444 REPORT — 1894. 



Anthropomef ric Laboratory. — Report of the Committee, consisting of 

 Sir W. H. Flower {Ghairman), Dr. J. G. Garson (Secretary), 

 Mr. G. W. Bloxam, Dr. Wilberforce Smith, Professor A. C. 

 Haddon, a7id Professor Windle. 



The Committee have to report that at the Nottingham meeting of the 

 Association an excellent laboratory was provided for them in the Univer- 

 sity College buildings, where many of the Sections met. The services of 

 a clerk were as usual placed at the disposal of the Committee, and by the 

 kind permission of Mr. Francis Galton those of the superintendent of his 

 laboratory at South Kensington were again available for measuring the 

 members of the Association who visited the laboratory. 



The schedule of observations and measurements made on each person 

 examined included the sex, age, birthplace, residence, occupation, colour 

 of eyes and of hair, profile of nose ; height when sitting, kneeling, and 

 standing ; vertical pi'ojection from the vertex of the head to tragus, mouth, 

 and chin ; maximum antero-posterior length and transverse breadth of 

 head, from which the cephalic index is obtained ; the length and breadth 

 of the nose, which gives the data for the nasal index ; the nasio-mental 

 length of face and the bizygomatic or maximum face breadth, from which 

 the facial index has been calculated ; length of upper limb from the 

 acromion to the tip of middle linger; length of cubit and of hand (right); 

 breadth of shoulders (bihumeral) and of hips (bitrochanteric) ; span of 

 arms ; weight in ordinary clothing ; strength of grasp ; vital capacity of 

 the chest, strength of vision, sense of colour. This last was tested, in 

 conformity with the recommendations of the Committee of the Royal Society 

 on the subject, with coloured wools. The colour of eyes and hair was 

 noted in accordance with Dr. Beddoes method, which has been adopted 

 for the Ethnographical Survey of Great Britain and Ireland. 



The attention of the Committee has been called by Professor Edge- 

 worth to the fact that the 'corrected mean' of each measurement as given 

 in the reports of former years is not satisfactory, in that it assumes the 

 dimension at the 25th and 75th grades — i.e. at the first and third quartile — 

 (Q, and Q-,), to be more accurate than that at the 50th grade (i.e. Q.,)- 

 He has supplied them with a simple formula wherein the probable error 

 at all three grades is taken into account. After several tests the superior 

 accuracy of Professor Edgeworth's formula has been proved, and has been 

 adopted in this report. His formula may be stated as follows : — 



Corrected mean=-^^—^^^—^. If the sum of Qi-fQs is greater 



than 2Q2, the difference is divided by 3'2, and the I'esult is added to Q2 ; 

 but if the sum of 2Q2 is greater than Q, + Qj, the latter is deducted from 

 the former, the difference divided by 3'2, and the product subtracted 

 from Qj. 



Since the close of the meeting the observations recorded during it have 

 been carefully worked up, under the direction of the Secretary, after the 

 plan which has been adopted in former years. Progress has also been made 

 in amalgamating the results of all the Association laboratoiy statistics, 

 which now amount to about 1,000. 



The Committee are glad to be able to report that the measurements 

 made in the laboratory of the Association for the last seven years have 

 been of material service to Her Majesty's Government in connection with 



