160 LIFE OF FLOWER 



"With the Oceanic Negroes, or Melanesians, as 

 they are now commonly called, we might naturally 

 suppose they had the most in common. But this is 

 not the case. Although the Melanesians vary much 

 in stature, none are so small as the Andamanese, and 

 some are fully equal to the average of the species. 

 Their crania, whenever they are met with in a pure 

 state, are remarkably long, narrow, and high. . . . The 

 pure Fijians are perhaps the most dolichocephalic 

 [long-headed] race in the world, and the New Cale- 

 donians and the New Hebrideans come near them. In 

 this respect they are therefore as distinct as possible from 

 the Andamanese. ... As is well known, the African 

 frizzly-haired races are mostly of moderate or tall 

 stature, but there are among them some, as the Bush- 

 men of the South, and others less known from the 

 Central regions, as diminutive as the Andamanese." 



The lecturer then went on to state that although 

 African Negroes were, as a rule, of the long-headed 

 type, yet there were even then indications of the 

 existence of round-headed races in the heart of the 

 continent. In conclusion, it was added that although 

 their very rounded skulls probably formed a special 

 feature of the Andamanese, yet that he regarded the 

 " Negritos," or group of which that race formed a 

 section, "as representing an infantile, undeveloped or 

 primitive form of the type from which the African 

 Negroes on the one hand, and the Melanesians on the 

 other, with all their various modifications, may have 

 sprung. Even their very geographical position, in the 

 centre of the great area of distribution of the frizzly- 

 haired races, seems to favour this view. We may, 



