ANTHROPOLOGY. 503 



tlie saiue (luestioii in Norway, and A. Fallot publishes a note npon the 

 index of the Provencals. 



With reference to the external characteristics of the human body, 

 none attracts so much attention as color of the skin, hair, and eyes. 

 Both in Germany and in France commissions have been appointed by 

 the Government to report on Xhis subject. In certain lines of investi- 

 gation this must lead to excellent results. Admitting that all varia- 

 tions in our species are the composite result of a struggle between the 

 environment and the species, it is incontrovertible that these changes 

 will take place more rapidly at those points where the battle rages most 

 fiercely, at the most exposed points, where sunlight and heat and actin- 

 ism, where humidity and aridity, heat and cold, and the like have made 

 their fiercest attacks upon us. The most eminent anthropologists have 

 not been unmindful of this. DeCandolle, Pommerol, Hansen, Variot, 

 Flinker, and Topinard, in many papers, have brought together the re- 

 ^ilts of the public inquiries and pointed out the way to better methods. 

 Longevity is the subject of several publications that have api)eared. 

 There are several factors which enter into the count of race vitality, 

 namely, fecundity, longevity, and energy or vigor, both bodily and 

 mental. There are vague accounts of long-lived individuals, but it is 

 only recently that means have been adopted for verifying the state- 

 ment as regards individuals and for reaching definite conclusions re- 

 specting the life periods of races, communities, or peoi)les. 



M. Turquan and M. Tissandier have collected the statistics of macro- 

 bians. Signor (^orradi and Signer Trussardi have written treatises on 

 longevity in relation to history, to anthropology and hygiene. Other 

 papers on the same subject have appeared by Ornstein, Humphrey, and 

 Ledyard. On the subject of vigor Signor Zqja has investigated metLds 

 of measuring the muscular force of various races. 



Further researches in this same line are the study of chest tvpes in 

 man, the Mongolian eye, physiognomic, prehension,' right-handedness, 

 erectness of posture, the senses of savages, bodily size and stature, vital 

 statistics, the preservation of vigor, weight, hairiness, and baldness. 



There is a mooted question concerning the relative advantage of sav- 

 agery and civilization as regards vitality. On May 24, 1888, George 

 Harley read an essay before the London Anthropological Institute on 

 the relative recuperative powers of man living in a rude, and man livii.o- 

 inahighlycivilized, state, in which he brought forward a number o't' 

 hitherto unpublished though mostly well known tiicts, demonstratino- 

 that the refining influence of civilization had not been altogether the niP- 

 alloyed boon we so fondly imagine it to have been. For the cases cited 

 went far to demonstrate the fact that while man's physique as well as 

 his mental power had increased during his evolution from a barbaric 

 state into a condition of bienscance, his recuperative capacity, on the 

 other hand, has materially deteriorated. In facr, it ai)pears from the ex- 

 amples cited that every appliance adding to man's bodily comfort as 



