The organisms while thus, in a sense, similar—of the eye, for example—in whites and negroes, is more elaborately and delicately constituted in the case of the former, and therefore it is also vastly more liable to disease, to congenital defects, to strabismus, etc., and especially short-sightedness. The negro, on the contrary, rarely suffers from these things, or even from inflammation of the eyes, so common among white people, and though, in keeping with the imitative instinct of the race, the negro “preacher” dons spectacles as well as white neck-cloth, it may be doubted if there ever was a case of near-sightedness in the typical negro. Though in extreme old age they doubtless lose the power of vision common to their youth, it is rare that negroes need spectacles at any age. The organism is supplied with a larger portion of nervous matter than in the case of the whites, and the function or sense is thus endowed with a strength and acuteness vastly greater than are the senses of the Caucasian. Travelers and others mingling among savages, Indians, negroes, etc., have observed the extraordinary power and acuteness of the external senses, and have supposed that this was a result of their savage condition, which, calling for a constant exercise of these faculties, gave them an extraordinary development. And Pritchard, carrying this theory or notion to an extreme, inferred that men were originally created negroes, for the exigencies of savage life demanded, as he supposed, a black color as well as acuteness of the senses! Doubtless the civilized negro of America ordinarily displays less strength and acuteness of sense than his wild brother of Africa, but he is born with the same faculties, and were the surrounding circumstances changed so as to call them into more active exercise, he would exhibit similar characteristics.