VARIATIONS IN BRAIN-WEIGHT. 121 



on the histological structure of their bodies which would 

 enable us to interpret the differences between them in 

 terms of their cellular constitution. There is some 

 reason to think, however, that in dwarfs the cell 

 elements are of small size. In every way it would 

 appear that the physiological condition of the dwarf 

 is superior to that of the giant, and that he repre- 

 sents the more efficient organism. These facts have 

 the following bearing : In general the presumptive 

 brain-weight among giants is greater than among the 

 dwarfs, yet to put the case most conservatively, the 

 giants are not recognised in any sense a mentally 

 superior group. Hence under these conditions the 

 larger brain is not correlated with the greater intelli- 

 gence. 



This relation of brain to body may be considered 

 from another point of view. It has always been 

 assumed that some light would be obtained from com- 

 parative anatomy, and to that end many observations 

 have been made in various animals on the weight and 

 size of the brain, and its relation to the weight of the 

 body. It appears that man is surpassed in the gross 

 weight of the encephalon only by the elephant, 

 some of the whales, and the recently extinct Stellar's 

 sea-cow. When the weight of the brain is compared 

 with the weight of the fully grown body, its propor- 

 tional value is found to be higher in man than in most 

 animals, although some of the lower monkeys, small 

 rodents, and some birds, have a proportional brain- 

 weight which is greater than that in man. Attention 

 has already been called to the fact that this proportional 

 value of the brain is greatest at birth, and diminishes 

 throughout the growing period. The same is probably 

 true of all vertebrates. As an illustration of this point 

 a table on the relation between the weight of the brain 



