Fune 25, 1885 | 
Galton reminds us that, during the first days of a 
traveller’s meeting with a very different race, he finds it 
impossible to distinguish one from another, without 
making a special effort to do so: to him the whole race 
looks alike, excepting distinctions of age and sex. The 
reason of this is that, by short contacts with many in- 
dividuals, he receives upon his retina, and has recorded 
upon his memory, a composite picture emphasizing only 
what is common to the race, and omitting the individu- 
alities. This also explains the common fact that resem- 
blances among members of a family are more patent to 
strangers than to the relatives. 
The individuals entering into these composites were all 
photographed in the same position. Two points were 
marked on the ground glass of the camera ; and the in- 
strument was moved at each sitting to make the eyes of 
the sitter exactly coincident with these points. The com- 
posites were made by my assistant, Mr. B. T. Putnam, 
who introduced the negatives successively into an appa- 
ratus carefully constructed by himself, and essentially 
like that designed by Mr. Galton, where they were photo- 
graphed by transmitted light. The arrangements of the 
conditions of light, &c., were such that an aggregate 
exposure of sixty-two seconds would be sufficient to take 
a good picture. What was wanted, however, was not an 
impression of one portrait on the plate, but of all the 
thirty-one ; and to do this required that the aggregate 
exposure of all the thirty-one should be sixty-two seconds, 
or only two seconds for each. Now, an exposure of two 
seconds is, under the adopted conditions, too short to 
produce a perceptible effect. It results from this, that 
only those features or lines that are common to all are 
perfectly given, and that what is common to a small 
number is only faintly given, while individualities are 
imperceptible. The greater the physical resemblances 
among the individuals, the better will be the composites. 
A composite of a family or of near relatives, where there 
is an underlying sameness of features, gives a very sharp 
and individual-looking picture. 
It would be difficult to find thirty-one intelligent men 
more diverse among themselves as regards facial like- 
ness than the academicians entering into this composite. 
They are a group selected as a type of the higher 
American intelligence in the field of abstract science, all 
but one or two being of American birth, and nearly all 
being of American ancestry for several generations. 
The faces give to me an idea of perfect equilibrium, of 
marked intelligence, and, what must be inseparable from 
the latter in a scientific investigator, of imaginativeness. 
The expression of absolute repose is doubtless due to the 
complete neutrality of the portraits. 
Fig. 3 contains eighteen naturalists and thirteen mathe- 
maticians, whose average age is about 52 years. Fig. 1 
contains twelve mathematicians, including both astro- 
nomers and physicists, whose average age is about 513 
years. Fig. 2 is a composite of sixteen naturalists, in- 
cluding seven biologists, three chemists, and six geologists, 
with an average age of about 524 years. 
I may mention, as perhaps only a remarkable coin- 
cidence, that the positives of the mathematicians, and 
also of the thirty-one academicians, suggested to me at 
once forcibly the face of a member of the Academy who 
belongs to a family of mathematicians, but who happened 
not to be among the sitters for the composite. In the 
prints this resemblance is less strong, but in these it was 
observed quite independently by many members of the 
Academy. So, also, in the positive of the naturalists, the 
face suggested, also quite independently to myself and 
many others, was that of a very eminent naturalist, 
deceased several years before the sitting for this com- 
posite. 
There is given also a composite (Fig. 4) of a differently 
selected group. It is of twenty-six members of the Corps 
of the Northern Transcontinental Survey—an organisa- 
NAGORE 
177 
tion of which I had charge, and the object of which was 
an economic survey of the North-Western Territories. 
It was a corps of men carefully selected as thoroughly 
trained in their respective departments of applied geology, 
topography, and chemistry, and having the physique and 
energy, as well as intelligence, needed to execute such a 
task in face of many obstacles. The average age of this 
group was 30 years. RAPHAEL PUMPELLY 
HOW THE NORTH-NORWAY FFORDS 
WERE MADE 
N NATURE (vol. xxx. p. 202) there was published an 
article by me “On Northern Norway under the 
Glacial Age,” in which, among other subjects, I referred 
to the course of the travelled granite blocks in the neigh- 
bourhood of Tromsé. The researches I had then made 
in this direction were, however, confined to a limited area, 
whilst last summer I was able to extend the same to the 
point whence the blocks started.. Although one of my 
assumptions in the former article has not been confirmed 
by my last researches, the conclusions I then arrived at 
have in the main been corroborated. And as I believe 
that this subject is one of considerable importance to 
science, I venture to give an account of my last re- 
searches. 
In order to understand the subject, it is necessary to 
explain the orographical conditions along the course of 
the travelled blocks from the Swedish frontier to the 
Arctic Ocean. 
From the eastern end of the Alt Lake, near the Swedish 
frontier, and northwards to the Store Rosta Lake, the 
country on the Norwegian side assumes the form of 
an extensive alpine plateau, with broad depressions, the 
average height of which is about 2000 feet, running 
between low rounded ridges. In the south-eastern part 
of these plateaux, not far from the eastern end of the 
Alt Lake, the Divi River rises. Having for some Io 
graphical English miles followed the plateau, this river 
flows gradually towards the Divi Valley, which it enters 
and follows throughout its whole course in a north- 
easterly direction, flowing eventually into the Maals 
River at a height of 260 feet (82 m.) above sea-level. Its 
length, from where it leaves the plateau, to the spot 
where it joins the Maals River, is about 30 geographical 
miles. In its upper course, where the Maals River 
receives the Divi River, the former flows through a wide 
plain or low plateau, the so-called Overbygd, which 
gradually slopes down to a distinct valley, the Maals 
Valley proper, which runs in a westerly direction along 
the southern slope of the high, island-shaped mountain 
ridge called Mauken. The latter begins about 5 miles 
west of the spot where the Divi River enters the Maals 
River, whence it runs in a direction east-west for a length 
of about 15 geographical miles, the highest tops being 
upwards of 4000 feet (1255 m.). On the north-western 
side, however, the Overbygd gradually rises towards the 
broad mountain depression filled by the Tag Lake, 7 miles 
in length, which runs in a direction east-west along the 
northern slope of Mauken, viz. between the latter and the 
more northerly-lying ridge Omasvarre, which, with tops 
upwards of 1900 feet (596 m.) in height, also runs in a 
direction east-west. The bottom of this depression is 
filled with the imposing Tag Lake, which lies on a height 
of about 600 to 700 feet (188 to 220 m.) above sea-level, 
and thus about 400 feet (120 m.) égher than the Divi 
River at the spot where it enters the Maals River. At the 
western end of the Tag Lake this depression takes the 
form of a broad mountain basin, the so-called Tag 
Valley, which in a north-easterly direction descends to 
Balsfjord. The distance between the Tag Lake and the 
Balsfjord is about 10 geographical miles. The Tag 
Valley is, on the western side, bordered by the lofty 
Maartin peaks, and further to the north-east by the Slet 
