308 FORMS OF THE SKULL. 



The foramen magnum is larger, and lies farther back in 

 the head : the other openings for the passage of the nerves 

 are larger. 



The bony substance is denser and harder ; the sides of 

 the skull thicker, and the whole weight consequently more 

 considerable. 



The bony apparatus employed in mastication, and in form- 

 ing receptacles for the organs of sense, is larger, stronger, 

 and more advantageously constructed for powerful effect, 

 than in the races where more extensive use of experience 

 and reason, and greater civilization, supply the place of 

 animal strength. 



If the bones of the face in the Negro were taken as a 

 basis, and a cranium were added to them of the same relative 

 magnitude which it possesses in the European, a receptacle 

 for the brain would be required much larger than in the lat- 

 ter case. However, we find it considerably smaller. Thus 

 the intellectual part is lessened ; the animal organs are en- 

 larged ; proportions are produced just opposite to those which 

 are found in the Grecian ideal model. Tlie facial angle of 

 the skull of a Negro in the Collection of Mr. Abernb thy is 

 65°. The narrow, low, and slanting forehead, and the elon- 

 gation of the jaws into a kind of muzzle, give to this head 

 an animal character which cannot escape the most cursory 

 examination. 



A similar head, with a similar facial angle, has been figured 

 by Ed. Sandifort *". It is sufficiently obvious, that on a 

 vertical antero-posterior section of the head, the area of the 

 face will be more considerable in proportion to that of the 

 cranium, in such a skull, than in the fine European forms. 



The larger and stronger jaws require more powerful mus- 

 cles. The temporal fossa is much larger ; the ridge which 

 bounds it rises higher on the skull, and is more strongly 

 marked, than in the European. The thickness of the mus- 

 cular mass may be estimated from the bony arch, within 

 which it descends to the lower jaw. The zygoma is larger, 



* Museum Acad. Lnsd. Bat. T. 1. tab. 3. 



