The Human Race. Figuier Louis

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      4.—WOMEN OF STAVANGER, NORWAY.

      The Icelanders are of middle height and only of moderate physical power. They are honest, faithful, and hospitable, and extremely fond of their native country. Their productions are small in extent, as they understand little more than the manufacture of coarse stuff and the preparation of leather.

      We give here some types of these people.

      Fig. 3 is a wake of the peasants.

      

      The Norwegians are robust, active, of great endurance, simple, hospitable, and benevolent.

      In Norway few differences are found in the manners and customs of the different classes of society. Customs here are truly democratic, the peasant plays the chief part in the affairs of the country. The popular diet dictates its will to the government.

      5.—CITIZEN OF STAVANGER.

      M. de Saint Blaise in his work, Voyage dans les Etats Scandinaves, describes the Norwegian as a rough and moody but reliable character. One thing which struck him was the absence of sociability between the two sexes. They marry usually before attaining twenty-five years of age, when the woman devotes herself entirely to her husband and household affairs.

      When the two sexes meet at meals, they separate immediately the repast is at an end. The result of this is a too familiar manner, an absence of constraint among the men, and a neglect in the dress of the women which contrasts strongly with their natural grace.

      6.—COSTUMES OF THE TELEMARK (NORWAY).

      In figures 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8, we give types of the inhabitants of Norway.

      

      The Danes (the old Jutes or Goths) are a people proud of their race, and full of valour and stubbornness. The men are tall and strong; the women slender and active. Their hair is blond, their eyes are blue, and their complexion ruddy. The children are fresh and rosy, the old men lithesome and erect in their walk. Their voices are good and vigorous, they speak in an energetic manner. We encounter in Denmark a strange mixture of democratic and feudal customs: perpetual entails are contrasted with laws whose object is equality. The working classes have an ardent desire to possess land in their own right.

      7.—WOMEN OF CHRISTIANSUND (NORWAY).

      There are in Denmark three classes of peasantry: those who possess both house and garden, those who possess merely a house, and those who only rent apartments. The first of these furnish their board with rich plate and utensils; their wives and children go to work in the fields decorated with rings and bracelets.

      The people therefore enjoy a considerable amount of comfort. Add to this a general degree of instruction, which extends even to the peasant’s cottage, and which embraces notions of agriculture, geography, history and arithmetic. The civilization of Denmark is, therefore, very considerable, and certainly greater than that of France, England, Spain, and Italy.

      Drunkenness is rarely met with in Denmark, and marriage is considered sacred.

      The marriages of the Fionian peasants last seven days. They dance and make merry three days before and three days after that on which the marriage takes place. The ceremony is performed amid a flourish of trumpets. The bridegroom is elegantly dressed, the bride still more so; she wears, moreover, a kind of diadem in which flowers are seen mingling with gold.

      8.—BOY AND GIRL OF THE LAWERGRAND (NORWAY).

      Germans.—When wandering as nomadic tribes in the woods, that is, at the time of the Roman Empire, the ancient inhabitants of Germany much resembled their neighbours, the Gauls. They were men of large stature and vigorous frame, with white skins. Their hair, however, was usually red, while among the Gauls the ruling colour was blond. Their head was large, with a broad forehead and blue eyes. But the modern descendants of the old inhabitants of Germany have undergone many modifications, which would render it difficult at the present day, to find, in the greater portion of that country, general characteristics based upon the structure of the head, and the colour of the eyes or hair.

      The modern inhabitants of Germany, the Germans, occupy a very large portion of Germany proper and of Eastern Prussia, as well as a broad band of country to the right of the Rhine. They are found also in different parts of Hungary, Poland, Russia, and North America. The Germans of the East and South having mixed much with the peoples of Southern Europe, do not represent exclusively the Teutonic type; some of them are met with who have brown hair and black eyes.

      9, 10.—SUABIANS (STUTTGARD).

      We give in the accompanying illustrations (figs. 9 to 14) some types and costumes of the inhabitants of Germany proper (Baden, Würtemberg, Suabia and Bavaria). The national costumes of Alsace are also shown.

      We shall borrow from a work, published in 1860 under the title “Les Races Humaines et leur Part dans la Civilisation,” by Dr. Clavel, an interesting description of the customs of modern Germany:—

      “Impinging, at its south-western frontier, upon the Latin world, at its south-eastern frontier, upon the Slavonian world, and at its northern frontier, upon Scandinavia, Germany,” says Dr. Clavel, “does not admit of any very distinct definition. Throughout the whole periphery of this country there exists no identity either of customs, language, or religion. Its provinces on the frontiers of Denmark are half Scandinavian; those bordering on Russia or Turkey are half Slavonic; those which are neighbours of Italy or France are half Latin: the provinces which together represent the frontiers of Germany, form a zone more mixed and various than is possessed by the frontiers of any other nationality.

      “It is only toward the centre of the country that we find in all its purity the blond Germanic type, the feudal organization and the numerous principalities which are its consequences. It is here that we find the conditions of climate which appear to produce this race with blue eyes, red and white complexion, tall figures, and full, powerful frames.

      “Whilst the Latin, glorying in the light of heaven, enlarges his windows, builds open terraces, and clears his forests that he may plant vineyards in their stead; the German СКАЧАТЬ