26 CRANIA BRITANNICA. [CHAP. II.
familiar to us by tlieir middling statme, their robust form inclining to obesity, their fair, florid
complexion, and their light hair. The head is large and spheroidal, the forehead broad and
arched, the face romid, the eyes blue, and the neck rather short. The moral character of the
Germans is marked by decided personal cotwage, great endurance of fatigue, flxmncss and
perseverance, and a strong attachment to their families and their liative land. Intellectually
they are conspicuous for industry and success in the acquisition of knowledge : with a singular
blending of taciturnity and enthusiasm, they rival all modern nations in music, poetry, and the
drama ; nor are they less conspicuous for their critical attainments in language, and the exact
sciences*." Vimont, after expressing an opinion of the great capacity of the German skvdl and
the thickness of its bones, gives an iaterestitig phrenological account of it highly favourable to
the intellectual and moral faculties and vai-ied talents of this great people t .
Dr. Knox is more discursive than usual in delineating the physical and moral features of his
Saxon race. We may, however, quote the chief liaes of Ms graphic sketch. " In all climes,
and under aU circumstances, the Saxons are a tall, powerful and athletic race of men ; the
strongest as a race on the face of the earth. They have fair hair, with bkie eyes, and so fine a
complexion, that they may ahnost be considered the only absolutely fair race on the face of the
globe. Generally speaking, they are not a well-made or proportioned race, falHng off most in the
Hmbs ; the torso being large, vast, and disproportioned. * * * Thoughtful, plodding, industrious
beyond all other races, a lover of lahom- for labom-'s sake ; he cares not its amoimt if it be biit
profitable ; large-handed, mechanical, a lover of order, of punctuality in business, of neatness
and cleanliness. In these qualities no race approaches him ; the wealthy with Mm is the sole
respectable, the respectable the sole good ; the word comfort is never out of his mouth—^it is the
heau idéal of the Saxoni."
Dr. Latham arranges the German races, imder the name of Goths, amongst his Indo-Germamc
' Japetidae,' and thus marks the characters with wMch we have to do :—" Physical
conformation.—a. Blue eyes, flaxen hair, ruddy complexion, smooth skin, fleshy limbs, b. Eyes,
grey, dark or hazel; hair, brown or black; complexion, sallow or swarthy; bulk, varied§."
Dr. Beddoes gives the following summary of Ms observations on the colour of the representatives
of tMs people as at present existing in our own island :—" Teutonic Race.—Eyes blue
or grey, passing through greenish-grey, yeUow and hazel into brown. Eyelashes light. Hair
light red, flaxen or flaxen-yeUow, passing tM-ough various shades of generally duU brown into a
very dark hue, but not into coal-black
The same observer makes the following remark bearing upon the physical peculiarities of
the Norse colomsts of the Western Islands :—" In the eastern parts of the Isle of Skye I found
a people very much resembling the West Highlanders, yet notably differing from them in
several points, which might probably indicate Scandinavian admixture. These were, the general
roimdness of their flgm-es and features, the commonly lightish hue of their lanlc abundant hair,
the shortness of their noses, and less prominence of their brows I f . " And in agreement with this
* Crania Americana, 13.
t Traitó de Phrénologie, 459, 2' éd. 183C.
X The Kaces of Men, p. 50, &c. 1850.
§ The Varieties of Man, p. 531.
II Oj). cit., p. 29. It may deserve notice, that, in the
graves of the Alemanni at Oherflacht in Suabia, opened in
1846 by Captain von Diirrich and Dr. Wolfgang Menzel, and
which presented a mode of interment highly favourable to the
preservation of the dead, by enclosing the body in a treecoiEn
previously split and hollowed out, 7'ed hair was discovered
in that of the woman, No. 19, and Mack hair in those of
the men, Nos. 28 and 38. See an account of these graves by
W. M. Wylie, Esq., in the Archceologia, xxxvi. p. 130-8,
1855.
Ibid. p. 27.
OlIAP. III.] ANATOMICAL EXPLANATIONS. 27
is the observation of the learned Danish antiquary Worsaae :—" Throughon.t Harris and Lewis
the Gaelic inhabitants are small, dark-haired, and in general very ugly. But no sooner do we
arrive at Ness," the northern promontory of the Isle of Lewis, whose inhabitants of Norwegian
origin, have preserved their blood in pm'ity by avoiding intermarriages with the more southern
Islanders, " than we meet vrtth a people of an entirely different appearance. Both the men and
women have in general lighter hair, taUer figures, and far handsomer features. I visited several
of their cabins and foimd myself sm-rounded by physiognomies so Norwegian, that I could have
fancied myself in Scandinavia itself*." Dr. Beddoes has also told us,—" The Orkney and
Shetland people very much resemble each other, and have something very English about their
aspect, speech, and honhomniie of manner. Their figures, craMa and faces, have aU a great
tendency to roundness; their eyes, if not grey, are generally of a muddy hazel; their haii- is of
a rather light than dark brownf." (J. B. D.)
CHAPTER III.
ANATOMICAL EXPLANATIONS.
The cliiefe Organ is the Braine, which is a soft, marrowish and white substance, iugendred of the purest part of seed and
spirits, included by many skinnes, and seated within the skull or braine-pan, and it is the most noble Organe under Heaven, the
dwellmg-honse and seat of the Soule, the habitation of wisdome, memory, judgement, reason, and in which man is most hke
unto God, and therefore nature hath covered it with a skull of hard bone.—THE ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY, p. 28, 1621.
IN order to render our pages more easy to be apprehended by readers not familiar with
anatomy, it has been thought advisable to present, in tMs place, a brief general descrijition of
the human skuU, and of the bones of which it is composed, as well as of the teeth.
The human cramum or skuU, in its most complete state, is formed of a congeries of twentytwo
bones, uTespective of the three or four ossicles suspended in each internal ear, and of the
thirty-two teeth. These bones are divided into those of the calvarkim, or those forming the
hollow chamber for the reception of the brain, eight in number:—the frontal, two parietal, the
occipital, two temporal, the ethmoid, and the sphenoid; and those of the face, of which there
are fourteen:—the two nasal, two superior maxillary, two lachrymal, two malar, two turbinated,
the vomer, two palatal, and the lower jaw. Most of these bones are umted by what
anatoimsts have denominated sutures, wMch are formed by two flat bones growmg into and indenting
each other at theii- edges, somewhat like the teeth of two saws meeting together,—a
beautiful arrangement, by which the spheroidal cavity of the cramum, and its dependencies
the seats of the organs of the senses, are enabled to enlarge in any direction in the early periods
of life. At bii-th some of the cramal bones do not touch at their edges, so that there is every
* An Account of the Danes and Norwegians in England, f Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, ut
Scotland and Ireland, p. 208, 1852. supra.
E 2