PHYSICAL ETHNOLOGY. 



245 



Messrs. Squier and Davis's " Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley." 

 A careful examination of tlie original, however, brings out features of this 

 remarkable skull, by no means apparent in the engravings. The vertical view, 

 especially, is inaccurate. In the original it presents the peculiar character- 

 istics of what I have before designated the truncated form : passing abruptly 

 from a broad flattened occiput to its extreme parietal breadth, and then taper- 

 ing, with slight lateral swell, until it reaches its least breadth, immediately 

 behind the external angular processes of the frontal bone. The occiput has been 

 subjected to the flattening process to a much greater extent than is apparent 

 from the drawings; but at the same time it is accompanied by no corresponding 

 affection of the frontal bone, such as inevitably results from the procedure of the 

 Chinooks and other Flathead tribes ; among whom the desired cranial deforma- 

 tion is effected by bandages crossing the forehead and consequently modifying 

 the frontal as much as the parietal and occipital bones. On this account, great 

 as is the amount of flattening in this remarkable skull, it is probably due solely 

 to the iindesigned pressure of the cradle-board acting on a head of markedly 

 brachycephalic proportions and great natural posterior breadth. The forehead 

 is fully arched, the glabella prominent, and the whole character of the frontal 

 bone- is essentially different from the Indian type. The sutures are very much 

 ossified, and even to some extent obliterated. 



The '' Scioto mound cranium," the best authenticated and most characteristic 



Fiir. 1. 



¥\s. 2. 



of the crania of tlie mound-builders, when discovered, lay embedded in a com- 

 pact mass of carbonaceous matter, intermingled with a few detached bones of 

 the skeleton and some fresh-water shells. Over this had been heaped a mound 

 of rough stones, on the top of which, incovered by the outer layer of clay, lay 

 a large plate of mica, that favourite material of the ancient mound-builders. 

 This is the skull which, according to the description of Dr. Morton, furnishes the 

 best example of the true typical American head. It is produced as such by 

 Dr. Nott, in the T//pes of Mankind, and, as described by Dr. Morton, "it is, per- 

 haps, the most admirably formed head of the American race hitherto discovered. 

 It possesses the national characteristics in perfection, as seen in the elevated 



