TRAXSACTIOXS OF SECTION H. 1013 



19. ? : the only known left hand ; Cayliis, ' Tubieres, Recueil,' vol. v., 



PJ. 63. 



7. On tilt Boat-building of Stain. 

 By H. Warington Smyth, M.A., F.R.G.S. 



The author describes the river craft in use among the Siamese, showing how 

 admirably adapted is each type of boat to the waters it is used to navigate — the 

 teak-built rua pet and rice boat to the lower reaches, and the long rua nua or 

 northland boat of thingan wood used on the upper waters of the Me Nam. 



The construction of the * dug-out ' Me Kawng boats is then explained, with the 

 bamboo fittings along the gunwale which render them uncapsizable and unsinkable 

 iu the worst rapids of that wild torrent. 



In describing the sea-going craft met with on the coasts of Siam, the 

 primitive Malay lugger of the Peninsula, the rua pet of the Gulf, with her spoon- 

 shaped bow, her wood fastenings, and high-peaked lug sails, the rzia chalom of the 

 Dative Chinese traders, with her peculiar double rudders, and the Chinese junk 

 itself are all touched upon, and the advantages of their various peculiarities in 

 build and rig pointed out. 



8. On the Reed Organ of the Lao Shans. 

 By H. Warington Smyth, M.A., F.R.G.S. 



A brief description is given of the simple fourteen-reed instrument in use among 

 the Lao of the Me Kawng Valley, and an example of the characteristic and mono 

 tonous music which rises and falls on moonlight nights in every jungle village 

 inhabited by these people is added by the author. 



FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9. 

 The President's Address was delivered (see p. 999). 



'The following Papers were read : — ■ 



1. On the Mediaeval Population of Bristol. 

 By John Beddoe, 3I.D., F.R.S. 



The author based his conclusions on two series of skulls, the one mediteval, the 

 ■other probably of the eighteenth century, disinterred on the occasion of the 

 removal of St. Werburgh's Church, and on certain lists of surnames of various 

 dates. He found the mediaeval skulls very generally small, short, and broad 

 (kephalic index 80-0), w-hile the later ones exhibited the same long types that 

 characterise the present population of Bristol and the surrounding districts 

 (index 76'6). He ascribed the mediteval brachykephalism to the larger propor- 

 tion of people of French descent which is indicated hy that of French surnames, 

 these latter having gradually declined in number ever since the fourteenth 

 century, 



2. Note on the Origin of Stone-worship. By Professor H. A. Miers. 



It is pointed out that among the various sources to which stone- worship is 

 ascribed in anthropological works mention is rarely, if ever, made of the worship 

 of meteorites ; it is urged that when meteorites fell in early times — and there is no 

 reason to believe that they fell less frequently than now — they must have 

 provoked religious awe. Several instances are quoted among recorded falls ia 



