSculen
tuberous root resemhled the artcboke in taste.
; has been asserted but without probability, tina
they had cucumber5 and waermelons. One 200
suticed for their wretched husbandry; hoe mad
of clam she'll, or Il moose shoulder blade astcnc
into a wooden handle
They were possessed OF pumpkins, but they wer
not equal to pies and OF all the forms in which ma
ture presents food to mankind. that of the pumpki
is most detestabIe and least nutritye. Amon
PfRSr Gfi tPai fer iSe 7 9s boz 81 For IL
bearing fruit That a ''vegetative lre'' should b
the result of a squash diet is not to be wondered al
and with their incapacty to continuous labor
and their preposterous hoes, we fear that the ma
tives' supply, even Of squashes, was not copous
rapid augmentation of population under sue
circumstances was clearly impossible. With tn
European people the case was different Cresci
ct mmifjpiicamiHi Injunction whose bindin
obligation was acknowledged by this pous peopl
in universal observance. "Increase' was by n
means an uncommon name, while it was the univer
sal function Of the head of the household They ha
other tools than "clam shells" and shoulder
blades" among which the most handy by far wa
the .musket BY their carts and arms" -devout
warlike, strenuous, child-begetting race that the,
were, they thrOve nightly, and the heather utterl
ceased from all their borders.
An empifcation of the Introduction and fixing o
specific traits in old race, segregated and operated
upon by circumstances, is afforded by the history
the people of New England, which might be wortl
Mr.. Darwin's attention. Our Eastern brethren arr
are, it is true not pretended to be a distinct specie
of the human family, bat had the causes which influ
enced them for the one hundred and fifty years, il
which they were pretty much left to themselves
operated for few centuries longer, there is ne
telling what might not have happened. For ex
ample, the substitution of the nasal for the voca
organs, as the medium Of speech, already partially
effected, might have gone to completion. One
quality, however, has been bred into the race and
many now be considered as distinctive and here
diary as the red color in the devon cattle, or the
long wool in the Rakewel sheep-we mean its
thrift deficiency" In Mr.. Palfrey's hint re-
specting the cause of the exemption of the Indian
race form physical deformites, he countenances
the theory of natural selection. According
to this, animal in any degree untitled
to surrounding circumstances, more especially if
competition is thereby invoked with others of more
suitable organization, speedily declines and his
race becomes extinct. A slow wolf cannot live in
a country where the game is feet enough to keep
|
sionally catch something, this chance would be
| gone, should fast wolf come into his nighbor-
hood and after a time only fast wolves would in
habit this region. This theory which we notice by
| way of suggestion, will not only account for the
speedy extirpaion of the New England savages, but
also explain the inmate tendency of the white people
at present. without exception, to take ofnumber
one. We have already recorded the results of the
thrift of the men of Massachusetts,, now exist
ing in the form of one thousand millions of pro-
perty within the borders of that small territory.
"Yet," says Mr.. Paltrey, cher soil is barren, and
she has no staple commodities of great value in the
markets of the world" 1t would require a very
peculiar texture of mind and body to flourish in
such region. The law of natural selection must
long ago have eliminated from a community thus
circumstanced every member of insufficient organi-
cation, and produced an nnmixed race, character
lied by instructive and spontaneous acquistiye-
ness.
1t might be worth while, did space permit, to
enter little deeply into this question of the
effects of upon each other, exhibited in
New England, in sharp and exterminating compet-
ton, and in the Southern States under the inlu-
ence Of harmonious relations of subordnation and
cooperation. What the Indian was, when first
brought into contact with "free white labor we
lo, zbo Mr. Dol