5o8 



NATURE 



\Mar(h 27, 1884 



morality. It is therefore the more necessary to expend 

 money and labour upon the victims of the latter, as is 

 the special aim of the New Jersey State Reform School. 

 The high aim of the Female Industrial School in this 

 State is " to make it such a home that any parent having 

 a wayward daughter may with confidence have her com- 

 mitted for reformation with the assurance that her sur- 

 roundings will be of an elevating character." The risk 

 of putting a premium upon vice is easily guarded against 

 where private feeling is not allowed to rule. 



The system of public instruction in Ontario (Canada) 

 is so highly approved and has been so successful that a 

 detailed account of its principles and organisation is 

 given here ; and the lucid, concise resuvie of the work of 

 other countries supplied in this United States Report 

 would be valuable to many a reader in Europe who has 

 not the time or the taste to go through the more lengthy 

 documents published in his own country. W. U. 



PATHOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY 



A NEW and important departure in anthropological 

 -'*- studies is taken by Prof. Klebs of Zurich in a paper 

 " On the transformations of the human race as a result 

 mainly of pathological influences," read at the recent 

 meeting of the Swiss Scientific .Association at Freiburg, and 

 of which we give the leading points. Hitherto pathology 

 can scarcely be said to have been seriously considered 

 at all in the speculations of anthropologists on the evo- 

 lution of the fundamental human types. Monogenists 

 especially, deriving all from one primeval stock, have 

 sought an explanation of present varieties mainly in out- 

 ward causes, such as diet, social habits, climate — in a 

 word, the environment. Now the learned Zurich professor 

 attempts to refer existing varieties rather to /«?i'(r;-</causes, 

 without of course pretending to deny that these may 

 themselves ultimately to a large extent depend on external 

 conditions. 



Prof Klebs starts with the assumption that the form of 

 the human body cannot be endowed with greater elements 

 of persistence than other varieties of animal species, which 

 may be modified either naturally or artificially, as, for 

 instance, by stock-breeders. Thus, by the laws of here- 

 dity, individual characteristics may be blended together, 

 and give rise to new forms within the several specific 

 groups. The intermingling of races amongst civilised 

 peoples tends in this way, not to universal uniformity, 

 but rather to an endless multiplication of forms. But, 

 besides heredity, these results may be brought about by 

 other influences which make themselves felt, especially 

 during the period of growth, and in a less degree in later 

 years. Such are the deformities associated with certain 

 pursuits, the typical and special characters of certain 

 social circles, the aristocratic, agricultural, and other 

 types, familiar examples of which are offered by the 

 lettered, labouring, and criminal classes. 



It rnay concluded from this decided tendency to 

 variation that the bodily forms, like all other jhenomena 

 of the organised world, are subject to continual modifica- 

 tion, that they are essentially plastic, sensitive to, and 

 perpetuating the traces of all external influences. Thus 

 the Danish anatomist, Schmidt, finds that the numerous 

 crania recovered from the prehistoric graves in Jutland 

 and the neighbouring islands present the most varied 

 anthropological types, ranging from that of the Neander- 

 thal skull to those of foreign races, which can scarcely be 

 supposed to have had any dnect contact with the Danish 

 aborigines. 



But amongst the causes producing structural change, 

 none, according to Prof Klebs, are more efiective than 

 pathological affections. It is now well ascertained that 

 the most prevalent ailments, and especially those of an 

 infectious character, are of a parasitic nature, so that 

 their diffusion takes the character of a struggle for exist- 



ence between two organisms. Henceforth it becomes 

 possible to study the action of these phenomena on racial 

 and specific transformation. 



But modern anthropology has approached this ques- 

 tion only from one point. It recognises that within a 

 given population, limited to a definite territory, typical 

 features may be produced, such as those observed by 

 Virchow amongst the Frisians and by Ranke amongst 

 the Bavarians. Yet the former refuses to attribute to 

 rachitis the flat shape of the East Frisian skull, although 

 analogous deviations from the normal German skull are 

 elsewhere also produced by rachitis. A whole series, 

 however, of pathological phenomena have been deter- 

 mined which place in the clearest light the connection 

 between structural change and internal affections. 



Cretinism at once suggests itself, the domain and 

 nature of which are best defined by describing it as a 

 malady spread over the Central European highlands, and 

 probably connected with the action of certain upland 

 waters on the production of goitre. It has been found 

 that in Bavaria, Switzerland, and Austria, these waters 

 contain certain minute infusoria, which, when introduced 

 into the waters of disaffected localities, produce like effects 

 on the inhabitants. 



The bodily structure of cretins, resulting from a prema- 

 ture arrest of the growth of bone, recalls in the most vivid 

 manner the descriptions of dwarfs handed down by popu- 

 lar traditions. Hence it seems not improbable that this 

 degeneracy may at a given point have resulted in the 

 formation of a definite, although possibly not permanently 

 fixed, type. A slight general influence of cretinism may 

 still be detected in many places, as in Salzburg, and 

 especially in Pinzgau and Pongau, where the natives 

 present a striking contrast to those of their kindred, who 

 have been driven by priestly intolerance to cjuit their 

 homes and settle in the North German lowlands. 



The opposite deformity, that is, excessive growth of 

 structure, is also met in upland regions, where its 

 presence recalls the legends of giants who usually dwelt 

 in the same districts as the dwarls. In fact the greatest 

 irregularity in the length of the body occurs in the high- 

 lands, although mountaineers are, on the whole, of shorter 

 stature than lowlanders. Thus the natives of Hasle, in 

 the Bernese Oberland, and those of Elm, in the Canton of 

 Claris, are above the average height. This has suggested 

 the theory of foreign immigration, a theory, however, 

 supported only by a few local geographical terms of 

 somewhat doubtf^ul origin. In reality this deformity may 

 also depend on pathological causes. At Elm a case has 

 occurred of gigantic growth setting in at the late age of 

 thirty-six and continuing till the death of the subject in 

 his forty-second year. Although we may be still ignorant 

 of the first and true cause of this disorder, the existence 

 of analogous cases in the same locality, the unusual size 

 of the inhabitants, and the established tact of gigantic 

 growth in highland regions, all seem to .point at some 

 subtle relation between such pathological phenomena and 

 the nature of the soil. They should perhaps be regarded 

 as due to the action of organisms in the system, as has 

 been shown to be the case with cretinism. 



Another series of pathological s>mptoms is associated 

 with the development of the pigments, which have hitherto 

 been considered as a salient characteristic of races. A 

 distinct relation has already been established between 

 pigmentation under certain pathological conditions, such 

 as the so-called "bronze-skin," and a morbid state of the 

 supra-renal capsules. Since then special attention has 

 been directed to these organs, which would appear to be 

 the chief centre of pigmentary development. It is nov/ 

 found that in the dark races, as among swarthy indi- 

 viduals of the fair races, the medullar portion of the 

 supra-renal capsules is always pigmented. From this 

 remarkable coincidence it may be concluded that to the 

 functional activity or sluggishness of these vascular 



