6o 4 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



agricultural counties about London, being even less than in the 

 metropolis itself.* On the other hand, the Anthropometric Com- 

 mittee of the British Association for the Advancement of Science,f 

 measuring more among the upper classes in London, found them to 

 exceed both in height and weight the peasantry in Hertfordshire, 

 near by. This need not disprove Dr. Beddoe's assertion. In fact, 

 the contradictory evidence is very valuable for that reason. The 

 only way to account for it is to suppose that the constant draft upon 

 these suburban populations for their most powerful men, for service 

 in the neighboring city as policemen, porters, firemen, and in other 

 picked professions, has depleted the land of all its best specimens. 

 Such an inflowing current always tends cityward. Everything 

 points to the conclusion, on the other hand, that the final product 

 of the continued residence of such sorted populations in the city 

 is to divide them into the chosen few who succeed and rise socially, 

 and the many who descend, in the social scale as well as in stature, 

 until their line becomes extinct. As they differentiate thus, they 

 migrate within the city. The few drift toward the West End, 

 toward the Champs Elysees or Fifth Avenue, where they maintain 

 the high physical standard of the quarter; the others gravitate no 

 less irresistibly toward Cheapside and the Bowery. 



We have seen thus far that evidence seems to point to an aggre- 

 gation of the Teutonic long-headed population in the urban centers 

 of Europe. Perhaps a part of the tall stature in some cities may 

 be due to such racial causes. A curious anomaly now remains, how- 

 ever, to be noted. City populations appear to manifest a distinct 

 tendency toward brunetteness — that is to say, they seem to comprise 

 an abnormal proportion of brunette traits, as compared with the 

 neighboring rural districts. The first notice of this is due to Mayr.:j: 

 who, studying some 760,000 school children in Bavaria, stumbled 

 upon it unexpectedly. Although blondes were in a very decided 

 majority in the kingdom as a whole, the cities all contained a notice- 

 able preponderance of brunette traits. This tendency was strikingly 

 shown to characterize the entire German Empire when its six mil- 

 lion school children were examined under Virchow's direction.* In 

 twenty-five out of thirty-three of the larger cities were the brunette 

 traits more frequent than in the country. In Metz alone was there 

 a decided preponderance of blondes, due perhaps to the recent Ger- 

 manization of Alsace-Lorraine as a result of political circumstances. 

 Broadly viewed, all the larger cities, dating from the period prior 

 to 1850, showed this brunette peculiarity in their school children. 



* 1867, p. 178. f 188a, p. 20. 



% 1875, pp. 299 and 305, with tables. * 1885 and 1886 b, pp. 320 et seq. 



