OCR Text |
Show 322 SEXUAL SELECTION: MAN. PAnT If. puans of the Malay archipelago, who are nearly as black 11 d 1 d bear·ds 16 ns negroes, possc~s we - eve ope ... · I. n tho Pacific Ocean tho inhabitants of the FlJl arclnp.elago have largo bushy beards, whilst those of the not-d1star.t archipelao·ocs of TonO'a and Samon. are beardless; bnt these mm~ belong to distinct races. In the Ellice group nJl the inhabitants belong to tho s:1me raco; yet on one island alone, namely Nunemaya, "~he men havO' splendid beards;" whilst on t~e oth~~· 1sl~nds ".th,;~ "have, as a rule, a dozen stragglmg bans for a bemd. Throughout the great American continent the ~on may be said to be bcanllcss; but in almost all the tnbes a few short hairs are apt to appear on the face, cspcciall y during old age. vVit h the tribes of North Amcnca, Catlin estimates that eighteen out of twenty men arc completely destitute by nature of a beard; but occasionally there may be seen a man, who has ncglecte~l to pluck out the hairs at pnbelity, with a soft beard an 1.1:~h o1· two in length. The Guaranys of Paraguay dtflc't· from aU the surrounding tribes in having a small beard,. ancl crcn some hair on tho body, but no whiskcrs.18 I am informed by Mr. D. Forbes, who particularly attended to this subject, that the Ay~aras and ~uichuas of ~be Cordillera are remarkably han-less, yet m old age a few straggling hairs occasionally appear 0~1 the cl~in. ThO' men of these t\YO tribes have very httlc hmr on the various parts of the body where hair grows abundantly pure negroes 11nd their crossed ofl'spring seem to have bodies almost n.s ]miry o.s those of Europo11ns. 10 Wallace, ' 'l'he Mo.l11y Arch.' vol. ii. 1869, p. 178. . ,. 11 Dr. J. Barnard Davis on Oceanic H11cei!, in' Anthropolog. Hcv10w, April, 1870, p. 185, 191. , . .. IB Co.tliu • North American Indio.ns, 3rd cdtt. 1842, vol. H. p. 22! .. On tho Gu~ranyi!, seoAzarn, 'Voyo.ges do.ns !'Amerique 1\'lcrid.' tom. 11 .. 1809, p. 58; also Hcngger, • Siiugetiliero von Pamgu11y,' s. 3. CI!AP.X:!X. LAW OF· DATTLE. 323 in Europeans, and the \\'Omen have none on the corresponding parts. Tho hair on the head, however, attains an extraordinary length in Loth sexes, often reaching almo -t to the ground; and this is likewise tho case with ~orne of the N. Ameriean tribes. In the amount of hair, and in the general shape of the body, the sexes of the American aborigines do not differ from each other so much as with most other races of mankind.19 This fact is analagous with what occurs with some allied monkeys; thus the sexes of the chimpanzee arc not as different a~ those of the gorilla or orang.20 In the previous chapters we have seen that with mammals, birds, fishes, insects, &c., many characters, which there is every reason to believe were primarily gained through sexual selection by one sex alone, have been transferred to both sexes. As this samo form of transmission has apparently prevailed to a largo extent with mankind, it will save much useless repetition it' ·we consider the characters peculiar to the male sex together with certain other c.haractors common to both sexes. Law of Battle.-With barbarous nations, for instance with the Australians, tho women are the constant cause of war both between the individuals of the same tribe and between distinct tribes. So no doubt it was in ancient times ; " nam fuit ante Relcna.m mulier teter" rima belli causa." With the North American Indians the contest is reduced to a system. 'That excellent ou~ 10 Prof. and Mrs. Agassiz (' Joumcy in Brazil,' p. 530) remark that the sexes of tho American Indio.ns differ less ihan those Qf the negroes and of tho higher mees. Sec also Rengger, ibid. p. 3, on tho Guaranys. 20 Hiitimeyer, 'Die Grcnzcn uer 'l'hierwelt; einc Bctrachtung zu Darwin's Lchre,' 18G8, s. 54. y 2 |