TABLE X

COMPARATIVE CEREBRAL CAPACITY OF RACES


		Capacity.	Brain-Weight.
Race.	Number.	Cubic Inches.	Oz. Av.


European	299	92.3	47.12
English	21	93.1	47.50
Asiatic	124	87.1	44.44
Chinese	25	92.1	47.00
Hindoos	35	82.5	42.11
Negroes	16	86.4	44.08
Negro Tribes	69	85.2	43.47
American Indians	52	87.5	44.64
Mexicans	25	81.7	41.74
Peruvians	56	75.0	38.25
Eskimos	13	91.2	46.56
Oceanic	210	89.4	45.63
Javans	30	87.5	44.64
Australians	24	81.1	41.38

Looking for some definite results from the various data here produced, the deductions which they seem to suggest may be thus stated. While Professor Wyman justly remarks that the relative capacity of the skull, and consequently of the encephalon, is to be considered as an anatomical and not as a physiological characteristic, relative largeness of the brain is nevertheless one of the most distinguishing attributes of man. Ample cerebral development is the general accompaniment of intellectual capacity, alike in individuals and races; and microcephaly, when it passes below well-defined limits, is no longer compatible with rational intelligence; though it amply suffices for the requirements of the highest anthropomorpha. Wagner thus definitely refers the special characteristics which separate man from the irrational creation to one member of the encephalon: “The relation of the lobes of the cerebrum to intelligence may, perhaps, be expressed thus: there is a certain development of the mass of the cerebrum, especially of the convolutions, requisite in order to such a development of intelligence as divides man from other animals.”

The important data accumulated by Morton, Meigs, Davis, Tiedemann, Pruner-Bey, Broca, and others, by the process of gauging the skulls of different races, proceeds on the assumption of brain of a uniform density. But it seems by no means improbable that certain marked distinctions in races may be traceable to the very fact of a prevailing difference in the specific gravity of the brain, or of certain of its constituent portions; to the greater or less complexity of its convolutions; and to the relative characteristics of the two hemispheres. Moreover, it may be that some of those sources of difference in races may not lie wholly out of our reach, or even beyond our control. The diversity of food, for example, of the Peruvians and of the American Indian hunter tribes was little less than that which distinguishes the Eskimo from the Hindoo, or the nomad Tartar from the Chinese. The remarkable cerebral capacity characteristic of the Oceanic races is the accompaniment of well-defined peculiarities in food, climate, and other physical conditions; and Australia is even more distinct in its physical specialties than in its variety of race.

Looking then to the unwonted persistency of the Peruvian cranium within such narrow limits, so far at least as the physical characteristics of the predominant population of Peru are illustrated by means of the great Coast cemeteries; and to the striking discrepancy between the volume of brain and the intellectual activity of the race; I am led to the conclusion that, in the remarkable exceptional characteristics thus established by the study of this class of Peruvian crania, we have as marked an indication of a distinctive race-character as anything hitherto noted in anthropology.

[152]

The Descent of Man, Part I. chap. iv.

[153]

Insanity and its Treatment, by G. F. Blandford, M.D., p. 10.

[154]

Mr. Darwin’s Critics: Critiques and Addresses.

[155]

Vogt, Lectures on Man, Lecture III.

[156]

Journal of Mental Science, vol. xii. p. 23.

[157]

Philosophical Transactions, vol. clviii. p. 505.

[158]

Proceedings of the Boston Natural History Society, vol. xl.

[159]

The internal capacity of 59 oz. is given here from the Thesaurus Craniorum, p. 40, in correction of that of 50 oz. stated in the memoir in Transactions of the Dutch Society of Sciences, Haarlem, p. 21, which may be presumed to be a misprint. Dr. Davis adds, in the Thesaurus Craniorum: “An early closure of the sutures has occasioned a stunted growth of the brain, especially of its convolutions, and thus prevented the development of those structures and faculties which might have given a different direction to his lower propensities”; and he justly adds his conviction that this was a case rather for timely treatment as a dangerous idiot, than for punishment as a criminal.

[160]

Report of British Association, 1861.

[161]

Journal Anthrop. Inst., vol. iv. p. 464.

[162]

Limits of Natural Selection, as applied to Man.

[163]

Bull. de la Soc. d’Anthropologie de Paris, 1861, ii. p. 501; 1862, iii. p. 192.

[164]

Mem. Anthropol. Soc. London, vol. i. p. 65.

[165]

Crania Ægyptiaca, p. 21.

[166]

Vide “Physical Characteristics of the Ancient and Modern Celt”: Canadian Journal, vol. vii. p. 369.

[167]

Thesaurus Craniorum (Appendix), p. 347.

[168]

Archæologia Scotica, vol. ii. p. 450.

[169]

Phrenological Development of Robert Burns, by George Combe, p. 7.

[170]

The use of different standards of weights and measures, and of diverse materials for determining the capacity of the skull in different countries, greatly complicates the researches of the craniologist. Some pains have been taken here to bring the various weights and measurements to a common standard. In attempting to do so in reference to the weight of brain of Italy’s great poet, the following process was adopted: It was ascertained by experiment that 912.5 grms. of rice, well shaken down, occupied the space of 1000 grms. of water. Hence 3.1321 lbs. rice = 3.4324 water. Multiplying this by 1.04, the s.g. of brain, the result is the capacity of the skull, viz. 3.5697 lbs., or 57 oz., as given above. In this and other investigations embodied in the present paper, I was indebted to the valuable co-operation of my late friend and colleague, Professor H. H. Croft.

[171]

Dr. J. B. Davis, Supp. Thesaurus Craniorum, p. 7.

[172]

Sir H. Holland’s Recollections of Past Life, p. 254.

[173]

The Descent of Man, vol. i. p. 120. Appleton ed.

[174]

Memoirs of Anthrop. Soc. London, vol. i. p. 289. Thesaurus Craniorum, p. 49.

[175]

Grey’s Elegy.

[176]

Mem. Anthropol. Soc. London, vol. i. p. 465.