Ill 



PITHECOID CHARACTERS 205 



given by Professor Schaaffhausen, which show that 

 the absolute height and relative proportions of the 

 limbs, were quite those of an European of middle 

 stature. The bones are indeed stouter, but this 

 and the great development of the muscular ridges 

 noted by Dr. Schaaffhausen, are characters to be 

 expected in savages. The Patagonians, exposed 

 without shelter or protection to a climate possibly 

 not very dissimilar from that of Europe at the 

 time during which the Neanderthal man lived, 

 are remarkable for the stoutness of their limb 

 bones. 



In no sense, then, can the Neanderthal bones be 

 regarded as the remains of a human being inter- 

 mediate between Men and Apes. At most, they 

 demonstrate the existence of a Man whose skull 

 may be said to revert somewhat towards the pithe- 

 coid type just as a Carrier, or a Pouter, or a 

 Tumbler, may sometimes put on the plumage of 

 its primitive stock, the Columba lima. And 

 indeed, though truly the most pithecoid of known 

 human skulls, the Neanderthal cranium is by no 

 means so isolated as it appears to be at first, but 

 forms, in reality, the extreme term of a series 

 leading gradually from it to the highest and best 

 developed of human crania. On the one hand, it 

 is closely approached by the flattened Australian 

 skulls, of which I have spoken, from which other 

 Australian forms lead us gradually up to skulls 

 having very much the type of the Engis cranium. 



