"Black" need not be a racial epithet in Burton: up to the eighteenth century if someone is desribed as black or yellow, it often refers to hair colour. Not likely here, i agree, but equally black was associated with a melancholic temperament (see Nerval's El Deschidado, with his "soleil noir"): a cause of melancholy was believed to be an excess of black bile, and a "black", lowering countenance went with it.
The Anatomy is one of my favourite books; it may have got Johnson up two hours early, but in our modern, idler age, it has often kept me in bed reading it. I first came across The Anatomy in my teens, when one of the characters in a Victorian novel remarks: "Hand me the Burton's anatomy and leave me to my abominable devices.". However, I can't recall the novel: does anyone know?
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