" This latter
statement agrees with what I remember of the Fuegian, Jemmy Button,
who blushed when he was quizzed about the care which he took
in polishing his shoes, and in otherwise adorning himself.
With respect to the Aymara Indians on the lofty plateaus
of Bolivia, Mr. Forbes says,[13] that from the colour of their
skins it is impossible that their blushes should be as clearly
visible as in the white races; still under such circumstances
as would raise a blush in us, "there can always be seen the same
expression of modesty or confusion; and even in the dark,
a rise of temperature of the skin of the face can be felt,
exactly as occurs in the European." With the Indians who
inhabit the hot, equable, and damp parts of South America,
the skin apparently does not answer to mental excitement so
readily as with the natives of the northern and southern parts
of the continent, who have long been exposed to great vicissitudes
of climate; for Humboldt quotes without a protest the sneer
of the Spaniard, "How can those be trusted, who know not how to
blush?"[14] Von Spix and Martius, in speaking of the aborigines
of Brazil, assert that they cannot properly be said to blush;
"it was only after long intercourse with the whites, and after
receiving some education, that we perceived in the Indians
a change of colour expressive of the emotions of their minds.
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