5. The description which ancient writers give us of the Huns, evidently proves that they belonged to the Mongolian variety. Their original scat was an exten sive tract of country, immediately on the north side of the great wall of China. About one hundred years after Christ, they emigrated in two great divisions, one of which settled in the fruitful plains of Sogdiana, on the eastern side of the Caspian. This division obtained the name of the white Huns, from the change in their com plexions. This change Gibbon is disposed to attribute to the mildness of the climate in which they took up their abode ; but as their emigration was from a colder to a comparatively warm climate, the change in their complexion and features must be ascribed rather to their intermixture with the inhabitants of the country in which they settled, probably with the Greeks of Sog diana.• 6. Colonel Symes, in his embassy to Ava, landed on the Andaman Islands. The natives he describes as " a degenerate race of Negroes, with woolly hair, flat noses, and thick lips ; their eyes are small and red, and their skins of a deep soot black." From this description it is evident that they resemble the natives of the interior parts of the Philippine islands ; and we should have no ticed the fact under a former head, had there not been proof of their unchanged complexion and features for nine centuries. The Mahommedan travellers of the ninth century, whose account has been published by Renaudot, describe the inhabitants of Andaman exactly as Colonel Symes does ; " their complexion is black, their hair frizzled :" so that they not only differ radically from the inhabitants of the adjacent islands of Nicobar and the continent, but have undergone no alteration in this long period of time. (Symes' Embassy to Ava, p. 7. 4to. edit. Asiatic Researches, iv. 385. Renaudot, p. 4.) 7. That singular race of people, the Gipseys, made their appearance in Hungary and Bohemia, according to Grcllman, about the year 1417 ; and reached as far west as England, about a century afterwards. This author is of opinion that they came originally from the East Indies. Wherever they arc found in Europe, they ex lubathe same complexion, and colour of eyes and hair ; i nor, in the course of four centuries, do they appear to i have lost, in the smallest degree, their original and pri mitive colour. (Grellman, (list. Vey-such weber die Liegenner.) The same remark may be applied to the Jews ; wherever they have preserved themselves unmix ed, they exhibit a striking uniformity of complexion and features, in all the various countries of Asia, Africa, and Europe, in which they are found.
8. Foster remarks, that " the Dutch who have been settled at the Cape of Good Hope, during an uninter rupted course of 120 years, have constantly remained fair, and similar to Europeans in every respect. though many of the Boors live almost in the same manner as their neighbours the Hottentots." (Foster's Observa tions, p. 271, 272.) And Chapman, in a narrative of a voyage to Cochinchina, informs us, that the aborigines of this country are called .Nags, and inhabit the chain which separates it from Cambodia. They resemble the Caffres in features and complexion, whereas the present possessors, who came in the 15th century, retain the complexion and features of the Chinese, from whom they are sprung. (Asiatic .Innual Register for 1801.) In the West Indies and America, Europeans and Ne groes were introduced nearly about the same time ; but they each retain their radical and permanent characteris tics of features and complexion.
9. Pinkerton, in his Dissertation on the Goths and Scythians, has proved, that the original inhabitants of Europe were Celts ; that the Goths, coming from Asia.
pressed there towards the west ; and that the Slavi suc ceeded the Goths, and occupied the eastern parts of this quarter of the world. Each of these races was distin guished by peculiarity of features, complexion, and co lour of eyes and hair, which they still retain in a greater degree than might have been expected, considering their intermixture : the colorati vultus4 and toll crincs of the Celts, are much more common among their descendants, the Welsh, and the native Irish, than among the or Slavonic tribes. The characteristics of the Gothic. race are frequently and strongly marked by the ancient historians ; to the Germans, the epithets of coi:lea lumina, and Flava eecsaries, are applied by Juvenal, (xiii. 164.) and carulei oculi, and rutila coma, by Tacitus ; (German, iv.) and Manilius speaks offara Germania, (Astro!). lib. iv.) The Gauls, most of whom were a Gothic race, have applied to them, by Livy, the epithet rutilat.e come, (xxxviii. 16.) Virgil also describes their yellow hair, aurea cesaries, 659.) and fair complexion, lactca colla, (lb. 660.) and, in the time of Ammianus Marcel linus, they were distinguished by the same character istics, candidi pent Galli aunt omnes et milli, (lib. xvi. § I. See also Diod. Siculus, lib. v. Edit. Stephan, p. 212. and Strabo, lib. vii. p. 290, Edit. Caus.) The inhabitants of South Britain are described by Strabo as resembling the Gauls in complexion and eyes, but with hair less yellow ; and the passage of Tacitus is well known, in which he infers the German origin of the Caledonians, on account of their rutilre come. (Strabo, lib. iv. p. 194 Tacit. .dfric § 1 1 ) The characteristic complexion, hair, and eyes, of the Goths, are still very evident in the Norwegians, Danes, and Icelanders, who have inter mingled least with other tribes4 Forster is of opinion, that the blue eyes and red hair of the Gothic nations of Europe, are to be ascribed to the circumstances of their being " the most early inhabitants of the north, and therefore of their hal ing had more time to become gradually fairer than the greater part of their ticighbour ing European tribes ;" (Forster, 273.) but this remark is not well founded ; we have seen that blue eyes and red hair were characteristic of the Gauls, Gem mans, and Britons, in the time of the Romans ; and they were also characteristic of other Gothic tribes in much more southern latitudes. About 270 years before Christ, a tribe of German Gauls founded the kingdom of Galatia in Asia Minor, and it is this tribe to whom Livy, in the passage already quoted, applies the epithet rutdate come. The description of the .flani, given by Ammianus Mar cellinus, is a still more decisive proof that the fair com plexion and flaxen hair of the Gotns, are not attributa ble to the influence of a northern climate, but distin guished them in their natil e southern country. The Alan) inhabited the plains between the Volga and the ; and Ammianus Marcellinus says, they were almost all tall and fair, with hair inclining to yellow ; Gibbon, indeed, ascribes the fairness of their complexion and hair to the mixture of Sarmatic and German blood ; but we have the express testimony of Ammianus, Nico phorus Gregoras, and Xiphilin, that the and the Alani were the saute people, and the Massagetx were undoubtedly a pure Gothic tribe.* The Slavi, who came last into Europe, were distin guished by a brownish complexion, dark eyes, black or brown hair, and, in general, red bushy beards ; and these marks they retain in the different climates of Poland, Bohemia, Russia, and Dalmatia.