The First Landing on Wrangel Island | Page 5

classification found in ethnographic literature may be
traced to a tendency to see diversities where few or none exist. To the
observant man of travel who has given the matter any attention, it
seems that the most sensible classification is that of the ancient writers
who divide humanity into three races, namely, white, yellow, and black.
Cuvier adopted this division, and the best contemporary British
authority, Dr. Latham, also makes three groups, although he varies
somewhat in details from Cuvier. In accordance with the nomenclature
of Latham, the Eskimo may be spoken of as Hyperborean Mongolidæ
of essentially carnivorous and ichthyophagous habits, who have not yet
emerged from the hunting and fishing stage.
PHYSICAL PECULIARITIES.
Their physical appearance and structure having been already described
by others, it is unnecessary to mention them here, except incidentally
and by way of noting a few peculiarities that seem to have been
heretofore overlooked or slightly touched upon by other writers.
Although as a rule they are of short build, averaging about five feet
seven inches, yet occasional exceptions were met with among the
natives of Kotzebue sound, many of whom are tall and of commanding
appearance. At Cape Kruzenstern a man was seen who measured six
feet six inches in height. This divergence from the conventional

Eskimo type, as usually described in the books, may have been caused
by inter-marriage with an inland tribe of larger men from the interior of
Alaska, who come to the coast every summer for purposes of trade.
The complexion, rarely a true white, but rather that of a Chinaman,
with a healthy blush suffusing each cheek, is often of a
brownish-yellow and sometimes quite black, as I have seen in several
instances at Tapkan, Siberia. Nor is the broad and flat face and small
nose without exception. In the vicinity of East cape, the easternmost
extremity of Asia, a few Eskimo were seen having distinctive Hebrew
noses and a physiognomy of such a Jewish type as to excite the
attention and comment of the sailors composing our crew; others were
noticed having a Milesian cast of features and looked like Irishmen,
while others resembled several old mulatto men I know in Washington.
However, the Mongoloid type in these people was so pronounced that
our Japanese boys on meeting Eskimo for the first time took them for
Chinamen; on the other hand the Japs were objects of great and
constant curiosity to the Eskimo, who doubtless took them for
compatriots, a fact not to be wondered at, since there is such a
similarity in the shape of the eyes, the complexion, and hair. In regard
to the latter it may be remarked that scarcely anything on board the
Corwin excited greater wonder and merriment among the Eskimo than
the presence of several persons whom Professor Huxley would classify
in his Xanthocroic group because of their fiery red hair.
The structure and arrangement of the hair having lately been proposed
as a race characteristic upon which to base an ethnical classification, I
took pains to collect various specimens of Innuit hair, which, in
conjunction with Dr. Kidder, U.S.N., I examined microscopically and
compared with the hair of fair and blue-eyed persons, the hair of
negroes, and as a matter of curiosity with the reindeer hair and the
hair-like appendage found on the fringy extremity of the baleen plates
in the mouth of a "bowhead" whale. Some microphotographs of these
objects were made but with indifferent results.
To the man willing and anxious to make more extended research into
the matter of race characteristics, I venture to say that a northern

experience will afford him ample opportunity for supplementing Mr.
Murray's paper on the Ethnological Classification of Vermin; and he
may further observe that the Eskimo, whatever may be his religious
belief or predilection, apparently observes the prohibitions of the
Talmud in regard both to filth and getting rid of noxious entomological
specimens that infest his body and habitation.
Whatever modification the bodily structure of the Eskimo may have
undergone under the influence of physical and moral causes, when
viewed in the light of transcendental anatomy, we find that the mode,
plan, or model upon which his animal frame and organs are founded is
substantially that of other varieties of men.
Some writers go so far, in speaking of the Eskimo's correspondence,
mental and physical, to his surroundings as to mention the seal as his
correlative, which, in my opinion, is about as sensible as speaking of
the reciprocal relations of a Cincinnati man and a hog. Unlike the seal,
which is preëminently an amphibian and a swimmer, the Eskimo has no
physical capability of the latter kind, being unable to swim and having
the greatest aversion to water except for purposes of navigation. He
wins our admiration from the expert management