March 6, 1884] 



NA TURE 



429 



ANTHROPOLOGICAL NOTES IN THE 

 SOLOMON ISLANDS 



IN my last paper on the physical characters of the 

 natives of St. Christoval and the neighbouring islands 

 (Nature, vol. .x.wii. p. 607) I drew attention to the varia- 

 tion which was presented towards the opposite extremity 

 of the Solomon group by the Treasury Islanders, of whom 

 1 considered the natives of the large adj icent island of 

 Bougainville would prove to be a more pronounced type. 

 My observations during 1883, which were confined, how- 

 ever, to the islands of the Bougainville Straits, and did 

 not extend to the large island of that name, have con- 

 firmed the existence of this variation in the type of the 

 natives at the western end of the group. 



Proceeding at once to the comparison of the inhabitants 

 of these two regions, I find that the most important dis- 

 tinction lies in the form of the skull. The cephalic indices 

 obtained from forty head-measurements amongst the men 

 of the islands of Bougainville Straits (Treasury Island, 

 Shortland Islands, Faro Island) ranged between 76 and 

 85 ; three-fourths were included between 79 and 83 (in- 

 clusive) ; and the mean was 8o'6. Of the same number 

 of measurements amongst the men of St. Christoval, half 

 produced cephalic indices between 75 and 78 (inclusive) ; 

 the range was 69 to 83 ; and the mem 767. In the first 

 region therefore brachycephaly may be said to prevail ; 

 in the latter, mesocephaly. But in addition to being 

 more brachycephalous, the men of Bougainville Straits 

 belong to a noticeably taller and more robust race, their 

 average height being 5 feet 4.h inches to 5 feet 5 inches, 

 as contrasted with 5 feet 3 inches to 5 feet 4 inches in the 

 case of the St. Christoval natives. I should also add 

 that the hue of the skin is of a darker shade, correspond- 

 ing to numbers 35 and 42 of the colour-types of M. Broca. 

 The character of the hair resembles that of the natives of 

 the eastern islands of the group inbeingfrizzly and bushy ; 

 but there is introduced among the populations of these 

 islands in the Bougainville Straits an almost straight- 

 haired element, to which further reference will be made. 



The inhabitants of the islands just alluded to are also 

 distinguished from those of St. Christoval and the eastern 

 islands of the group in many of their arts and usages, to 

 some of which I can here only just refer. CannibaHsm is 

 rarely if ever practised among the natives of Bougainville 

 Straits : it is, however, frequent amongst those of St. 

 Christoval. Polygamy is more prevalent in the former 

 region, where Gorai, the powerful chief of the Shortlands, 

 possesses between eighty and one hundred wives, and 

 Muld, the chief of Treasury Island, owns between twenty- 

 five and thirty. The patriarchal and despotic rule of 

 these chiefs must be contrasted with the little authority 

 which belongs to the majority of the chiefs in the eastern 

 islands. The women of Bougainville Straits manufacture 

 a kind of unglazed pottery, employing for this purpose a 

 wooden trowel, a large smooth pebble 3 to 4 inches 

 across, and a ring-cushion of palm leaf ; a rudely-shaped 

 saucer is first made from a lump of the clay ; and upon 

 this the vessel is built up, strip by strip. A large number 

 of the houses in the principal villages of Faro — an island 

 in the middle of the Straits — are built upon piles. I 

 should here refer to the greater prevalence amongst the 

 natives of the islands in Bougainville Straits of the 

 cutaneous disease — an aggravated form of " body-ring- 

 worm " — to which 1 alluded in my description of the St. 

 Christoval natives : four-fifths of the inhabitants of 

 Treasury Island are thus affected ; and half of the chief's 

 wives are covered with this disease from head to foot. 



From frequent observation of the different modes of 

 wearing the hair which prevail among the Solomon 

 Islanders, I am of the opinion that their variety is to be 

 attributed more to individual fancy than to any difference 

 in the character of the hair. According to his taste, a 

 man may prefer to wear his hair close and uncombed, 

 when the short matted curls with small spiral give a 



woolly appearance like that of the hair of the African 

 negro Should he allow his hair to grow, making but 

 little use of his comb, the hair will hang in ringlets 3 to 8 

 inches 1 mg — a mode more frequent amongst the natives 

 of the eastern islands of the group, and best described as 

 the " mop-headed " style. More often from a moderate 

 amount of combing, the locks are loosely entangled and 

 the hair-mass assumes a somewhat bushy appearance, 

 the arrangement into locks being still discerned and the 

 surface of the hair presenting a tufted aspect. The 

 majority of natives, however, produce by constant comb- 

 ing a bushy periwig in which all the hairs are entangled 

 independently into a loose frizzly mass, the separate locks 

 being no longer discernible. These four styles of wearing 

 the hair — the woolly, the mop-like, the partially bushy, 

 the completely bushy — prevail with both sexes, the fashion 

 varying in different islands of the group. I am inclined 

 to view the mop-headed style as the natural mode of 

 growth, it being the one which the hair would assume if 

 allowed to grow uncombed and uncut. The Solomon 

 Islander unfortunately makes such a constant use of the 

 comb that one rarely sees his hair as nature intended it 

 to grow. When, however, a man with bushy hair has 

 been diving for some time, the hairs, disentangling them- 

 selves to a great extent, gather together into long narrow 

 ringlets — nature's coiffure of the Solomon Island native. 



Amongst the natives of Bougainville Straits the hair is 

 coarser and of a darker hue, corresponding to numbers 

 34 and 49 of the colour-types of M. Broca ; whilst the 

 lighter hue of the hair of the St. Christoval natives more 

 accords with numbers 35 and 42. The diameter of the 

 spiral when measurable varied between 5 and lomms. — 

 its usual range throughout the group ; but on account of 

 the practice of combing it was often difficult to measure 

 it with any accuracy. Here I may allude to the almost 

 straight-haired element which has been infused among 

 the inhabitants of Bougainville Straits. The individuals 

 thus characterised have very dark skins, which for want 

 of comparison might be termed black ; the hue, however, 

 nearly agrees with colour-type 42 of M. Broca; the hair, 

 which is even darker, corresponding with types 34 and 

 49, is almost straight, often erect, and giving the person 

 a shock- headed appearance ; whilst it may in some in- 

 stances tend to gather into curls of a large spiral. I was 

 unable to detect any constant change in physical charac- 

 ters accompanying this variety in the growth of hair. 

 The general colour of the iris amongst the natives of 

 Treasury Island may be described as a deep muddy- 

 violet, approaching nearest to number 1 1 of the colour- 

 types of i\I. Broca. 



The relation between the lengths of the upper and 

 lower limbs in over thirty individuals was fairly constant, 

 the mean intermembral index being 68. A steady index, 

 giving a mean of 334, indicated the proportion of the 

 length of the upper limb to the height of the body ; but 

 the corresponding index which my measurements gave 

 for the lower limb was somewhat variable, and the mean 

 49'2 is therefore not so reliable. H. B. Guppy 



H.M.S. Lark, Auckland, N.Z., January 2 



ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ASCIDIAS 

 COMPOSIT.E 



COMPOUND ASCIDIAXS should undoubtedly be 

 studied in the fresh condition. This becomes evi- 

 dent to any one who, after having admired the graceful 

 forms, gorgeous colouring and transparency of tissue 

 exhibited by the 1' ving animals on our western and southern 

 coasts, or in such a favoured spot as the Chausey Archi- 

 pelago, seeks in vain for these or any other beauties in 

 the leathery repulsive-looking masses usually exhibited in 

 a collection of Tunicata.' And it becomes painfully im- 

 pressed upon one when working through a large coUec- 



* There are exceptions: sjme few species retain both form and colour 

 airly well when preserved. 



