8. That each well-marked cranial type admits of certain variations
in its individual characters, which variations constitute divergent
forms.
9. That these divergent forms must not he confounded with hybrid
types. Both, it is true, are produced by modifications in the mode
of action of the developing principle ; in the former, however, these
modifications depend upon climatic conditions, in the latter they
result from race-amalgamation.
10. That reasons exist for considering some, at least, of the so-
called artificial deformations as strictly natural types, representing
very early humanitarian epochs.
11. That a regular system of gradation seems to underlie and harmonize
the various cranial forms of the human family.
12. That these forms appear to he pre-represented or anticipated
in the various types of skull exhibited by different genera and species
of monkeys.
13. That if we regard artificial deformations as the forced imitations
of once natural types, and upon this ground admit them in our
systems of classification, as some writers have done, then the perplexing
gaps which seem to break the animal chain by disparting
man and monkeys—the group which stands nearest to man—will
to a certain extent he. filled intelligibly.
espèces primitives.” (Eléments de Morphologie Humaine, 2de partie, p. 115; Paris, 1850.)
The general immobility of raee-characters and specific forms is pretty well determined for
the historic period. But in this period a remarkable equilibrium of physical conditions
has been maintained. In the ante-historic epoch, the question of the mobility or immobility
of cranial, in common with all organic forms, must be studied over a wider time-
latitude, and under altered physical circumstances. If now we recall the great physiological
fact, that under the influence of the vital principle, organic matter assumes a
definite, though infinitely diversified form (the organic cell and its developmental modifications),
and that this form constitutes the medium through which all the active phenomena
of life are manifested, and if we, furthermore, reflect upon the mass of evidence
which strongly tends to correlate, if not, indeed, to identify the vital with the physical
forces, then it will appear that the study of specific forms, when carried through great
geological cycles, is, in reality, a study, not so much of parentage, as of the functional or
dynamical energy of physical conditions. The question of what constitutes species is by
no means necessarily connected with that of parentage. Naturalists, measuring nature by
limited periods of time, have too often fallen into the error of regarding specific sameness
as a mark of common origin. Very philosophically observes Dr. Leidy : “ Naturalists have
not yet systematized that knowledge through which they practically estimate the value of
sharacters determining a species. What maybe viewed as distinct sub-genera by one, will
be considered as only distinct species by another, and a third may view both as varieties
or races. In the use of these words, or rather in the attempt to define them, we go too far
when we associate them with the nature of the origin of the beings in question. We know
nothing whatever in relation to the origin of living beings, and even we cannot positively
deny that life connected with some form was not co-etemal with time, space, and matter,
and that all living beings have not successively and divergingly ascended from the lowest
types.” (Vesoriptiori of Remains of Extinct Mammalia. Journal Acad. Nat. Sciences, N. S.,
iii. 167.)
14. That typical forms of crania increase in number as we go
from the poles to the equator.
15. That the lower forms are found in the regions of excessive cold
-¿excessive ; tlle hiSher 0CCUPying the middle temperate region.
16. That cranial forms are inseparably connected with the physics
of the globe.
The entire arctic zone is characterized by a remarkable uniformity
or sameness of climatic condition and animal distribution. The
stunted plants exhibit but few specific forms ; and where the cold
is most intense and most prolonged, this uniformity is most evident.'
Here, also, the human cranial type is least varied. Bending his steps
southward, and traversing the temperate Asio-European continent
the observant traveller becomes aware of a gradual increase in thé
light and-heat of the sun; and accompanying this increase, he
beholds a peculiar and much more diversified flora and fauna
At every step, organic forms multiply around him, and monotony
slowly gives place to variety; a variety, moreover, in which a
remarkable system of resemblance or representation is preserved.
The temperate zone,” says Agassiz, “ is not characterized, like
the arctic, by one and the same fauna; it does not form, as the
a,rctic does, one continuous zoological zone around the globe.”
And, again, he says: “ The geographical distribution of animals
m this zone forms several closely connected, but distinct combinations
How, we have already seen that the globular, cranial
type of this region is.more varied than the pyramidal form of the
extreme North. The Kalmuck or true Mongolian, the Tartar
Chinese, Japanese, and Turkish types of skull are all, to a certain
I p B r® at®d> .and 7et are a11 read% distinguishable from each
other. Each of these groups, again, presents several cranial va-
netrns. 80 among the barbarous aborigines of North America,
notwithstanding the general osteologic assimilation of their crania’
important tribal distinctions can be readily pointed out. It is inte’
resting also to remark, that in the Turkish area, we are to look for
the traces of transition from the Mongolian to the European forms
a fact singularly m keeping with the statement of Agassiz, that
the Caspian fauna partakes partly of the Asiatic, and partly of the
-European zoological character.
- + t i! ? iger eral and, veiy Well~known fa c t-fir st noticed by Buffon
, ke fauna and flora of the old world are not specifically idenmaff7
? ! i e and fl0ia °f the new- Their relationship is
manifested m an interesting system of representation, or as Schouw
xpresses it, ot geographical repetition according to climate. To a
limi+ln B B R an Cramal forms aPPear also to fall within the
0f thls sJ'stem- As far as my own opportunities for exami