ALBINO. The name Albinism, or Leucopathia, is applied to a remarkable peculiarity in the physical constitution of certain individuals, which consists in the skin and hair being perfectly white. The earliest accounts we have of it refer to its being observed among the negroes of West Africa by the Portuguese, who called the persons so affected Albinοes. They have also been called Leucoethiopes, i. e., white negroes. Albinism is most common and most marked in the negro and Indian races, but it occurs in all parts of the world and among all the varieties of the human race. The appearance arises from the absence of the minute particles of colouring matter which ordinarily occur in the lowest and last-deposited layers of the epidermis or outer skin, and to the presence of which the skin owes its colour. With very rare exceptions, it affects the entire body, and continues through life. The skin of the albino is of a dull milky or pearly colour, unrelieved by the slightest tint of red or brown, and is generally of rough texture. All the hair on the body is of the same dull hue, and is commonly soft and silky. Another peculiarity that invariably accompanies this whiteness of skin and hair is an affection of the eyes: the pupil is a bright red, and the iris (or white of the eye) that surrounds it is of a pale rose colour. This redness is attributable to the absence of a colouring matter, the pigmentum nigrum of the membrane of the eye, which serves to protect the retina. In consequence of this defect, the eye of an albino cannot bear a strong light. Albinism is hereditary in the same limited degree as blindness, deafness, &c. See on this Darwin’s Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication (chap. xii.), where mention is made that “two brothers married two sisters, ...