[ 3,8i J (4.) p. 127. Monf. BufFon has indeed given an affliding pidure of human nature in his defcription of the man of America.
But fure I am there never w^as a picture more unUke the original. He grants in- deed that his ftature is the fame as that of the man of Europe. He might have ad- mitted, that the Iroquois were larger, and the Lenopi, or Delawares, taller than peo- ple in Europe generally are. But he fays their organs of generation are fmaller and weaker than thofe of Europeans. Is this a fad: ? I believe not ; at lead it is an ob- fervation I never heard before. ' They have no beard.' Had he known the pains and trouble it cofts the men to pluck out by the roots the hair that grows on their faces, he would have feen that nature had not been deficient in that refped. Every nation has it cuftoms. I have feen an In- dian beau, with a looking-giafs in his hand, examining his face for hours together, and plucking out by the roots every hair he could difcover, with a kind of tweezer made of a piece of fine brafs wire, that had been twilled round a flick, and which C 382 ] he ufed with great dexterity. ** They have no ardour for their females." It is true they do not indulge thofe excelTes, nor difcover that fondnefs which is cuftom- ary in Europe; but this is not owing to a defed in nature but to manners. Their foul is wholly bent upon war. This is what procures them glory among the men, and makes them the admiration of the women. To this they are educated from their earlieft youth. When they purfue game with ardour, when they bear the fatigues of the chafe, when they fuf- tain and fuffer patiently hunger and cold ;
it is not fo much for the fake of the game they purfue, as to convince their parents and the council of the nation that they are fit to be enrolled in the number of the warriors. The fongs of the w^omen, the dance of the warriors, the fage counfel of the chiefs, the tales of the old, the tri- umphal entry of the warriors returning with fuccefs from battle, and the refpeft paid to thofe who diftinguifli themfelves in war, and in fubduing their enemies; in (hort, every thing they fee or hear tends i: 383 ] to