Appletons' Popular Science Monthly, March 1900: Vol. 56, Nov. 1899 to April, 1900Various
History
Appletons' Popular Science Monthly, March 1900: Vol. 56, Nov. 1899 to April, 1900
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
The experiments which have been intentionally or accidentally made in
transplanting organic species from the countries in which they have
been developed to others of diverse soil, climate, and inhabitants
are always of much interest to the naturalist--each of them affords
indications of some value as to the relations of species to what
we term "environment." In almost all instances we find that the
transplanted forms undergo changes in consequence of the alteration
of their circumstances. It is true that certain of our domesticated
animals, such as the horse, the dog, and most cattle, follow men from
the Arctic to the Antarctic Circle, and that sundry insect pests
appear to demand nothing of Nature save the presence of man; yet, as
a whole, the creatures we have turned to use, both plant and animal
alike, have shown themselves incapable of accommodating themselves to
conditions of temperature differing much from those in which they were
developed. With hardly an exception, species or varieties which have
been developed in the tropics perish when called on to withstand the
winter of higher latitudes. Few, indeed, do well when taken to stations
where the heat or the humidity differs greatly from that to which they
are accustomed.
The intolerance of organisms to climatal changes is nowhere more
evident than in the varieties, or species, as we would term them, of
mankind. It is a well-attested fact that none of the tropical races
has ever of its own instance colonized in the temperate zones. It
is also clear that none of the northern peoples have ever become
fully acclimated within the tropical realm. The colonies which have
been founded there by the Teutonic folk, including the English group
therein, have been lamentable failures, the pure-blooded strains dying
out in a few generations. The people of southern Europe have been a
little more successful in the equatorial regions, probably because
their blood has there to a great extent become mingled with that of
tropical origin. These general conclusions concerning the climatal
limitations of man would be unassailable were it not for the history
of the negro in North America. In his case we have the one masterful
exception to the rule, otherwise good, that creatures bred near the
equator can not endure boreal conditions.
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