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1036 THE LEADER, [No. 445, October 2, 18...
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'THE COTTON MOVEMENT. I>? our last numbe...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Will, The English Eace Degenerate? [Seco...
as to be by no means uncommon , there being Jews even of a sandy red . Then for texture the mass have hair as fine as Indo-Europeans , some Jews liAvingas fine hair and . as richly curled as any . in the world , but on , the other , hand we find Jews with hair crisped and frizzled like the Nubian races , or even nearly woolly like the Negro races , to which the Jew approaches as nearly on the one side as he does to the Indo European on the other , for we may find among the Jews the highest , handsomest , an < i most refined Indo-European expression , or the brutality of the negro with the difference chiefly of a lighter skin . The Jew has this greaf range of for
hair , and almost of complexion , we may see a Spanish Jewess as white as any English woman in a ball room , or one as dark asaTuarick or the tribes of Northern Africa . The nose of the Jew , recognised a 3 a characteristic , is subject to the same variations which deprive the hooked nose of its monopoly of claim . The eye is not always to be found with its almond shape , nor prominent like that of the lower animals , but sometimes near the English eye . The lips , of which the upper lip is o negro modification , showing the line of inner , or mouth skin turned up and much exposed at the angle , is sometimes almost of Indo-European proportion , and the lower lip likewise , although it more The
commonly projects in analogy to the negro . ear varies from that of the negro flap to the delicacy of form of the higher races . The leg * which in some examples may be admired in the first dancer or humble ballet girl , is nevertheless to be found of the type of the negro , or the Irish Celt , with distorted shin and flat foot . These facts are in strict conformity with what is to be observed throughout the range of ethnology , in the families , in the races , and so down to the individuals . Thus in the Altaic or Ugrie races we have races as high as the Etruscans , Lydians , Iberians , Magyars , Basques ^ or Finns , arid as low as the Lapps ; and thus amongv Indo-Europeans we have those as high as English or Greeks and as low as Slavonians or Irish . What
more miserable object than the Irish apple-woman squatted in our streets , monkey-like in feature , and what less indicative of the genius of the Indo-European race than many a Spanish grandee or Portuguese fidalgo . We may not be prepared to look for these facts among the Jews , and yet we cannot help acknowledging them if we use our eyes . There is , as already said , a wide range of variation among the Jews as a highly organised race , and there are powerful influences at work . The Jews are distributed in climates greatly differinc :, so that the complexion
an , d colour of the eyes , and it cannot be doubted the colouring matter of the hair , and in fact all the colouring matters of the system which can be influencedTby light , are greatly affected . The photometric range is great between the north of Europe or America and the tropics within which Jews are now to be found . Food affects muscle and bone , and the Je \ r of England lives very differently from his poor brother of Poland or the Jew of a hot climate living on vegetable food . Although the Jews are a temperate people , there is likewise a sufficient
difference in drink to produce physical effects . The moral attributes of the Jews , although they afford many proofs of the identity of idiosyncrasy between the Jew as depicted in the Mosaic code and books and him of the present day , are , nevertheless , subjected to great ' fluctuations . How different is the JBarbary Jew , crouching at the foot of a despot , and the Jew in England , engaged as a Jewish peer , or Jewish commoner , or Jewish minister , or even as exercising the simple rights of citizenship , in influencing the destinies or the millions of India , and indeed of the world . These moral influences again will exercise a physical reaction , and the Jew in
England , the issue of the marriage of well-grown adults , brought up in a public school , and athletically exercised as Englishmen are , is a very different man from the effeminate Jew of the tropics . Haw different , too , the Jewess , leader of a Court circle or fashionable assembly in Western Europe , or even officiating as the prima donna of a crowded operahouse , and the filthy slavish hag or wench of Russia , and the veiled and captive recluse of the women ' s apartments in Barbary . The one shows the queenly grace of a free woman , the latter exhibit only the imprint of debasement . The English are none the more than the Jews a mixed race , beoause they have among them many cplours of hair , from black to red , or yellow and flaxeu . In the case of the English , there is a
o-reater range of variety of colour of the hair than among the Jews , but there is less range of variety in the texture . The latter is more uniform , and such modifications will be found throughout . In one race the eyelids will be more uniform , in others the nose may fluctuate in form , in some the hair be fixed in colour or texture , but no such extent of fluctuation or modification is to be held as diminishing the typical value of the characteristic points . The English are subjected to pliysical and moral influences like oth -r races . In thfise islands there is a variation of climate from
the myrtle-growing reg ions of the southern shores to the bleak rocks of the Shetlands , from the eastern fens to the highest inhabited hills , from the dryer climate of East England to the bedewed shores receiving the vapours of the Atlantic . These influences of climate are among the most powerful which affect the human system , though the extent of these influences no collection of observations allow us adequately to appreciate . Undoubtedly , the dweller in a fen level , or in a maremma , will have his physical apoearance greatly affected , whether reduced to the last stage of decrepitude by
ague , or marsh fever , or no : so , too , will the mountain resident be affected by the water and density of the atmosphere , even if he does hot become goitrous or a cretin . We know the extreme of influence in some cases , but we do not know the permanent and persistent influence . So , too , we see the effect of occupation in a dwarfed and dwiudled population like that of Spitalfields and Bethnai-green , among which a common-sized Englishman towers like a grenadier . The difference of food has less effect , perhaps , on the English than oil most populations , not even as much as among
the Celts in these islands , now that the English have given up rye bread , barley bread , and oatcake , of which the latter alone is still largely consumed , and eat generally wheat bread of one genenil make . The use of animal and vegetable food of the like class , and with very small consumption of fish , tends to maintain this uniformity . In drink we iiiiil-a greater variety , as we regard the several populations drinking beer , cider , and spirits . The effect . climate and soil must , however , be that which is chiefly felt by the English in this country , though how manifested is obscure .
The tall men of Yorkshire , Northumbria , and Aberdeenshire , who supply the Guards , may well give the impression that tliey ^ jpnstltute a distinct race , and it may become matter of speculation how far they will succeed in the hills and plains of India in supplying grenadiers to the Indian armies , or how far their descendants may dwindle from the ancestral standard . And yet it is possible that this latter may be no proof of degeneracy , and it is likewise possible that the short populations of southern and midland England may , in the Indian hills , run ud to six-feet men , as thev do in New England and
Australia . Before the mere fact of a declension in height can be allowed as an evidence of degeneracy , we must ascertain how far such diminution takes place in these islands , bearing in mind that England is no more the natural habitat of the English , Warings , Saxons , Jfrizians , and Jutes , who came from Jutland , than are New England , the antipodes , or the heights of the Himalayas . As the census returns show us , the' emigration of all the shires to the metropolis and great towns is something enormous , aim it has been going on from Yorkshire to the midland and to London , and from
Aberdeenshire to Edinburgh , for many generations . The question is , Do the descendants of those tall immigrants in the third and fourth generation commonly maintain the ancestral height P The answer , we opine , is that they do not ; but what there is in the soil of Yorkshire . or New England to make men tall , or in the soil of Derbyshire or London to make them short , that docs not appear . Another subject of inquiry is , Do immigrants to Yorkshire have tall offspring P and tho evidence , so fur as it goes , is , that they do . Tho Welsh Celts on the Welsh hills do
not run up , but tho Colts in tho Scotoh Highlands are many of them tall . It would appear that there must bo the concurrent operations of a climate tending to inoreaso the stature , and of a disposition of race to acquire this greater stature . There are mountains of India with Ghoorkas , Lopohas , and Bhootoas , diminutive of stature . It may be affirmed that as a' matter of course in the hills of India the English race will bo subjected to ^ modifloations and variations , to those changes wl jich may bo denominated orcolisation , but whether this will constitute a degeneracy rojnrmins to be seen . If similarity of sou and climate would
en-*™ ° ^ J-W ™ 1 qualities - of the race , then iu Nor . folk , Suffolk , and Lincolnshire we ought to find the finest populations , physically and morally repre senting the emigrants from Jutland , and possessin g the hig hest endowments , and ' ycj : no statician woul 2 dare to arrogate for the ¦ ¦ po pulation of the east of England such superiority . It may be , as we have already hinted , that , the modifications of statur e resulting from change of climate and of foo # mav in the Western Himalayan valleys , more particu ' larly result in th § physical improvement of the
immigrant . Exercise m a mountain region lie must have—this he cannot miss—and in so far he must be robust as are the hillmen of England , as are the Celts of the Welsh , Scotch , ami Irish mountains and as are the Aff g hans , the Ghoorkas , the Lepchas ' and the Bhooteas'in . question , many of whi ch latter supply labourers to our hill settlements , and , diirinothe revolt , supplied vis with recruits for our armies ! Morally , it is scarcely to be expected that the English immigrant will be exposed in 1 he Indian hits to worse influences than at home . He will ere lop *
have English and free institutions , he will have the same domestic and social enjoyments as at home , he will not carry on promiscuous intercourse with the women of the hill tribes , and he will have the proud feeling of superiority over the new English population , which sustains the career of exertion , in every quarter of the world . There is no necessity for the Englishman to degenerate ; it is not easy to sec how he can , and there is only the fancy that he will , degenerate .
1036 The Leader, [No. 445, October 2, 18...
1036 THE LEADER , [ No . 445 , October 2 , 1858
'The Cotton Movement. I>? Our Last Numbe...
' THE COTTON MOVEMENT . I >? our last number wo announced that to India the funds of the Cotton Supply Association Avill be largely applied and its exertions mainly directed , and that , upon the principles of obtaining for India improved roads , more extensive irrigation , a better land system , and free scope for English capital and enterprise . The Cotton Supply Reporter , the organ of the Association , has this week made an official announcement to the same effect in an admirable article , which touches on some of the chief points of Indian policy and Indian progress . It has for its motto " It is to British India that , for the present , we must look for an increase of our supplies of cotton . . . The two Indian requirements with which we have to deal , and with which it is in our power
to deal , are the want of roads and the want of irrigation . " Thus spoke Lor 4 Stanley at the Manchester Town Hall no longer ago than the 19 th of June , 1857 , and as by agitating , with India as a topic , Lord Stanley , on the 19 th of June , 1858 , found himself with India as the province of his administration , Lancashire means to hold him to his opinions and call upon him to carry t hem out . Lord Stanley hna told us that the want of roada , which ho has experienced , and the want of
irrigation , which he knows , are requirements with which it is in the power of a minister like himself to deal , and with them Lancashire requires him to deal , with U »» further addition , that the tenure of land i . v India may bo so fixed that its cultivator shall receive tho reward or his toil . To this call Lord Stanley promises to respond , for at tho Fishmongers' banquet ho said , of the change of government under his auspices , " I hope it may ieau to the larger introduction into that country of J-uropeaw enterpriseand thought . " /
energy , , _ _ _ m ora _ It is high time , says the Jteporter , that the managemerit of Indian affairs should bo brought under we direct control of tho House of Common * , and tnm public opinion in this country should judge mm » fluonqe tho conduct of its legislature . Wo « tf «* J » JJ " tho tlmo has arrived when English skill , ™ o ™ capital , and English energy , unfettered mid llll ^ l 0 . ,, , by the restrictions of an unwioldly corporation , ma ; ' free play upon Indian soil . _ _ .,, ireo piay upon xnuian sou . -nnlNed to roo
Tho future which tho Association hopes see .. ^ is a fair ono , as , indeed , a few years will n manifest . Lot but tho Government do its duty , nn wo shall see private enterprise * soon tnin-i ""' ft wholo face of that populous and rich couiur \ «» scone of busy industry , such as shall mini * ° r ¦ " ' to tho welfare and happiness of iln ' »' nblt , '" [ . ci supply our poople at homo with its abounding pro" ^ Our hard-headed practical Lancashire roan , cm ¦ ^ reason why , with tho » amo moanx , the vaii" } » t Ganged , tho Indus , and tho Goduvory « j »« J , bo made as productive of tho valleys of Jho J-Hj » w ^ and Missouri » whv tho'hill countries of W « Jto "" ri , ia
Lahoul should not bo occupied , as arc nov tno n Maine , of Now England , > nd of the 1 »« ° J ( , of and as tho ranges of tho Kooky MoiintaU n < Oregon will shortly bo . If Kng llalwiuii can «" J , ] l 0 do what the world has soon that they «« " » ' w , United States and Canada , no impartial oMon boUsvo they cannot do bettor In India- in van
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 2, 1858, page 20, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_02101858/page/20/
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