382 ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF PARIS. 



this society has turned only upon general principles, and the special question of 

 the permananco of human races has not been broached. While M. Gaussin 

 contested the vahie of the exclusive jdiysioloD^ical character on which M. Sanson 

 relies for the determination of species, MM. Lartet and Lagneau suggested 

 doubts respecting the absolute permanence of races, and cited facts tending to 

 demonstrate the formation of new races in domestic species, and even in wild 

 species; and M. de Mortillet, relying chiefly on paleontology, went so far as to 

 deny not only the permanence of races, but also that of species. The convictions 

 of M. Sanson have not, however, been shaken by these objections, and his oppo- 

 nents themselves have acknowledged the talent which he has displayed in this 

 difficult line of inquiry. Questions of this class are among those which will be 

 long, doubtless, the subject of controversy; but the discussion elicted b}^ M. 

 Sanson has not been without its fruits : it has shown, in the first place, that the 

 standard idea of species, considered as a natural, primordial, and permanent gi'oup, 

 is far from sufficing to the actual needs of science; it has shown also that races 

 to which it has been the custom to attribute a variability much too great, tend, 

 on the contrary, for the most part, to maintain and perpetuate themselves without 

 durable change: that the innumerable varieties obtained by crossings, selection, 

 or culture have in general only a factitious existence, and that, left to themselves, 

 they disappear if not always, at least almost alwa^'s, whether from the want of 

 fecuudity or Irom the effect of the law of atavism, which, after a while, causes 

 types momentarily effaced to reappear. 



I must pass in silence, but not without regret, a considerable number of ethnolo- 

 gical facts, simply descriptive, which would lead to analytic details of too special 

 a nature. As a subject of more commanding interest, and one which has always 

 asserted a paramount claim to the attention of the societ}^, I proceed to notice its 

 discussions respecting craniology. 



As the skulls presented to the societ}^ and destined to enrich its museum become 

 more numerous, the more need is manifested of a recurrence to rigorous processes 

 of measurement in order to institute truly scientific comparisons between the dif- 

 ferent series. For geometric diagrams, for angular measures and triangulations, 

 special instruments are indispensable; thej^ enable the observer to detect shades 

 of difference which would otherwise escape the most practiced eye, and furnish 

 moreover numencal data for the calculation of mean terms. Hence the commis- 

 sioners to whom the society has intrusted the charge of preparing instructions lor 

 craniometry have applied themselves particularly to the improvement of instru- 

 ments for study. They have already presented us a new goniometer, light and not 

 costly; a new craniograph qualified to delineate completely, by way of geometric 

 projection, all the details of the surface of the cranium; and a small and very 

 simple instrument, the sphenoidal crotchet {crochet)^ by means of which the 

 sphenoid angle of AVelcker ma}' be measured without sawing the skull. Our col- 

 league, M. Grenet, (de Barbezieux,) has also communicated a new process of 

 triangulation of the skull and face, an ingenious expedient, the utility of which 

 has been shown by M. Bertillon in his dissertation on cephalic angles. In tliis 

 memoir, in which are collected all known facts relating to the facial angle of 

 Camper and its derivatives, as well as the auricular angles and the angle of 

 Welcker, M. Bertillon has recorded moreover the numerous obsei-vations made 

 by himself on the different series of our museum, and has pointed out all the 

 advantages to be derived from the judicious employment of statistical calculations, 

 for correcting the errors or rather the divergencies which result from the diversity 

 of the processes of mensuration. 



It was not the first time that the results of craniometry had been submitted 

 before the society to the correction of mathematical methods. M. Gaussin had 

 already applied algebraic formulas to the determination of the relations which 

 exist between the three diameters of the skull, and had expressed these relations 

 by the help of graphic constructions based on the system of rectilinear co-ordinates. 



