are not essential
for the main purpose, which is to show that the evolutionary explanation
is the only one that is reasonable and self-consistent. Opinions are
sometimes widely at variance regarding countless minor points, but no
anthropologist of to-day can be anything but an evolutionist, because the
main principles upon which the specialists agree fall directly into line
with those established elsewhere in zooelogy. It seems best to state these
principles without reverting to controversial matters which find their
place in the monographs of the experts. Any comprehensive account such as
that of Keane, even if it may not give the final word, will be entirely
sufficient to demonstrate how fruitful are the methods of evolution when
they are employed for the study of human races, and indeed how impossible
it is to discuss human histories without finding conclusive evidences of
their evolutionary nature.

The facts that are available indicate that the first members of our
species evolved in an equatorial continent which is now submerged, and
which occupied a position between the present continents of Asia and
Africa. From this center hordes of primitive men migrated to distant
centers where they differentiated into three primary and distinct groups.
The first of these was gradually resolved into the darker-skinned peoples
most of whom now live in the continent of Africa, although many dwell also
in the islands of the western Pacific Ocean. The second branch divided
almost immediately to produce, on the one hand, the Indians of the new
world and, on the other, the yellow-skinned inhabitants of Asia and other
places. The third branch developed as such in the neighborhood of the
Mediterranean Sea, and produced the series of so-called Caucasian peoples,
which are by far the most familiar to us and to which most of us belong.
But so early did the second branch divide that there are virtually four
main divisions of the human species that are to be examined in serial
order.

It is best to begin with our own division, because its greater familiarity
makes it easier to become acquainted with the methods and results of
anthropology, on the basis of facts that we already know. Three
subordinate types exist, located primarily in northern, central, and
southern Europe respectively, but many other races dwell elsewhere that
are assignable to one or another of these subdivisions. In northeastern
Europe we find people such as the Norwe