Its primary meaning is: 1. Sunburnt; 2. swarthy; 3. dark; 4. black--and its most _unusual_ meaning. Having now disposed of these _fancies_, for they are nothing better, of the effects of Ham's name, and Noah's curse, in making him a negro; and having examined them, for the purpose of allowing on what flimsy grounds this mightiest of structures of air-built theories rests, and for _this_ purpose _only_, as what we have said about them is not connected with, nor germain to the way we intend to pursue, in investigating the questions forming the caption to this paper. But having now disposed of them, we take up our own subject. The reader will bear in mind the description we have given respectively of the white and black races. The first question to which we now invite attention is: Do the characteristics which we have given of the white race, belong equally, to all three of the sons of Noah--Shem, Ham and Japheth, and their descendants? If they do, then the black race, belong to, and have since the flood at least, belonged to another and totally different race of _men_. Now to our question: Do the characteristics, which we have given of the white race, belong equally to the three sons of Noah and their descendants alike? We will begin with Noah himself first. The Bible says of Noah, that he was perfect in his generation. We will not stop to criticise the Hebrew translated "generation," for any English scholar on reading the verse in which it occurs, will see at once, that to make sense, it should have been _genealogy_. Then Noah was perfect in his genealogy--he was a preacher of righteousness--he was the husband of one wife, who was also perfect in her genealogy; by this one wife, he had three sons, all born about one hundred years before the flood, and all three of them married, before the flood, to women who were perfect also in their genealogies. Ordinarily speaking, this little statement of facts, undenied by all, and undeniable, would settle at least _this_ question, that whatever the color of _one might_ be, the others would be the same color--if one were black, all would be black--if one were white, all would be white. Out of this arises the question, what was the color of these three brothers--were they and their descendants black or white?