FORM OF THE SKULL. Ill 



length and breadth. — A hundred measurements, which I made of the 

 heads of natives in this group/ in order to obtain their proportional 

 breadth, taking the lejigth as 100, gave indices varying between 69"2 

 and 8G'2, The whole series, however, displays a tendency to group- 

 ing around different medians, and thus paints to the important 

 inference that we cannot accept one type of the skull as a distinctive 

 character of the Solomon Islander. As shown in the subjoined table, 

 which gives the indices corrected to actual skull-measurements by 

 subtracting two units as proposed by M. Broca, there would appear 

 to be a marked preponderance of mesocephaly ; but fiom my measure- 

 ments beino- limited both in number and localitv, the safest conclusion 

 to draw will be the most general one, viz., that all types of skulls, 

 brachycephalic, mesocephalic, and dolichocephalic, are to be found 

 prevailing amongst the islands of the Solomon Group, the particular 

 type being often constant in the same locality .^ If my measure- 

 ments had been five times as numerous, and had been spread equally 

 over the group, I might somewhat narrow my conclusions ; and in 

 truth brachycephaly might have formed a more important factor in 

 the series, if I had measured the heads of the same number of 

 natives from the north coast of Malaita which I measured in the dis- 

 tricts of St. Christoval and of Bougainville Straits. In the subjoined 

 table I have accepted all indices below 75 as dolichocephalic, those 

 between 75 and 80 as mesocephalic, and those above 80 as brachy- 

 cephalic. 



Cephalic indices which have been reduced to actual skull-measurements hy 



the subtraction of two units. 



Dolichocephalic indices ... ... 29 



Mesocephalic ... ... ... 52 



Brachycephalic ... ... ... 19 



100 

 I now come to consider more in detail the series of measurements 



^ The localities were — St. Christoval and the adjoining islands of Ugi and Santa Anna, 

 Florida Islands, north coast of JIalaita (Urasi and Uta Pass), Simbo or Eddystone Island, 

 the islands of Bougainville Straits, including the west end of Choiseul 



2 This conclusion is in accordance with the extensive observations of Miklouho-Maclay in 

 New Guinea and in the jMelauosian Islands. He found brachycephaly common in the New 

 Hebrides, indices of 81, and even of .85, not being rare. The indices of several hundred 

 measurements of New Guinea natives varied between G2 and 86. This eminent traveller 

 therefore arrived at the conclusion that no classification of these natives can rest on the 

 form of the skull. ("Nature," xxvii., pp. 137, 185. Proc. Lin. Soc, N.S.W., vol. YL, 

 p. 171. ■ 



