The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-04-07
Huxley ON "The FOreGath ers Of
the English People,

''Ihe Forefathers OF the EngnSh geople on
the Mainland of Europe and Asia" The Pro-
fessor illustrated his remarks by references to
a large map of the two continents, which, he
explained, he had had specially prepared for
the occasion. The hall was crowded by an
interested audience, which heartily greeted
the Professor on his entrance, and listened to
his discourse throughout in q most attentive
manner
Professor Huxley, after few Introductory
observations, said:-
The English people of the present day pre-
sent two types of physical structure, which
are extremely different in their most marked
forms, though they pass into one another by
every shade of gradation. The one type is
tall, fair-complexioned, yellow or red-haired,
and blue-eyed; the other, short, darkroom
plexioned, black-haired and black-eyed.
The two types and their intermediate grada-
tions are at present to be found side by side
in most parts of the British Islands; but there
is q marked preponderance of the fair type in
the eastern half of Britain. The languages
spoken by the English people have at the
present time no relation to these two physical
types, English speakers and Celtic speakers
belonging no less to the one type than to the
other. Nor are the two Celtic dialects,
Cymric and Gaelic, confined to people of the
one or the other physical type, as both the
types described are exhibited in their ex-
treme forms among Welshmen, Highlanders,
and Irishmen.
The earliest historical records furnished by
Caesar, Strabo, and Tacitus, of the nature of
the population of Britain take us back nine
teen hundred years, and show that, at that
time, the physical characters of the popula-
tion might be described in the same language
as at present. The people of Southeastern
England and Caledonia were certainly tall,
fair, and blue-eyed, with hair varying from
yellow to red in hue; while, in South Wales,
they had dark hair and complexions, resem-
bling the Spaniards of that day. But there
was wonderful difference in language, mas
much as all these people of Britain so far as
we know, spoke the Cymric dialect of the
Celtic tongue; while it is probable, though we
have no absolute knowledge on this point,
that in Ireland they spoke Gaelic Thus, at
the time of the Roman invasion, the outward
physical characters of the population of
these islands were much what they are now,
though the language spoken was altogether
Celtic. And there was no parity between the
distribution of the Cymric and Gaelic dialects
of the Celtic and that of the two physical
types, any more than there is now between
English and Celtic and the fair and dark
stocks. If we confine our attention to the
British Islands, therefore, we have absolutely
no means of ascribing any special physical
characters to the Celtic-speaking people.
British or Irish Celt might be tall or short,
dark or fair, round-headed or long-headed;
and the remark of Professor Max Muller that
it is as rational to speak of dolichocephalic
language as of Celtic skull is, for the Celts
of Britain, perfectly justified.
Whence was this Celtic-speaking people,
with its two contrasted dark and fair forms,
which inhabited Britain nineteen hundred
hundred years ago, derived? The position
of the British Islands is sufficient to suggest
the extreme probability that it migrated
from Europe, the eastern and the southern
faces of these islands being within easy
reach of the shores of those countries which
are now Norway, Denmark, North Germany,
Holland Belgium, and France. And the
probability suggested by the facts of geo.
graphy becomes converted into certainty by
those of etbnology and of history.
In the first place, if we turn to the existing
population of the continent of Europe and
Asia we shall at once recognize our two ply
sical types-the fair and the dark. From
Norway to Northeastern France the predomi-
nant constituents of the riverain population
OF the North Sea and of the British Channel
are tall, fair-haired, and blue-eyed. In
Northwestern France the proportion of
short and dark people increases, until, in
Southern and Southwestern France, they are
the chief constituents of the population. A
traveller who should set out from the Orkney
Islands and call at every point in the North
Sea- and who then should make land Jour-
ney from the mouth of the Elbe co that of
the Don, would find the people with whom he
met to be generally, and in many regions ex-
clusively, of the fair type. On the other
hand, if he set out from Galway and cruisea
along the western coasts of these islands,
and of France and of Spain and the north
shore of the Mediterranean, he would find as
marked predominance of the dark type. In
fact, the population of the southern and
western parts of France, of Spain, of the
Iigurian shore, and of Western and Southern
Italy, is as generally dark as that of North
Germany is fair.
There is no reason to think that climata
conditions have anything whatever to dc
with this singular distribution of the fair and
the dark types. Not only do the darl
Highlanders lie five or six degrees farther
north than the fair Black -foresters of Germany
but, to the north of all the fair inhabitants Of
Europe, in Lapland, there lives race o.
people, very different in their characters from
the dark stock of Britain, but still having
black hair, black eyes, and swarthy yellowish
complexions. Thus, having regard only tt
physical characters, the population of Europe
falls into three broad bands, which run in
rough way from west to east. In the nortl
is the zone of the black-haired, black-eyeC
Mongoloid Lapps. In the south is the zon
Of the people who resemble the dark type o
the British islands, and who have been calleC
-MeIanOchTOt; between them lies the broa
belt OF fair people, who have been terme
XGRtt0chT0G If this we're mere naturs
history question, the facts 1 have mentione
H., a. !,