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Show 354 SEXUAL SELECTION: MAN. PART II. and if so each race would possess its own innate ide~l ~s tandard ' of beauty. It has been argue d 69 that ughness consists in an approach to the structure of the lower am.m als an d t b1' s no do u bt 1· s true with tho more civilised nati~ns, iu which intellect is highly app~·eciated; but a nose twice as prominent, or er,es tw1co as large as usual, would not be an approach m structure to any of the lower animals, and yet would be utterly hideous. Tho men of each race prefer what tbev arc accustomed to behold ; they cannot endl~re any great chango; but they li~{e variety, and admuo each characteristic point earned to a moder~te extrome. 7o Men accustomed to a nearly oval face, to straight and regular features, and to bright colours, admire, as we Europeans know, these points when strongly developed. On ~he o~her hand, men accustomed to a broad face, w1th lugh cheek-bones, a .depressed nose, and a black skin, admire those po~nts strongly developed. No doubt characters of all kmds may easily be too much developed for beauty. Hen~o a perfect beauty, which imp~ie~ many characters m~d1~Ll in a particular manner, w1ll m every race b~ a p10d1bY· As the great anatomist Bichat long ago smd, 1f every one were cast in the same mould, there would be no such tbinO' as beauty. If all our women were to become as bea;tiful as the Venus de Medici, we should for a time be charmed; but we should soon wish for variety ? and as soon as we had obtained variety, we should w1sh to sec certain characters in our women a little exaggerated beyond the then existing common standard. GD Scban.ft'hauson 'Archiv flir Anthropolngio,' 1866, s. 164. 10 Mr. Bain has ~olloctod ('Mental and Moral Science,' 1868, p. 304- 314) about a dozen more or lcs~ different thc~rics of the idea of Lcauty; but none are quite tho same w1th that hero gtvon. •CIIAl'. XIX. SEXUAl, SELEC'r!ON : MAN. 355 CHAPTER XX. SECONDARY SEXUAL Cu.A.RACTEt:S OF MAN-oontinuecl. On the effects of the continued selection of women according to a different standard of beauty in each rfl.cc- On the causes which interfere with sexual selection in civilised and savage nations -Conditions favourable to sexual selection during primo\'al times- On the manner of action of sexual selection with mankind- On the women in savaae tribes l1avina some power to choose their husbands- Absen~e of hair on the body, and ·development of the beard- Colour of tho skin- Summary. vVE have seen in the last chapter that \Yith all barbarous races ornaments, dross, and external appearance are highly valued; and that tho men judge of the beauty of their women by widely different standards. vVe must next inquire whether this preference and the ·Consequent selection during many generations of those women, which appear to the men of each race the most attractive, bas altered the character either of the .females alone or of both sexes. With mammals the ,general rule appea-rs to be that characters of all kinds sro inherited equally by the males and females · we might therefore expect that with mankind any 'cba: racters gained through sexual selection by the females would commonly Lo transferred to the offspring of both sexes. If any change has thus heen effected it is almost certain that the different races will have been differ. ently modified, as each has its own standard of beauty. With mankind, especially with savages, many causes jnterfere with the action of sexual selection as far as the bodily frame is concerned. Civilised men are largely 2 A 2 |