Composite Portraits 207 



on the same sensitized plate. He described the process, 

 and said that the single figure, which was the aggregate 

 result, had a surprising air of reality. He thought such 

 photographs would be useful to anthropologists in enabling 

 them to obtain more typical figures of races and families 

 than they now possessed. In hereditary enquiries also 

 composites of brothers and sisters could be compared with 

 those of their near ancestry. 1 



Dr. Carpenter said the late Mr. Appold used a stereoscope 

 to combine two portraits of himself, one with a serious, the 

 other with a smiling expression. The result was an excellent 

 likeness. 



Mr. Busk thought the process might be applied to produce 

 typical figures of the skulls of different races. Some members 

 considered that persons had more points of resemblance 

 than was generally supposed, Dr. Carpenter saying that 

 to English observers Japanese looked very like one another, 

 though probably to themselves they seem as dissimilar in 

 aspect as we think our own people to be. Sir Philip Egerton 

 quoted the case of sheep, where the apparently close 

 resemblance might be equally illusory. 



June 20th, 28ist meeting. Mr. Abel exhibited specimens 

 to illustrate the ravages of white ants at St. Helena, and more 

 recently at Pointe de Galle. At the latter place quantities of 

 thick rope had been rendered useless, the strands in many 

 places having been cut through. At the former one, they 

 had reduced a district of James Town to ruins, leaving only 

 the bare stone walls. Thence they went to the barracks, 

 Ladder Hill, and then to the arsenal, attacking the woodwork 

 of the stores, shell-bottoms, rifle-plugs and the like. Mr. 

 Abel exhibited specimens of these, of papier-mache wads 

 and office-records ; teak was the only kind of wood which 

 they did not attack. The frequent use of whitewash was 

 the only protective agent, not because the lime in it was 

 poisonous to them, but because the glare of the white walls 



1 A specimen of a composite photograph, nearly full-faced, is inserted in 

 the Minute Book. One would suppose it to be the likeness of an individual, 

 where the photograph wanted rather more clearness of outline. 



