Mr Nasmyth on the Human Mouth. 163 



far as they are connected with ethnology, no feature seems to 

 me to bear so instructively on the solution of the various dif- 

 ficult problems involved in this study as the form of the mouth, 

 and the development of the teeth. Every thing would appear 

 to yield to the necessities of existence and the varied mate- 

 rials for sustaining that existence, the manner of procuring 

 those materials, and their situation and nature. The mouth 

 is the original and essential constituent of the apparatus for 

 the assimilation of these materials, and in the lower animals 

 it is peculiarly and beautifully adapted to their exigencies. 

 In the mouths of men, too, we observe a medium type fitted to 

 every peculiarity of terrestrial existence, and capable of per- 

 forming every office exacted from the mouth in all the lower 

 animals. Just as those .peculiarities are exacted by external 

 circumstances and situation, so we have a display of corre- 

 sponding peculiarities of organization. As I have said on an- 

 other occagion, it is a remarkable fact, that no other confor- 

 mation of mouth than that of man, could admit at once of 

 perfect articulation and mastication of his varied food. This 

 organ may be regarded as fulfilling a most essential part in his 

 intellectual life ; for it is not only in him, in common with all 

 other animals, the essential and original element of the appa- 

 ratus of assimilation, but it is also the organ of intellectual ex- 

 pression, and, as such, is equally indispensable to the existence 

 of the race, and therefore an essential grand agent for the im- 

 provement of man's condition, and for his communion in social 

 life. From mere observation, therefore, of the conformity of 

 development of the anterior chambers of the head, with the 

 presentation of the anterior position of the mouth, we may be 

 led to the general conclusion, that those of weak intellect were 

 forced originally to emigrate to the mor^ inhospitable quarters 

 of the globe, for we find that the inhabitants of these climates 

 are generally possessed of a low development of forehead with 

 a protruded jaw ; while those still inhabiting the position of 

 the original stock possess an elevated forehead and a perpen- 

 dicular jaw. 



Blumenbach raised the maxilla into a degree of importance 

 by taking his characteristic diameter of the cranium from the 

 conjoint form of the frontal and maxillary bones ; and he re- 



