INTRODUCTORY. 



LXIII 



An examination of the figures on Egyptian monuments, especially of those copied 

 by Lepsius^ and Hosellini", shows that the designers had rigorously adhered to a 

 definite scale of proportions. Lepsius deduces three canons of measure as having been 

 in use by Egyptian sculptors at different periods. The mixture, however, of profile 

 and front view in all Egyptian figures, and the apparent unwillingness of their artists 

 to represent, for the most part, any position but that of standing upright, or of sitting, 

 deti-acts greatly from tlie utility for comparison of the canons obtained. 



Some ethnologists have believed that they discovered in the bas-reliefs of Egyptian 

 monuments certain differences of figure, as well as of face and head, characteristic of 

 particular races. As these instances are found mostly among the captives in scenes of 

 military triuniph, it should be borne in mind that a constrained position and crouching 

 figure is uniform among them, and seems to have been purposely assigned to them 

 b}' the artist in order to heighten the contrast with the nobler form and more com- 

 manding attitude of the conqueror. The canon of measurement for the body, however, 

 seems to have been the same in all. While in many of the drawings in the works of 

 Lepsius, of Rosellini, and of Champollion le jeune^, the head and face of the negro, 

 both male and female, child and adult, are surprisingly characteristic, showing that for 

 four thousaiKl years at least, according to received computation, the type of that peo- 

 ple has not varied, yet the greater length of arm appertaining to the black race either 

 did not then characterize them, winch is improbable, or it escaped the observation of 

 the Egyptian sculptors.'' 



' DcnhniUcr ans JEgiijitrn viid xElHojncn, iff., 12 vuls., folio, Berlin, 1849-59. 



- Monnmenii thlC Erjitio e dtUa Nubia, 9 vols., Svo; plates, 3 vols., folio, Paria, 1832-'44. 



^ llonnmens tie VKiiypte et de la Niibie, cfc., 4 vols., fi)lio, Paris, 1835-'45. 



•• Investigations iiiailo dining the late war as to the relative length of the fore-arm iu the white and negro races show 

 rcsnlts greatly diti'ering from .some previons data. Broca, assuming the upjier arm to he 100, states the proportion of 

 the fore arm iu the European at 73.93 and iu the uegro at 79.40. His figures include both men and women, which slightly 

 reduces both means ; the sexual difference iu length of fore-arm is small. Burmeister shows au excess of length of the 

 European fore-arm and Pruner-Bey of the black. Aeby found no appreciable difference. The value of Ihe comparisons 

 of these European authorities is uot great, the number of the black men examined by them having been very small. 

 Mr. Gould states the mean length of the fore-arm to be 15.548 iuches iu 10,876 white and 10.103 inches iu 2,020 full 

 black soldiers. These dimensions include the hand, of the mean length of which, unfortunately, no separate determi- 

 nation was made. The distance from the tip of the middle finger to the edge of the patella, when the man was placed 

 erect, " in the position of a soldier," was found to be 5.036 iuches in the whites and 2.884 inches iu the full blacks. As 

 the relation of hand to knee has some special ethnological interest, it is proper to add that the mean height in these 

 cases was 67.149 inches for whites aud 66.210 for blacks, aud the mean height to perineum in whites was 31.065 inches, 

 iu blacks 32.100. The following table exhibits the different results obtained : 



It was nccessnry 'o deduct the length of the hand from Mr. Gould'.s figures to obtain (he dimensions in the first 



