xvii NATIVES OF NORTHERN INDIA 271 



Besides those I have already mentioned, the Association 

 has aided many other anthropological investigations by the 

 appointment of Committees to carry them out, and in some 

 cases by the more substantial method of giving grants from 

 its funds, and by defraying the cost of publication of the 

 results in its journal. Among these I may specially mention 

 the series of very valuable Eeports upon the Physical Char- 

 acters, Languages, and Industrial and Social Condition of the 

 North-Western Tribes of the Dominion of Canada, drawn up by 

 Mr. Horatio Hale, Dr. F. Boas, and others, the importance of 

 which has been recognised by the Canadian Government in the 

 form of a grant in aid of the expenses. 



Another very interesting investigation into the Habits, 

 Customs, Physical Characteristics, and Keligion of the Natives 

 of Northern India, initiated by Mr. H. H. Eisley, and carried 

 on under his supervision by the Indian Government, though it 

 has received little more than moral support from the Associa- 

 tion, may be mentioned here on account of the illustration it 

 affords of the value of exact anthropometric methods in 

 distinguishing groups of men. Although a practised eye can 

 frequently tell at a glance the tribe or caste of a man brought 

 before him for the first time, the special characters upon which 

 the opinion is based have not hitherto been reduced to any 

 definite and easily comparable method of description. In 

 Mr. Kisley's examination, the nose, for instance (which I have 

 always held to be ( one of the most important of features for 

 classificatory purposes), instead of being vaguely described as 

 broad or narrow, is accurately measured, and the proportion of 

 the greatest width to the length (from above downwards), or 

 the " nasal index," as it is termed (though it must not be 

 confounded with the nasal index as defined by Broca upon the 

 skull), gives a figure by which the main elements of the com- 

 position of this feature in any individual may be accurately 

 described. The average or mean nasal indices of a large 

 number of individuals of any race, tribe, or caste offer means 

 of comparison which bring out most interesting results. By 

 this character alone the Dravidian tribes of India are easily 

 separated from the Aryan. " Even more striking," as Mr. Eisley 

 remarks, " is the curiously close correspondence between the 



