remote geographically, we can not help coming to the conclusion that these customs have either been communicated in some hitherto unexplained manner, or are the outcome of some common element of humanity, in either of which cases they tell nothing of the special relations or affinities of the races which practice them.
This subject of ethnography, or the discrimination and description of race characteristics, is perhaps the most practically important of the various branches of anthropology. Its importance to those who have to rule—and there are few of us now who are not called upon to bear our share of the responsibility of government—can scarcely be overestimated in an empire like this, the population of which is composed of examples of almost every diversity under which the human body can manifest itself. The physical characteristics of race, so strongly marked in many cases, are probably always associated with equally or more diverse characteristics of temper and intellect. In fact, even when the physical divergences are weakly shown, as in the case of the different races which contribute to make up the home portion of the empire, the mental and moral characteristics are still most strongly marked. As it behooves the wise physician not only to study the particular kind of disease under which his patient is suffering, and then to administer the approved remedies for such disease, but also to take into careful account the peculiar idiosyncrasy and inherited tendencies of the individual, which so greatly modify both the course of the disease and the action of remedies, so it is absolutely necessary for the statesman who would govern successfully, not to look upon human nature in the abstract and endeavor to apply universal rules, but to consider the special moral, intellectual, and social capabilities, wants, and aspirations of each particular race with which he has to deal. A form of government under which one race would live happily and prosperously would to another be the cause of unendurable misery. No greater mistake could be made, for instance, than to apply to the case of the Egyptian fellah the remedies which may be desirable to remove the difficulties and disadvantages under which the Birmingham artisan may labor in his struggle through life. It is not only that their education, training, and circumstances are dissimilar, but that their very mental constitution is totally distinct. And when we have to do with people still more widely removed from ourselves—African negroes, American Indians, Australian or Pacific islanders—it seems almost impossible to find any common ground of union or modus vivendi; the mere contact of the races generally ends in the extermination of one of them. If such disastrous consequences can not be altogether averted, we have it still in our power to do much to mitigate their evils.
All these questions, then, should be carefully studied by those who have any share in the government of people of races alien to themselves. A knowledge of their special characters and relations
