96 THE WHENCE AND THE WHITHER OF MAN 



A fair idea of the size of the brain may be obtained 

 by measuring the cranial capacity. This varies in man 

 from almost one-hundred cubic inches to less than 

 seventy. In the gorilla its average is perhaps thirty, 

 in the orang and chimpanzee rather less, about twenty- 

 eight. This is certainly a vast difference, especially 

 when we remember that the gorilla far exceeds man in 

 weight. 



Le Bon tells us that of a series of skulls forty-five 

 per cent, of the Australian had a cranial capacity of 

 1,200 to 1,300 c.c, while 46.7 per cent, of modern Pa- 

 risian skulls showed a capacity of between 1,500 and 

 1,600 c.c. The skull of the gorilla contains about 

 five hundred and seventy cubic centimetres. Broca 

 found that the cranial capacity of 115 Parisian skulls, 

 of probably the higher classes from the twelfth cen- 

 tury, averaged about 1,426 cubic centimetres, while 

 ninety of those of the poorer classes of the nineteenth 

 century averaged about 1,484. His observations 

 seemed to prove that there has been a steady increase 

 in Parisian cranial capacity from the twelfth to the 



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nineteenth century. 



Turning to the actual weight of the brain, that of 

 Cuvier weighed 64.5 ounces, and a few cases of weights 

 exceeding 65 ounces have been recorded. The lowest 

 limit of weight in a normal human brain has not yet 

 been accurately determined. From 34 to 31 ounces 

 have been assigned by different writers. The brain 

 of a Bushwoman was computed by Marshall at 31.5 

 ounces, and weights of even 31 ounces have been re- 

 corded without any note to show that the possessors 

 were especially lacking in intelligence. As Professor 

 Huxley says in his " Man's Place in Nature," a little 



