and all other animals of the monkey tribe are much longer and narrower than those of men, it could hardly be supposed but that some points of resemblance should exist between the ape and the African. These analogies are of much less weight than they are supposed to be; the differences between the heads of Simiæ and those of men have been already described. In Dr. Prichard says, he has "carefully examined the situation of the foramen magnum in many Negro skulls. all of them the position may be accurately described as being exactly behind the transverse line bisecting the antero-posterior diameter of the basis cranii." This is precisely the place which Professor Owen has pointed out as the general position of the occipital foramen in the human skull. In those Negro skulls which have the alveolar process very protuberant, the anterior half of the line above described is lengthened in a slight degree by this circumstance. If allowance be made for it, no difference is perceptible. "The difference," says Dr. Prichard," is in all instances extremely slight, and it is equally perceptible in heads belonging to other races of men if we examine crania which have prominent upper jaws. If a line is let fall from the summit of the head at right angles with the plane of the basis, the occipital foramen will be found situated immediately behind it, and this is precisely the same in Negro and in European heads." The projection of the muzzle, or, more correctly to speak, of the alveolar process of the upper jaw-bone, gives to the Negro skull its peculiar deformity, and to the face its ugly, monkeylooking aspect; and to the same circumstance, the difference, noticed by Camper, in the facial angle, between the head of the European and the head of the Negro, may be attributed. In the Negro, the external organ of hearing is also wide and spacious, and, as it appears, proportionately greater than in Europeans. The mastoid processes, represented in the chimpanzee by a protuberant ridge behind the auditory foramen, and which Soemmering remarks can scarcely be discovered in apes, are as fully formed in the Negro as in our own race. In the Negro, the styloid process of the temporal bone is fully and strongly marked; in the chimpanzee, orangoutang, and all apes, it is entirely wanting. Wormian or triquetral bones have been thought to be rare in the skulls of Africans, and Blumenbach even doubted their existence in the crania of any of the African races. * There is an Australian skull in the museum of Guy's Hospital, in which there are some of considerable size, and Dr. Prichard describes † a Negro's skull in his possession, having Wormian bones. He also justly remarks that the features of the Negro races are by no means widely diffused in so strongly-marked a degree as some descriptions might lead us to suspect. The Negroes of Mozambique have a considerable elevation of forehead, and an examination of several crania in the museum of Guy's Hospital, of the Negroes of this locality, will show that they display a less protuberance of jaw. The facial angle contains, according to Professor Camper's tables, 80° in the heads of Europeans; in some skulls it is much less, and in Negroes only 70°. In the Orang it has been estimated at 64°, 63°, and 60°. This error has been already pointed out; an angle of 60° is the measurement of the skulls of young apes. Professor Owen has shown the facial angle of the adult Troglodyte to be only 35°, and in the Orang, or Satyr, it is only 30°. The Peruvian cranium, described by Tiedeman, possesses so very remarkable a configuration, that some might be inclined to adopt his opinion that it belonged to an original and primitive race, were it not known that it had been produced by artificial means. We have examined several of such skulls, brought from Titicaca, in Peru, and in another place‡ have given a sketch of a skull brought from this locality, and which is now in the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. Dr. Morton§ has given several drawings of skulls, so altered by this pressure as almost to have lost the outlines of humanity. În one skull brought from Peru, the intervention of art is very manifest in the depression of a forehead naturally low. The lateral swell is not very remarkable, and the parietal protuberances are flattened; and these two peculiarities are the well-known types of the formation of the crania of these people. That the Caribs of St.Vincent flattened the heads Page 88. + Pp. 296-7. On the Animal Kingdom and Unity of our Species, by J. C. Hall, M.D. plate iv. p. 87. London, 1840. § Crania Americana, by S. Morton, M.D. Philadelphia, 1839. of their offspring is well known; and the inspection of Blumenbach's engraving of a Caribbean skull will convince any one of the great amount of deformity which may be produced. Among the Columbian tribes, the child immediately after birth is put into a cradle of a peculiar construction, and pressure is applied to the forehead and occiput After the head has been compressed for several months it exhibits the most hideous appearance: the antero-posterior diameter is the smallest, while the breadth from side to side is enormous, thus reversing the natural measurements of the cranium. In comparing the measurements of the Negro's skull with that of an European, it must be remembered that many of the skulls in our museums do not present the true characters of this race: they have been taken from unfortunate creatures kidnapped on the coast, or their enslaved offspring, and that conclusions are to be drawn from the formation of the head in the whole race, and not from the crania of particular museums. With regard to the brain Dr. Cadwell remarks, "In both the Negro and Caucasian races we have the brain, which, except in point of size, is precisely the same in the African as the European." The following are the conclusions of Dr. Tiedeman :*-1st, In size, the brain of a Negro is as large as an European. 2nd, In regard to the capacity of the cavity, the skull of the Negro in general is not smaller than that of the European and other human races; the opposite opinion is ill-founded, and altogether refuted by my researches. 3rd, In the form and structure of the wellpossessed spinal chord the Negro accords in every way with the European, and shows no difference except that arising from the different size of the body. 4th, The cerebellum of the Negro, in regard to its outward form, fissures, and lobes, is exactly similar to that of the European. 5th, The cerebrum has, for the most part, the same form as that of the European. 6th, The brain, in internal structure, is composed of the same substance. 7th, The brain of the Negro is not smaller, compared as to size, nor are the nerves thicker. 8th, The analogy of the brain of the Negro to the orangoutang is not greater than that of other races, "except it be * On the Brain of the Negro; Philosophical Trans. 1838, p. 498. in the greater symmetry of the gyri and sulci; which I very much doubt." As these features of the brain indicate the degree of intellect and faculties of the mind, we must conclude that no innate difference in the intellectual faculties can be admitted to exist between the Negro and European races. The opposite conclusion is founded on the very facts, which have been sufficient to secure the degradation of this race. "The more interior and natural the Negroes are found in Africa, they are superior in character, in arts, in habits, and in manners, and possess towns, and literature to some extent. Whatever, therefore," says Robinson, "may be their tints, their souls are still the same." It is the opinion of Dr. Prichard, also, that there is nothing whatever in the organisation of the brain of the Negro which affords a presumption of inferior endowment, of intellectual or moral faculties. This writer has also given the weight of several skulls of nearly the same size, from which it would appear that there is little constant difference.* The average weight of the brain of an European is about 44 ounces troy weight. Dupuytren's brain weighed 64 ounces: Cuvier's, 63 ounces: Abercrombie's, 63 ounces: the brain of the celebrated Dr. Chalmers only reached 53 ounces; he had a large head. Some other peculiarities might be noticed, such as the articulation of the head with the spine; the teeth are all of one length, and arranged in an uniform unbroken series. In the Simiæ, whose masticatory apparatus most nearly resembles man, the cuspidati are longer, often very much longer, than the other teeth, and there are intervals in the series of each jaw to receive the cuspidati of the other. * Table exhibiting the weight of several skulls, nearly of the same size. From the researches of Professor Tiedeman it appears that the average weight of the European brain is from 3lbs. 3oz., troy weight, to 4lbs. The lower jaw of man is distinguished by the prominence of the chin, a necessary consequence of the inferior incisors being perpendicular; by its shortness, and by the oblong convexity and obliquity of the condyles. This remarkable feature in the face of our species is found in no animal. In the orang-outang it appears as though the part were cut away. There yet remains the grand distinction between all the races of man and other animals— LANGUAGE! the miracle of human nature!! The lower animals can indeed communicate with each other by sounds and signs, but they cannot speak. The language of man is the product of art; animals derive their sounds from nature. Every human language is derived from imitation, and is intelligible only to those who either inhabit the country where it is vernacular, or have been taught it by a master or by books. Homer and Hesiod distinguished man by the title of μepoy, or voice-dividing; and Aristotle says, " Speech is made to indicate what is expedient and what is inexpedient; and, in consequence of this, what is just and what is unjust. It is therefore given to men, because it is peculiar to them that of good and evil, of just and unjust, they only, with respect to other animals, possess a sense or feeling.' The existence of language, therefore, says an American writer,* is in itself a proof of the specific character of humanity in all those among whom it is found. The distinguishing characteristics of man, and the peculiar eminence of his nature and his destiny, as these are universally felt and acknowledged by mankind, are usually defined to consist in reason aud the faculty of speech. Frederick Von Schlegel has, however, suggested that the peculiar pre-eminence of man consists in this,- that to him alone, among all other of earth's creatures, the "wORD "has been imparted and communicated. The word," he continues, "actually delivered, and really communicated, is not a mere dead faculty, but an historical reality and occurrence. In the idea of the word considered as the basis of man's dignity and peculiar destination, the word is not a mere faculty of speech, but the fertile root, whence this stately trunk of all language has sprung."+ * Unity of the Human Races, by the Rev. T. Smyth, D.D. |