CHAPTER VII.
THE INFLUENCE OF HYBRIDITY.
We must regard hybridity in a double point of view, as being able or unable to give an indication of the real value of different human races, as compared with the acknowledged natural groups in the greater number of zoological classifications; and on the other hand, we must study hybridity, belonging, as has been asserted, to the creation of new races.
It has been said, we repeat, that all men being able to reproduce one with another, the genushomoonly constitutes one single family. That this argument should hold good, it was necessary to be proved that among animals (for thence it was that it was borrowed) two well acknowledged species, more different even than two human races, should never be prolific one with the other. Now, this is far from being the case. Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, who has treated this subject in a masterly manner in hisHistoire Naturelle Générale, acknowledges that animals belonging to two different genera can, by a union, produce a mixed breed, which, consequently he callsbigenerate hybrids.
So we will not give ourselves the trouble of contesting, as some polygenists have done, the universality of reproduction between all races of mankind; we will not ask if every degree of combination has been observed,—the union, for instance, of an Esquimaux with a Negro, an American with an Australian, a Tartar with a Bosjesman. Let us admit, what is, perhaps, hardly the truth, that all races produce one with another,—we will admit all this; and yet it will prove nothing in favour of the monogenists who have brought forward this fact, since wehenceforth know that there is no basis in this universality of reproduction for a serious argument,—since we know that two distinct species, two genera, in fact, can produce cross-breeds. This faculty of reproduction has had too much importance given to it,—it is only a function, that is to say, a physiological character quite improper for classification; the existence ofbigenerate hybridsshows this sufficiently. It is a bad characteristic, because it is not a constant one; because either the man or the animal does not bear it in him, and that a given uniformity of circumstances is necessary in order to reveal this characteristic to an observer. It is the same with animal forms, which do not countenance in any manner such an observation; it is sufficient to recall the alternating generations of the invertebrata. Where shall we place all these agamous animals? how shall we class theseproscolexandscolex, which have no sex, and which will never have one? Instead of the idea of fecundity, which is insufficient to characterise a species, we must substitute another, that of the development of the produce. If everything shows us that zoosperms, proceeding from very different animals, can equally fecundate any given ovum,—if we even admit that we have no good reason for rejecting the theory that each ovum can be impregnated by different kinds of zoosperms, it is very easy, on the contrary, to account for the fact that offspring will have no chance of life, except so far as the two parents show a sufficient identity, but which we cannot regard as fit to characterise species.
As the produce of two organisms, a descendant ought always to be considered as the result of two united halves fitted together, and combined one with the other. If the two halves are identical, the animal is like its progenitors in everything. If the two beings, who have endeavoured to unite themselves, are too dissimilar, the two forces cannot combine, and there is either no produce, or it is arrested in its development from the first moment of its embryo life. If the two forces, or the sum of the two forces, have a certain amount of common direction, they can produce a new being, but an imperfect one, and which will not have all the conditions of existence like its parents; it will not have genital power, and consequently willnot be fitted to become the founder of a series of individuals similar to itself, succeeding it through time, “naturally, regularly, and indefinitely.”246
Putting on one side the power of reproduction, we must attend solely to the union of different human races with regard to vitality of produce, and let us see what observation will teach us on this subject.
Jacquinot states, that “one can scarcely quote any cross between Australians and Europeans.” When the ancient inhabitants of Van Diemen’s Land, reduced to the number of two hundred and ten, were taken from Flinder’s Island, not only had the union of the women with the unscrupulous convicts been unable to form a distinct race, but only two adults were found who were the produce of these unions.247
“The Mulattoes,” says Nott, “are the shortest-lived of any of the branch races; when they unite amongst themselves, they are less prolific than if united to one or other of the branches.248” This assertion is especially true concerning the cross-breeds born of Negroes and inhabitants of the north of Europe. At Java, crosses between Malays and Dutch appear not to be able to reproduce beyond the third generation.249“Thehalf-casteof India,” says Warren, “comes to a premature end, generally without reproduction; and if there are any offspring, they are always wretched and miserable.”250
We must say another word about Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire’s opinion on the important question of cross-breeding in mankind. After having reproached Cuvier, and with reason, with having often, in the interest of particular views, admitted, as regards mankind, a flagrant contravention of the biological laws which his genius proclaimed for other animals,Isidore Geoffroy seems to us to have, in his turn, fallen into a contradiction of the same kind. He especially callshybridsthe crosses which occur from the cross of two different species, and he remarks, besides, that hybrids have generally tolerably decided characteristics, which are partly those of the father and partly those of the mother; so that the offspring, he adds, can resemble one more than the other, but notexclusivelyeither of them: the cross is always to be found in it. On the contrary, it is notalwaysso with the cross between two varieties of the same species; the produce has often the characteristics of both its parents, but very frequently, also, it resembles one of them exclusively.
For these beings who are the offspring of two varieties of the same species, andwho very frequently reproduce entire the type of one of their parentsto the exclusion of the other, Isidore Geoffroy reserved the name ofhomoïdes. Well, we ask him this,—in taking, as an example, the offspring of a union between a white and a black, shall we find in it the characteristics of a homoïd cross? Will it never resemble exclusively one of the two founders? Are not the characteristics of the Mulatto perfectly represented, perfectly defined, and always medium? Are not exceptions, if any can be quoted, of extreme rarity?251In the name of this consistency, ought not Isidore Geoffroy to have seen in a Mulatto something besides a homoïd mongrel, and to doubt even more that the different races of mankind constituted only varieties of the same species?
However, let us examine into hybridity so far as it may serve to produce new, or modify existing races, as Blumenbach and Flourens have admitted.252Let us only remark that these two authors, like most monogenists, in placing hybridity, as the modifying cause, in the same rank as climate or medium, commit a great error. Hybridity, even in giving it the creative power which some have desired, goes entirely into the second rank, for it supposes a pre-existing plurality. It can only act, in the end, by weakening differences, by creating a middleterm to two extremes. It cannot of itself produce variety of origin, it is the consequence of it, and we shall see that the part it takes on this matter is extremely restricted.
White253supposes a colony composed of an equal number of blacks and whites; then he tries to find out what will happen in the course of time, by supposing that a thirtieth part of them die and are born each year. He arrives, by his calculations, at the following results: in sixty-five years the number of blacks, whites, and mulattos will be equal; in ninety-one years the whites will only form one-tenth of the total population, and the blacks one-tenth; in three centuries, there would not remain one hundredth part of them, either black or white.
This proposition is true, theoretically speaking; it is practically false: it rests upon what we may call an unstable equilibrium. In the physical world we may, by care, happen to put an ellipsoid in a state of equilibrium on the extremity of its greater axis, or a cone on its apex; these are also unstable equilibria, but the least cause intervening, the smallest movement, and the balance is instantly destroyed. If we admit into White’s theory a birth which does not take place, or an unproductive union, the conclusions are overturned at once; a part of the new generation will preserve the primitive type,254and this portion will be much more considerable than White imagined. When the facts of arrest of development, quoted above, are not sufficient to prove that a mongrel breed cannot subsist by itself, can we anywhere find one? Do we find a people preserving for centuries a medium type between two other types which gave it birth? We see them nowhere,—just as little as we see a race of mules. The fact is that such a hybrid race, intermediate to two defined types, can only have a subjective and ephemeral existence.
The definition of the wordtype, both in natural history and in the particular case in which we are engaged, is rather a difficult matter, and which we canfeelmuch better than we can express it in writing. When we have seen a certain number of men belonging to one race, the mind, without anyparticular study, takes from each a number of general characteristics, and forms from them a sort of ideal being, to which it refers the real beings which it may henceforth see, and with which it identifies those who have a sufficient amount of similarity with this being.255
We have seen in the preceding chapter that, as regards historic times at least, a type invariably reproduces itself through time and space, when it does not succumb to the new climate in which it is about to live. If we admit, however, that two types may have met with a harmony of influences, a medium in which they can both live, we say that—even with all the care that may be taken to mix them—we shall always find, whatever White may say, black people and white people, if these races were black and white originally; and this by reason of laws which we think we can shape, and whose demonstration will be as positive as that of the domain of history.
LawI.—A medium type cannot exist by itself, except on the condition of being supported by the two creating types.
LawII.—When two types become united, two phenomena may arise: 1. Either one of them will absorb the other; or, 2. They may subsist simultaneously in the midst of a greater or less number of hybrids.
These two laws are only, in fact, the formula of the principles which Prichard256himself laid down long ago, and which are held also by the editor of theEthnological Journal,257by Knox,258and by William Edwards.259
By reason of these laws, we find that nowhere can a medium race either establish itself on the ruins of two creating races, or replace them, and live by itself with an independent existence, formed entirely of hybrids which propagate among themselves. In fact we have laid down a rule that conditions of development are very much restricted among hybrids, and that they can only go on decreasing in their descendants, if they are capable of producing any. The crossed race will only exist in the condition of being supported by the two creating types remaining in the midst of it. If the value of this law is only deduced from a negative fact,—that is to say, from the absence on the surface of the globe of any real hybrid race existing by itself on a certain extent of territory,—we shall find, as regards the second, a great number ofpositivefacts.
When two types unite, we said, a double phenomenon may be observed; either of these two types will absorb the other, or they may subsist simultaneously, one near the other. The first case ought to be the most frequent; but it is the least appreciable, because it does not leave sensible traces. We must endeavour to discover in history the remains of a people who formerly existed, and who have since disappeared. Thus, the colony of Nubians, taken to the banks of the Phasis by Rámases, have left no trace of their sojourn among the inhabitants of the land. It is the same with the Greek colonies of the Mediterranean coasts.260The Normans have only left, on the coasts of Labrador, their engravedstelæ;261their race has not remained. The primitive Turkish and Asiatic type has likewise disappeared from Europe. This has been attributed to the introduction of Georgian women into the seraglios, and it is, perhaps, a reason only too readily accepted. It is, indeed, very natural that the repeated introduction of Georgian and Circassian women into the hárems should deprive the descendants of the conquerors of their original characteristics; but if this were the case, the Turks of our days would, from continued unions withthe same race, have become real Georgians and Circassians themselves. It has not been so, however, because the harems are recruited in Europe as well as in Asia, and even then the fact would only be applicable to families of high position. The truth seems to be that the real Turkish blood has nearly disappeared, and has been encroached upon and replaced by the old blood of the country, either Macedonian or Thracian.
We are ignorant of the laws which govern the disappearance of one race in the sight of another. Sometimes it happens very rapidly; sometimes it does not show itself. The complex conditions which rule it enter into the great order of facts which Darwin has so ingeniously classed under the name of thestruggle for existence. They have always seemed to us to present a complete analogy with the disappearance of certain animal species before others, the steps of which disappearance history sometimes allows us to measure; so that there seems to be a curious similarity between the great fluctuations of nations and of animals upon continents. We are almost tempted to say that the invasion of the West by the Barbarians, the black rat, and the field mouse, is the triple expression of one and the same biological law. The American population retrogrades, like certain animals;262that of the Australian coasts has disappeared; and we believe that the Negroes of Africa themselves will be called, at some distant period, to give up their place in their turn.
We do not know any more about the conditions which allow two types to subsist indefinitely one near the other: must we attribute this resistance to the country, or the races which are always before them? Why, if the Normans have disappeared in America, Italy, and Asia, should they still remain in Normandy, few in number, it is true, but always the same, and perfectly described by Linnæus, when he said of the Goths in the Scandinavian peninsula, “They have smooth, fair hair, and the iris of the eye is of a bluish colour.”263Even whencross-breedings take place between more than two races,—even when these various influences are mixed together, struggled with, and assisted in a thousand ways, so that the question has become almost inextricable to the anthropologist, in the midst of the varied produce resulting from all these combinations, we are astonished to see here and there individuals who have the absolute and complete character of one of the original stock. Whilst there remains among a people a considerable amount of mixed blood, we may always expect to see some one appear who will have the pure characteristics of the race which was believed to be extinguished, and mingled for ever with the blood of others.264
The most remarkable instance which can be quoted about these crosses, and at the same time the easiest to notice, is that presented by England, where two races live side by side, mixed together, without one having absorbed the other since the time of Strabo, Tacitus, and Julius Cæsar. England, isolated from Europe, ought necessarily to be a fertile field for the anthropologist, and it will be there where the history of historic and pre-historic races will soonest be made. Eminent men work at it with ardour; and the certainty of remounting, through archæology and palæontology, to the first races which invaded England, at a time when the use of metals was unknown in the west, makes this study one of the most interesting of the present day.
Two distinct races divide Great Britain, or, at least, representatives of two races are found there; and in the midst of an immense number of intermediate individualities, the least accustomed eye will not fail to distinguish these two fundamental types, as different as two men with white skins can be. One of these races is composed of tall, strong, powerful men, with transparent skin, and blue eyes;265the other, with a more tawny complexion, has black, curling hair.266The first were formerly called Caledonians, the second Silurians, very like theIberians of the Spanish peninsula: the first, of Germanic, or northern origin; the second, of Celtic, or southern origin. Nobody denies, at the present day, that these two races are well characterised, and every day one can meet perfect specimens of them in England. We may quote certain districts where the Silurian, Iberian, or Celtic race, as tradition wills it, are dominant;267for example, in the north-west of Glamorganshire, in the outskirts of Merthyr, and in the Vale of Neath.268Mr. John Philips finds them equally abundant in the Danelag269district, between Leicester, Nottingham, and Derby, with the same characteristics, “black eyes and hair, uniform, or rather, dark complexion.”270Among these two races there are of necessity a considerable number of cross-breeds who, allying themselves among one another, or to the pure types, produce varied results, and in this manner unite the two groups by a multitude of inappreciable shades of difference.
Such is also the case in France. Edwards271has divined it almost by inspiration; and M. Périer272has powerfully added to his presumptions, by examining more attentively all ancient documents which treat on the inhabitants of Gaul. M. Broca, in theMémoirewhich inaugurated the proceedings of the Paris Anthropological Society,273has proved in the clearest possible manner, that if we draw a line passing by Cherbourg and Nice,274we shall divide France into two distinct zones as regards the appearance and height of the inhabitants. In the south-west, the ancient Celtic population is of small height, asis proved by the great number of military exemptions.275In the north-west, in the region which was always encroached upon by the fair and powerful races of the north, the result is quite the contrary. Here, then, are two distinct races: the one, formerly mistress of the west, and then pushed to the extremity of the continent; the other, leaving its forests and encroaching on the rest,—both differing as much as possible by physical aspect and by moral aptitudes, but now filling up their numbers, so to speak, by each other’s help, and working together for the glory and prosperity of their common land.
We must not, however, give a general meaning to these last words, and thus extend their meaning to all cases of ethnic cross-breeding. The two united terms must not be too dissimilar, so that the two branches may reunite as regards progress. This is essential; and if we have endeavoured to prove that the hybrids of distant races do not possess all the necessary conditions of animal life and of propagation, it would be easy to find numerous proofs in order to show that, generally, the intellectual conditions of hybrids are not much more satisfactory than their physical condition, since the two intelligent organisms which are there combined do not show a decided similarity.
Doctor Tschudi276says, in speaking of the Zambos (hybrids from aborigines and Negroes at Lima), “As men, they are greatly inferior to the pure races; and as members of society, they are the worst class of citizens:” they alone furnish four-fifths of the criminals in the prisons of Lima. Mr. E. G. Squier277has made almost the same observation about the Zambos of Nicaragua. In his part of the country, the union of Spaniards with these same Americans, seems to have only produced degenerate men, who show no capability whatsoever for perfection or improvement. In fact, it is on account of these same principles that M. de Gobineau278has set himself to prove atlength that the mixture of races necessarily conducts mankind to degradation and universal debasement. Cabanis had the same ideas on the subject.279
The supposition which Cabanis and M. de Gobineau have taken up will, doubtless, never be realised. To admit that all human races can reach a complete hybridity, would be to admit that each race is cosmopolite, which it is not. But at least it remains true, that when twovery differentraces are united, we must not hope for anything good or durable from their union. The same phenomenon happens, with the simple difference ofintensity, when two differentspeciesof animals are united. So the monogenists are astonished at such a result in man, “a result quite contrary,” says one of them,280“to what one generally expects in crossing a race.”281The astonishment of the learned man, of whom we speak, is explained easily enough by the ideas which he holds of human races, where he only sees degenerated varieties of the original type, preserved by the European in its primitive purity.
It is evident that in this monogenic hypothesis, which we shall not touch on again, the union of one of these degenerated races with the pure stock would be a sort ofhygid282consanguinity, and therefore favourable to the offspring. Here there would happen something analogous to the practice of the peasants in thecrétindistricts, who try to struggle against the scourge by seeking for marriages in the plains, in order to give purer blood to each generation. In a more general manner it is evident that if we suppose two sets of people born of the same stock, and that one of them, after various fortunes, after having undergone fatal influences, should unite itself with the other, which had remained unaltered, it is evident that theproduce of such a union ought to tend to reproduce in its purity the primitive type.283If it is not so with the union of different races of men, the reason is simply that they do not directly descend the one from the other; and from this debasement of produce there results a new proof in favour of the ideas which we are defending.
It remains for us to speak of hybridity, as applied to the propagation of a deformity or a monstrosity. We know that when we experimentally unite one of this class to the other, two individuals whose organism has equally deviated from the usual type, “nothing is more difficult than to prevent these mischances from being done away with.”284A stronger reason, then, for the same when one of these individuals alone is deformed, which happens always in a state of nature. The races which we can thus produce are a kind of experiment which exist, but which it would be illogical to deduce can exist naturally. Because we make in a laboratory oxygenated water, or mixtures of hydrogen and chlorine, must we admit that these bodies are to be found united in nature? Quite the contrary; we deduce from their instability that they do not, and cannot thus exist in a natural state.