GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 1035 



the face ; indicating the predominance of the intellectual powers over those 

 merely instinctive propensities which are more directly connected with sensa- 

 tions. Among European nations, the Greeks have probably displayed the 

 greatest symmetry and perfection in the form of the head; but various departures 

 may be traced towards the preceding forms, when we compare the crania of 

 different races, and even of individuals, belonging to the same stock some 

 approaching the pyramidal form of the Northern Asiatics, whilst others approxi- 

 mate to the prognathous type of the Negro. 



1042. The influence of habits of life, continued from generation to generation, 

 upon the form of the head, is remarkably evinced by the transition from one 

 type to another, which may be observed in nations that have undergone a change 

 in their manners and customs, and have made an advance in civilization. Thus, 

 to mention but one instance, the Turks at present inhabiting the Ottoman and 

 Persian empires are undoubtedly descended from the same stock with the 

 nomadic races which are still spread through Central Asia ( 1053). The 

 former, however, having conquered the countries which they now inhabit, eight 

 centuries since, have gradually settled down to the fixed and regular habits of 

 the Indo-European race, and have made corresponding advances in civilization ; 

 whilst the latter have continued their wandering mode of life, and can scarcely 

 be said to have made any decided advance during the same interval. Now the 

 long since civilized Turks have undergone a complete transformation into the like- 

 ness of Europeans ; whilst their nomadic relatives retain the pyramidal configu- 

 ration of the skull in a very marked degree. Some have attributed this change 

 in the physical structure of the Turkish race to the introduction of Circassian 

 slaves into the harems of the Turks ; but this could only affect the opulent and 

 powerful amongst the race ; and the great mass of the Turkish population have 

 always intermarried among themselves. The difference of religion and manners 

 must have kept them separate from those Greeks whom they subdued in the new 

 Ottoman countries; and in Persia, the Tajiks, or real Persians, still remain 

 quite distinct from their Turkish rulers, belonging to a different sect among the 

 Mussulmans, and commonly living apart from them. In like manner, even the 

 Negro head and face may become assimilated to the European, by long sub- 

 jection to similar influences; thus, in some of our older West Indian Colonies, 

 it is not uncommon to meet with Negroes, the descendants of those first intro- 

 duced there, who exhibit a very European physiognomy ; and it has even been 

 asserted that a Negro belonging to the Dutch portion of Guiana may be distin- 

 guished from another belonging to the British settlements, by the similarity of 

 the features and expression of each, to those which peculiarly characterize his 

 masters. The effect could not be here produced by the intermixture of bloods, 

 since this would be made apparent by alteration of color. But not only may 

 the pyramidal and prognathous types be elevated towards the elliptical ; the 

 elliptical may be degraded towards either of these. Want, squalor, and igno- 

 rance have a special tendency to induce that diminution of the cranial portion 

 of the skull, and that increase of the facial, which characterize the prognathous 

 type ; as cannot but be observed by any one who takes an accurate and candid 

 survey of the condition of the most degraded part of the population of the great 

 towns of this country, but as is seen to be pre-eminently the case with regard to 

 the lowest classes of Irish immigrants. 1 A certain degree of retrogression to 

 the pyramidal type is also to be noticed among the nomadic tribes which are 

 to be found in every civilized community. Among these, as has been remarked 

 by a very acute observer, 3 "According as they partake more or less of the purely 

 vagabond nature, doing nothing whatsoever for their living, but moving from 



1 See the " Dublin University Magazine," No. xlviii. 



2 Mr. Henry May hew, in " London Labor and the London Poor," p. 2. 



