Note 56 — Chapter X · SOME ANTHROPOLOGISTS REGARD MAN AS HAVING A MULTIPLE ORIGIN[47]

Job Ludolf, whose data on this subject were necessarily very incomplete and inferior to those we have now, is none the less opposed to the opinion accepted by Prichard. His remarks on the black race are striking and unanswerable, and I cannot resist the pleasure of quoting them: “It is not my purpose to speak here about the blackness of the Ethiop; most people may, if they will, attribute it to the heat of the sun and the torrid zone. Yet even within the sun’s equatorial path there are peoples who, if not white, are at least not quite black. Many who live outside either tropic are further from the Equator than the Persians or Syrians—for instance, the inhabitants of the Cape of Good Hope, who, however, are absolutely black. If you say that blackness belongs solely to Africa and the sons of Ham, you must still allow that the Malabars and the Cingalese and other even more remote peoples of Asia are equally black. If you regard the climate and soil as the reason, then why do not white men become black when they settle down in these regions? If you take refuge in ‘hidden qualities,’ you would do better to confess your ignorance at once” (Jobus Ludolfus, Commentarium ad Historiam Æthiopicam). I will add a short and conclusive passage of Mr. Pickering. He speaks of the regions inhabited by the black race in these words: “Excluding the northern and southern extremes, with the tableland of Abyssinia, it holds all the more temperate and fertile parts of the Continent.” Thus it is just where we find most of the pure negroes that it is least hot ... (Pickering, “The Races of Man and their Geographical Distribution.” The essay is to be found in the “Records of the United States’ Exploring Expedition during the Years 1838–42,” vol. ix).