SCIENTIFIC AND LITERARY NOTES. 77 
January, as well as in the Canadian Journal (Nov., 1857), I remarked, when 
referring to a striking example of the vertical occiput in an Indian skull found 
in Canada,—‘“I think it extremely probable that further investigation will tend 
to the conclusion that the vertical or flattened occiput, instead of being a typical 
characteristic, pertains entirely to the class of artificial modifications of the 
natural cranium familiar to the American ethnologist alike in the disclosures of 
ancient graves, and in the customs of widely separated living tribes. In this I 
am further confirmed by the remark of Dr. Morton, in reference to the Peruvian 
erania ;” and, after quoting him in reference to the unsymmetrical conformation 
common to the Indian occiput, which, he says, ‘‘ is sometimes, no doubt, increased 
by the manner in which the child is placed in the cradle,” the paper thus proceeds: 
“To this Dr. Morton subsequently added, in describing an unsymmetrical Mexican 
skull, ‘I had almost omitted the remark, that this irregularity of form is common 
in, and peculiar to, American crania!’ The latter remark, however, is too wide a 
generalization. I have repeatedly noticed the like unsymmetrical characteristics 
in the brachycephalic crania of the Scotch barrows; and it has occurred to my 
mind, on more than one occasion, whether such may not furnish an indication 
of some partial compression, dependent, it may be, on the mode of nurture in 
infancy, having tended, in their case also, if not to produce, to exaggerate the 
short longitudinal diameter, which constitutes one of their most remarkable 
characteristics.” Such was the hint I gave of an important feature affecting 
the question of primitive British archeology, the full working out of which I 
reserved for the revisal of my ‘ Prehistoric Avnals of Scotland. I readily 
accept the consequences of my delay in publishing more extended views on 
the subject, and recognise Dr. Davis’s claims to all that is novel in his paper; 
but as he omits all reference to my published views, while referring to various 
Continental authorities, and produces the idea as an original discovery, the 
following extract from one of his contributions to the ‘Urania Britannica 
will best set forth my reasons, not only for claiming priority of publication, 
but for crediting Dr. Davis with the adoption of the idea as one first sug- 
gested in my paper on the American cranial type. In Decade III. of the 
‘ Crania Britannica, when describing an ancient skull from Caedegai Barrow, 
Denbighshire (pl. 23, p. 3), he remarks :—“ Our description of those from Juniper 
Green, Lesmurdie and Newbigging has made known an unusual and rather 
abrupt flattening in the occipital region, which we consider to have been the 
work of art at an early period of life. * * * Among the American races in 
general there is so marked a flatness in the occipital region, that Prof. Morton 
was induced to regard it as one of the few typical characteristics of the skull 
belonging to the American nations, and spreading from one end of the continent 
to the other. This position, which is, no doubt, founded on truth, must be 
allowed to be liable to numerous exceptions. * * * Prof. Daniel Wilson, of 
Toronto, in an able paper, has expressed a reasonable doubt whether this 
occipital flatness, or great vertical diameter, be properly a universal character 
of the American races, and has supported his argument by observations made 
upon crania disinterred in Canada. He has also given expression to a query, 
which the examination of skulls remarkable for vertical diameter and flatness of 
