St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1898-01-14
RECOr1ING INDIANS.


chronological science which has been
uropounded popularity Of late. The In
f1uence of environment upon the race
resident in the United States must IN
the course Of four centuries produce GER
tain marked and undeniable physical
results 1t is not generally acknowledge
ed by American anthropologists that
there is a tendency Of reversion to the
type indigenous to the soil. But foreign
students of race, with more perspective,
have offered interesting food for refec-
ton. A writer in the Chicago Times,
Herald, commenting on the assertion OF
the French authors that on this CONT
nent the American white man has varied
toward the Indian type, offers support
ing study which is curiously fascinating
possibly vastly important.
First, the familiar faces Of the Garcia
turists' creation are called in as wit
nesses. The Yankee and the southron-'
large and loose limbed-of these pictures
are types, even as the stout, full faced
John Bull is type found in another
environment. Both American favorites
Of the cartoonist have high cheek bones
and usually excellent straight noses.
These witnesses are not, of course, scien-
tifcally admissible. The faces given us
by the caricature makers are impress
aons not testimony.
Scientific, however, is the study OF
fered of the Pennsylvania Germans-a
happy, thrifty, frugal people, who have
been subjected to American conditions
for nearly two centuries, with very lit
tie intermingling with other races,
much less than the English people II
New England or in Virginia
1t is true that the pervasive and be
quilting Irish have intermarried some
what with these old Pennsylvania set
Tiers, but in the main it is q very exclu
siye, pure blooded Palatinate stock
Data have been secured relative to
large number of school children and tt
sdult males from 25 to 30 years of age,
and many copies of portraits of original
settlers. 1t appears that stature In
creases and that other important gener-
alizations may be made, tentatively OF
course. The increase of finger reach is
marked, and the head measures are i'm
portont.
"The anthropologist places consider
able value upon certain proportions Of
relations between measures, says the
student of the subject. "Thus the length
Of the head and the breadth of the head
when compared, give numerical expires
Gon, which is called the cephalic index
20 find it the length is divided into thu
breadth and the result multiplied by
100. A head half as wide as it il
long would have an index Of 30; ont
three fourths as wide as long would
have an index Of rs; one as wide as i
was long would have an index of 100
There is no race whose head is normally
80 wide as to have an index of 100 or 81
narrow as to have one of so. The highe,
the index, of course, the broader an(
sounder the head; the lower the index
Che longer and narrower the head. Ger
mans generally are notably round head
ed. Topinard gives for some people O
Lorraine the index Of 1913. The averag
index of 100 Pennsylvania Germans i
61.9, which is notably less and mar
rover The heads of our northern ant
eastern Indians are still longer and mar
rover. We cannot at present make
further comparison with profit. Wha
we have already said may prove erro
neous when we learn the actual Palati
nate type. We assume now that tn
Palatinate Germans were Of medium
stature, light haired, blue or light eyed
round headed, with finger reach O
I.043. We find that the Pennsylvani
German children are dark in hair an
eyes, that the men are probably of in
creased stature, that heads appear to b
lengthening, that arm reach appears t
be increasing. In all these respects tn
Pennsylvania German varies from tn
assumed Palatinate type and in the di
rection of the Indian. If our assumptlo
proves valid, we may claim that on
evidence shows change, which, if COZ
tinued, may form an Indian type fror
the German
All this, it must be noted, is absC
lutely distinct from any of the reason
for discussing the tendency of American
to revert to 'riginal types from the il
filtration of the red Indian blood itse
in the veins of the white race. From til
days of the old French and Indian wal
freside tales of New England interim,
ture Of that sort have been commo
enough. A recent novel has expresse
the country knowledge in New Englar
that there is an occasional "streak
from ancestry that approached Ne
England from the west as well as tn
which approached it from the east aero
the Atlantic. In the western states al
territories the great numbers of ha
breeds whose descendants find their W;
into the life of cities brings to bear
curious and unreckoned force in the
velopment of tho fiber and sinew of &
race in North America. Boston Ira
script
Just think Of it'll eleven tin
around this globe of ours" in the spl
Of so secondsl Can you imagine III
thing that moves with such reinarka