The Basques live and increase like other people-in the extreme points whither, according to Dr. Knox, they took shelter in consequence of the destruction of their original habitations thousands of years ago. The same is true of the Polynesians, if it be true, as many suppose, that those islands are the sole remains of a vast continent. Diseases have also played their part, but all these causes would only be temporary, were a sufficient quantity of soil left in the hands of the indigenous races. Let us hope, in the interests of anthropology, that such an amount of territory will be reserved and respected in the possession of the natives we come in contact with, as to ensure a perpetuation of some of their descendants to ages indefinitely remote. In historical times one tribe has always been found to increase on the ruins of another. Thus it was not till after the massacre of the French by the Natchez that the Muskogees attained any importance. In the course of thirty years this tribe spread over a very fertile country of more than one hundred square miles in extent, and built fifty towns. The Navajos, according to Domenech, increase in number every day. The Cherokees increased so fast on the lands allotted to them in Alabama, as to incur the fear and jealousy of the whites. They were compelled by force to transplant themselves beyond the Mississippi, and in consequence were considerably reduced in numbers. Here we have a striking proof that it is the occupation of the soil of the aborigines alone which is the real reason of any irrecoverable diminution in their numbers. The Indians living on their allotments in the state of New York seem to be almost stationary. Thus, their total number in 1845, was 3,753; in 1855, 3,934; and now, again, about 3,700. So there is nothing to show that the Red Indian, if not actually driven from the possession of the soil, will not continue to survive for an indefinite period. Those who are in the habit of speaking about the speedy extinction of a race ought to fix some period, within which the disappearance of a race can be called extinction. No one can undertake to assert that the Red Indian will continue to inhabit the continent of North America as long as the human species exists, and so far cannot deny the possibility of his extinction as a race; but, on the other hand, I should consider the proposition I have asserted, sufficiently demonstrated, if the mysterious dispensation of Providence, invoked by some as a real cause, did not completely triumph for the space of the next thousand years. If, during that period, considerable oscillations took place of numbers, owing to the checks enumerated by Malthus, it would be clear that the laws of population are not in any way interfered with in the history of savage tribes; and that if extinction of any considerable race was ultimately effected, it could only, by the coincidence of the occupation or its soil, with one of the usual or normal periods of loss of numbers to which all races are subject.

VOL. II.NO. V.

FEBRUARY 2, 1864.

JAMES HUNT, ESQ., PRESIDENT, IN THE CHAIR.

The minutes of the last meeting were read and confirmed.

The following new Fellows were elected. Rajah Sir James Brooke, K.C.B.; Rev. Henry Clare; Lieut. Fred. Firebrace, Royal Engineers; J. O. Griffits, Esq.; Charles J. Harland, Esq.; A. E. McCallum, Esq., 39th Madras Native Infantry; George F. Rolph, Esq.; Dr. James Turle; Dr. George Moore, and H. J. B. Hancock, Esq. The Secretary read the list of presents given to the Society since the last meeting, for which thanks were voted to G. E. Roberts, Esq.; Dr. Beddoe; C. F. von Martins; J. Fred. Collingwood, Esq.; T. Bendyshe, Esq.; Dr. James Hunt; M. Georges Pouchet, and M. Duhousset.

The following paper was then read :—

Some Remarks on the Construction of the Upper Jaw of the Skull of a Greenlander. By Dr. C. G. CARUS.

HIGHLY appreciating the opportunity of corresponding with the London Anthropological Society, I feel myself called upon to communicate some remarks, and to add a question about them, the answer to which will not be uninteresting for anthropology in general.

In the first part of my Atlas on Cranioscopy, which appeared in Leipzig in 1843, I remarked that in the skull of a Greenlander, which I sketched, it was singular, that on this skull there was a decided separation between the upper jaw-bone and the intermaxillary bone, almost as in little children or in quadrupeds, and consequently in this skull there was a decided resemblance to an animal form.

Very soon after this I was so fortunate as to procure another real authenticated Greenlander's skull, and I was not a little surprised to find in this also quite the same conformation on the jaw-bones. Taking it for granted that the London Anthropological Society, either in their own collection, or at the British Museum, can easily procure a great number of real and genuine Greenlander skulls, I would propose that a strict examination may be made of all the skulls and their upper jaw from this race of people, and would look forward with pleasure to a report on this subject in the publications of the Society.

It would in all cases be very remarkable if this construction of the bones, which I find so very seldom in African, Asiatic, and European skulls, should occur so often as to make it almost universal among the Esquimaux. Certainly, if this is the case they might be classed among the lower order of human beings, and the well-known voracity of these tribes from the extreme north of North America could be then brought in a near connection with this particular conformation.

Mr. C. CARTER BLAKE stated that the above paper having been referred to him by the Council, it was now his duty to make a report

thereon. He had not thought it necessary to pursue the comparison further than the investigation of the Greenlander or Esquimaux skulls in the collection of the Royal College of Surgeons, and in the British Museum. He there found several instances in which the premaxillary palatine suture was distinctly closed in the skulls of Greenlanders, and on referring to his own note books, he found that similar instances were sometimes present in other races than the Esquimaux. His friend, the late Camille Bertrand, whose loss to anthropology he had personally to deplore, as well as the society at large, had accumulated many facts on this subject. He might further refer to Rousseau's valuable memoir, "De la non-existence de l'os intermaxillaire chez l'homme à l'état normal, et des erreurs commises à l'egard de la pretendue existence de cet os." Prof. Carus had not stated whether the fissure he alluded to was present on the outer or inner side of the maxillary bone. If the former, of course such an abnormity was almost unprecedented in the human adult; but if the latter not uncommon defect of ossification was all that Prof. Carus alluded to, Mr. Blake had much pleasure in reading the folfowing passage from the work of his friend Dr. Webb, on The Teeth in Man and the Anthropoid Apes. "We may, however, remark here, that although the premaxillary palatine suture is usually entirely obliterated at a very early period in the human cranium, traces of its existence are occasionally found both in adult European skulls and in those of the dark races. A careful examination of the collection of crania in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons will satisfy the inquirer on this point. In the skull of the human idiot figured in the first volume of the Zoological Transactions, the same condition is represented, and its occasional occurrence has not only been noticed by Lawrence and other modern writers, but it was especially remarked by some of the older anatomists. In Vesalius's great work, De Humani Corporis Fabricá, edit. 1555, is an engraving of a skull exemplifying this peculiarity. Let it be, however, distinctly understood that in such exceptional cases the suture has never been found to extend through the alveolus. Galen, as Vesalius infers, debarred the practical study of human anatomy, and, restricted to the dissection of the lower animals, was led into the error of reckoning an intermaxillary amongst the separable bones in Man." The character in question was neither common to all Esquimaux skulls, and it was to be found in other races of man.

The thanks of the Society having been given to Dr. Carus and Mr. Blake the following paper was then read.

On Anthropological Desiderata, considered with reference to the various Theories of Man's Origin and existing Condition, Savage and Civilised. By JAMES REDDIE, F.A.S.L., Hon. Mem. Dial. Soc., Edinburgh University.

SIR,-One of the first questions raised in this Society was, whether there were not already sufficient facts collected, from which it would be our duty to deduce general laws; or if the collecting of additional facts was not a primary duty? But, whether there be sufficient data

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for a safe anthropological generalisation or not, it is not, at any rate, left to us to choose whether we should yet generalise or refrain from doing so. Generalisations or theories of man's origin and present condition have been already put forth, which we cannot ignore; and it is impossible to reflect upon the various facts of which we are aware, without considering their bearing for or against one or other of these conflicting theories. As regards the collecting of additional facts, I cannot imagine any dissent from the language of our President in his inaugural address: "It must be our object to decide what are the facts we most want, and to collect information on a systematic plan."*

It would be idle to enter into the question whether it would have been better not to have had theories put forward till all possible facts were collected. I question whether reasoning man could thus possibly refrain from drawing conclusions from the facts he already knows. But theories do exist; and, as they are diametrically opposed to one another, the practical and immediate question for us to decide is, simply, In how far are such theories supported, or not supported, by the facts we know? Till this is decided, indeed, we shall scarcely be able to ascertain what further facts we want to complete the science of man. While, if we attempted to arrange our facts-whether those already ascertained or those expected hereafter to be discovered-in accordance with some false hypothesis, we should only succeed in constructing an elaborate pseudo-science, that might have, indeed, the outward appearance of truth, but would have nothing of its stability. It was long ago observed by Lord Bacon, that theories must necessarily at least seem to accord with facts, or they could not possibly be entertained or accepted as true. But every student of the history of human philosophy must know how the most obvious facts may be overlooked or disregarded, when they happen to interfere with antecedent traditions or theoretical prejudices. It is not merely travellers (as Dr. Hunt says), or the vulgar, who only see or believe what suits their preconceived notions. The Anthropological Society of London was actually founded in a year when a tardy first acknowledgment was publicly yielded, by one of our most eminent geologists, to certain facts in geology, the existence of which he had for many years persistently refused to admit, mainly because they proved that man was contemporaneous with certain animals, contrary to a theory he then held, which required these animals to be extinct ages before man came upon the scene.

This circumstance shows the great influence of theory upon induction, and may well serve as a warning to this Society, to guard against adherence to hasty generalisations, only based upon a limited or partial knowledge of facts. But there is something even worse than hasty generalisation, which ought to be utterly deprecated in science; namely, the admission of fanciful and gratuitous theories, of not merely "hasty" but false generalisations, that are not really in accordance with any recognised facts or principles whatever. And

On the Study of Anthropology, (Anthropological Review, vol. i, p. 11.)

yet, in the very same volume in which Sir Charles Lyell acknowledges his long-lived rejection of facts bearing upon the antiquity of man, he becomes the ardent advocate of a new and startling theory, which strikes at the root of, and supersedes, all other theories and traditions of man's origin and history; and he recommends it to be accepted, as "at least a good working hypothesis", upon the sole ground that the geological record-which at present contradicts it-is "so very imperfect"! He seems also to think, that all that is now necessary, in order to secure its acceptance, so far as anthropology is concerned, is the discovery of the fossil remains of some animal intermediate in form between that of the ape and man. He even tells us precisely where the search must be made for this last of the apes or first of mankind—namely, in equatorial regions. And should there, by some fortuitous chance, hereafter be found buried in Africa, the skull of a Negro idiot, or of some African female of the lowest type, with an abnormal cranium somewhat more flattened than usual, enlightened and civilised man is then expected to believe, not only that his first human progenitor was a Negro, but that the Negro Adam and Eve were the progeny of apes! Certainly, if men can be brought to believe in the latter deduction, they can scarcely hesitate as to the former; though, before they can accept it, they must unlearn all the facts they now knowand which were recently so ably laid before this Society-relating to the Negro character and history. According to the transmutation theory, adopted by Sir Charles Lyell, man becomes merely the last link in one so-called "natural" chain of being; anthropology would then be apparently reduced from one of the most difficult and complicated of human studies, to a simple fraction of one common science of organic life; and "Anthropological Desiderata" would dwindle down to the attainment of one solitary object-the discovery of a semi-human skull!

A hypothesis so sweeping and comprehensive as this, claims the especial attention of anthropologists. It is either a very great truth or an astounding error. If true, it disposes summarily of the most important anthropological hypotheses. It gets rid, of course, of the polygenous theory, by assigning to us the ape for an ancestor, mediately through the Negro. But it not only settles the question of man's origin from one or many Adams; but it also determines that the primitive man was a savage, or something even lower. And it must surely be admitted to be absurd, that anthropologians should go on discussing whether the primitive human pair or pairs were savage or civilised, if there is really any ground for believing in the probability that our immediate progenitors were baboons.

The scope of this paper does not admit of a critical examination of the whole grounds upon which the theory of transmutation is now put forward by Mr. Darwin. It is enough to say that, although it is enunciated in a volume of 500 pages, its author does not claim in that volume to have as yet adduced facts sufficient even to establish the

On the Negro's Place in Nature. By Dr. James Hunt, Pres. A.S.L., etc. Trübner and Co.: 1863.