animals. Besides special tastes and habits, general intelligence,
courage, bad and good temper, etc., are certainly transmitted. With man
we see similar facts in almost every family; and we now know, through
the admirable labours of Mr. Galton (10. Hereditary Genius: an Inquiry
into its Laws and Consequences, 1869.), that genius which implies a
wonderfully complex combination of high faculties, tends to be
inherited; and, on the other hand, it is too certain that insanity and
deteriorated mental powers likewise run in families.
With respect to the causes of variability, we are in all cases very
ignorant; but we can see that in man as in the lower animals, they
stand in some relation to the conditions to which each species has been
exposed, during several generations. Domesticated animals vary more
than those in a state of nature; and this is apparently due to the
diversified and changing nature of the conditions to which they have
been subjected. In this respect the different races of man resemble
domesticated animals, and so do the individuals of the same race, when
inhabiting a very wide area, like that of America. We see the influence
of diversified conditions in the more civilised nations; for the
members belonging to different grades of rank, and following different
occupations, present a greater range of character than do the members
of barbarous nations. But the uniformity of savages has often been
exaggerated, and in some cases can hardly be said to exist. (11. Mr.
Bates remarks ( The Naturalist on the Amazons, 1863, vol. ii p. 159),
with respect to the Indians of the same South American tribe, no two
of them were at all similar in the shape of the head; one man had an
oval visage with fine features, and another was quite Mongolian in
breadth and prominence of cheek, spread of nostrils, and obliquity of
eyes. ) It is, nevertheless, an error to speak of man, even if we look
only to the conditions to which he has been exposed, as far more
domesticated (12. Blumenbach, Treatises on Anthropology. Eng.
translat., 1865, p. 205.) than any other animal. Some savage races,
such as the Australians, are not exposed to more diversified conditions
than are many species which have a wide range. In another and much more
important respect, man differs widely from any strictly domesticated
animal; for his breeding has never long been controlled, either by
methodical or unconscious selection. No race or body of men has been so
completely subjugated by other men, as that certain individuals should
be preserved, and thus unconsciously selected, from somehow excelling
in utility to their masters. Nor have certain male and female
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