HEALTH AND POPULATION 585 



( hat the brain cortex (grey matter) of the native is quahtatively 

 deficient compared with the European's: the individual pyramidal 

 cells of the cortex are smaller, less well-formed, with a preponder- 

 ance of undifferentiated cells. These results are not, however, at 

 present accepted as conclusive by experts. In another part of the 

 world, the extensive investigations made by Professor Shellshear 

 (1937) on the brains of Australian aborigines and of Chinese have 

 shown that the two groups are characterized by differences in 

 structure; but it should be noticed that he expressly refrains 

 from basing on these results any conclusions with regard to dif- 

 ferences in mental capacity, while pointing out that so far as bio- 

 logical evolution is concerned, the retention of primitive charac- 

 ters in the so-called 'lower' races may provide the possibility of 

 greater evolutionary advance. 



Dr. Gordon published a summary of his conclusions on the 

 brain in a letter to The Times of 8th December 1933, which called 

 forth an abundance of criticism, particularly against his methods 

 of calculating brain capacity from the measurements of the living 

 head, and in the presentation of results as absolute brain size 

 rather than relative brain size, taking into account the size of the 

 body. Dr. J. S. Huxley, in a letter on the subject dated i8th 

 December 1933, pointed out that the only true criterion is relative 

 brain size based on Lapicque's formula for different types of mam- 

 mals: the brain varies as the body weight raised to the power 0-56. 

 There was also some doubt whether the natives examined repre- 

 sented a true sample of the populations concerned. Most people 

 are agreed, as Drs. Gordon and Vint themselves maintain, that 

 the results to date are merely pointers, but that the subject is one 

 on which exhaustive work is required. 



Apart from the study of brains, which naturally attracted public 

 attention, Gordon ( 1 934) recorded a number of other suggestive 

 facts relating to physical development. In characters such as sit- 

 ting and standing height, weight, hand grip, and vital capacity, 

 the native at the age often is better developed than the European, 

 but is overtaken at about fifteen years, after which the native's 

 development falls off, while the European's leaps ahead. When 

 speaking of the 'native' it is important to realize that Gordon's 

 results are based mainly on the Kikuyu mixed with some Nilotic 



