himself to diverse
conditions. Among the Andean tribes there are seldom over five children,
generally but one, in a family; and Bates, speaking of Brazilian
Indians, says "their fecundity is of a low degree, and it is very rare
to find a family having so many as four children."[180]

[Footnote 180: We do not infer, however, from this fact alone, that the
race is exotic, for the Negroes of Central Africa multiply very slowly.]

While it is probable that Mexico was peopled from the north, it is very
certain that the Tupi and Guarani, the long-headed hordes that occupied
eastern South America, came up from the south, moving from the Paraguay
to the banks of the Orinoco. From the Tupi nation (perhaps a branch of
the Guarani) sprung the multitudinous tribes now dwelling in the vast
valley of the Amazon. In such a country--unbroken by a mountain, uniform
in climate--we need not look for great diversity. The general characters
are these: skin of a brown color, with yellowish tinge, often nearly the
tint of mahogany; thick, straight, black hair; black, horizontal eyes;
low forehead, somewhat compensated by its breadth; beardless; of the
middle height, but thick-set; broad, muscular chest; small hands and
feet; incurious; unambitious; impassive; undemonstrative; with a dull
imagination and little superstition; with no definite idea of a Supreme
Being, few tribes having a name for God, though one for the "Demon;"
with no belief in a future state; and, excepting civility, with virtues
all negative. The semi-civilized along the Lower Amazon, called
_Tupuyos_, seem to have lost (in the language of Wallace) the good
qualities of savage life, and gained only the vices of civilization.

There are several hundred different tribes in Amazonia, each having a
different language; even the scattered members of the same tribe can not
understand each other.[181] This segregation of dialects is due in great
part to the inflexibility of Indian character, and his isolated and
narrow round of thought and life. When and where the Babel existed,
whence the many branches of the great Tupi family separated, we know
not. We only know that though different in words, these languages have
the same grammatical construction. In more than one respect the polyglot
American is antipodal to the Chinese. The language of the former is
richest in words, that of the latter the poorest. The preposition
follows the noun, and the verb ends the sentence. Ancient Tupi