ii GORILLA AND MAN: SKULL. 105 



difference becomes more striking still, the pelvis 

 acquiring an altogether quadrupedal character. 



But now let us turn to a nobler and more 

 characteristic organ — that by which the human 

 frame seems to be, and indeed is, so strongly dis- 

 tinguished from all others, — I mean the skull. 

 The differences between a Gorilla's skull and a 

 Man's are truly immense (Fig. 17). In the former, 

 the face, formed largely by the massive jaw-bones, 

 predominates over the brain-case, or cranium 

 proper: in the latter, the proportions of the two 

 are reversed. In the Man, the occipital foramen, 

 through which passes the great nervous cord con- 

 necting the brain with the nerves of the body, is 

 placed just behind the centre of the base of the 

 skull, which thus becomes evenly balanced in the 

 erect posture; in the Gorilla, it lies in the posterior 

 third of that base. In the Man, the surface of the 

 skull is comparatively smooth, and the supraciliary 

 ridges or brow prominences usually project but 

 little — while, in the Gorilla, vast crests are de- 

 veloped upon the skull, and the brow ridges over- 

 hang the cavernous orbits, like great penthouses. 



Sections of the skulls, however, show that some 

 of the apparent defects of the Gorilla's cranium 

 arise, in fact, not so much from deficiency of brain- 

 case as from excessive development of the parts of 

 the face. The cranial cavity is not ill-shaped, and 

 the forehead is not truly flattened or very retreat- 

 ing, its really well-formed curve being simply dis- 



