WEIGHT INCREASE AND INCREASE IN STATURE. 75 



made, and must necessarily be made, on the dead. So 

 far as non-accidental causes of death are concerned, the 

 anatomical peculiarities of the person dying are probably 

 an important factor in causing death, for there can be 

 no doubt that persons, the relation of whose various 

 systems and organs are dissimilar, do also present 

 different degrees of resistance to attacking disease or 

 mechanical strains. An example of the latter is the 

 observation by Boyd, that still-born children have 

 heavier brains and larger heads than those born living, 

 a result to be explained by the fact that under the 

 mechanical conditions of birth a large head in the 

 child is distinctly a disadvantageous variation. The 

 dead, therefore, representing those individuals least well 

 organised, form one series, and the living another. 

 Where growth is very rapid, as in the lungs, slight 

 variations may be obscured, and probably the curve 

 from the dead does not materially mislead us as to the 

 changes taking place in the living ; but when we find 

 that among the males in the table before us the average 

 brain-weights are heavier at fifteen and twenty years 

 than they are at twenty-five years, and among the 

 females the same is true, with the addition that it holds 

 at ten years also, the question at once arises whether 

 there are here simply misleading figures, or whether the 

 records are significant. Since other series of observa- 

 tions on the weight of the brain show the same 

 pre-maxima, we can feel fairly certain that their occur- 

 rence is more than accidental. The social status of 

 the persons on whom these observations were made 

 was essentially similar at all periods, and the variation 

 cannot therefore be explained by a change in that con- 

 dition, Furthermore, this feature occurs in the statistics 

 for both sexes, and, as we have noted, in the females 

 at an earlier date than in the males. The suggestion 



