Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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In Plants And In Animals, Accidental
Varieties, Formed Under Our Own Eyes, Have Become Fixed, And Have
Been Propagated;* (* For Example, The Sheep With Very Short Legs,
Called Ancon Sheep In Connecticut, And Examined By Sir Everard
Home.
This variety dates only from the year 1791.) but nothing
proves, that in the present state of human organization,
The
different races of black, yellow, copper-coloured, and white men,
when they remain unmixed, deviate considerably from their primitive
type, by the influence of climate, of food, and other external
agents.
These opinions are founded on the authority of Ulloa.* (* "The
Indians [Americans] are of a copper-colour, which by the action of
the sun and the air grows darker. I must remark, that neither heat
nor cold produces any sensible change in the colour, so that the
Indians of the Cordilleras of Peru are easily confounded with those
of the hottest plains; and those who live under the Line cannot be
distinguished, by their colour, from those who inhabit the fortieth
degree of north and south latitude." - Noticias Americanas. No
ancient author has so clearly stated the two forms of reasoning, by
which we still explain in our days the differences of colour and
features among neighbouring nations, as Tacitus. He makes a just
distinction between the influence of climate, and hereditary
dispositions; and, like a philosopher persuaded of our profound
ignorance of the origin of things, he leaves the question
undecided. "Habitus corporum varii; atque ex eo argumenta, seu
durante originis vi, seu procurrentibus in diversa terris, positio
coeli corporibus habitum dedit." - Agricola, cap 2.) That learned
writer saw the Indians of Chile, of the Andes of Peru, of the
burning coasts of Panama, and those of Louisiana, situated in the
northern temperate zone.
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