164 OLIYEK — BLINDNESS FEOM MALFORMATION OF SKULL, [April 5, 



The epipteric bones, wedged between portions of the frontal, the 

 parietals, the sphenoid and the temporal bones, are of importance 

 in this study. They are present from the second year of life to 

 about the age of adolescence ; they then persist as true ossicles or 

 help to form new sutures. They are variable in size. 



The Wormian bones, that at times are found in great numbers in 

 the various sutures of the cranial part of the skull, must also be 

 considered of value in this connection. 



The sphenoid bone, the most important and the most irregular 

 of the basilar bones, is situated in the region of the anterior and 

 middle fossa. It practically contains all of the foramina and fis- 

 sures intended for the emergence and the exit of the sensory and 

 motor nerves, blood vessels and lymph channels connecting the 

 intracranial and external portions of the visual apparatus. The 

 middle fossa is the most complicated of the three great depressions 

 in the floor of the cranial cavity, it containing all of the most im- 

 portant nerve communications and vascular and lymph channels 

 that are in association with the optic nerves and eyeballs. The 

 posterior fossa hold the occipital lobes in their subdivisional cere- 

 bral fossa, that are situated above the groove that is intended for 

 the course of the lateral sinus. 



It is a well-known fact that cranial asymmetry is almost universal. 

 Study of the main foramina and fissures of the various orbital cavi- 

 ties of man exhibit marked variabilities in their relative sizes, 

 shapes and positions. The average depth of the orbit of the Negro 

 race, for example, is at least an eighth greater than it is in the orbit 

 of the Caucasian ; while the early ossification of the septum with 

 the superior maxilla in the same race produces a normal flattening 

 of the glabella, with a lateral broadening of the alse of the nose. 

 Moreover, in this class of subjects the characteristic prognathism of 

 the race becomes apparent when the individual has passed the 

 pubertal period, at which time of life an over-development of the 

 inferior maxillary bone occurs. Here there is type-form of indi- 

 vidual with a flattened nose, a wide interpupillary distance, a broad, 

 flat forehead and a projecting malar prominence, that are all so 

 characteristic of the usual brachycephalic head : here there are 

 individuals representing one of the principal subspecies of human 

 life in whom there are probable retentions of some of the most 

 pronounced features of the quadrumana; a true acceleration, as it 

 were, passing beyond the Caucasian retardation of embryonic 

 development. 



