84 SCIENTIFIC AND LITERARY NOTES. 
4, The tone and temper of Dr. Wilson’s memoir, where it comments so severely 
upon myself and the views I have been led to take upon the subject of a prece- 
dent and pre-historic race before the Ancient Britons, and who were distinguished 
by dolicho-cephalism, or kumbe-cephalism, seems to me to be singularly mis- 
placed, if I may be excused the expression, on this ground, viz., that in the 
consideration of this pre-celtic hypothesis in the “ Crania Britannica,” I have 
always treated the opinions of its supporters with the utmost respect and defer- 
ence, and even opposed them with reluctance. In the Description of the Long 
Lowe Skull, pl. 33, where the subject is discussed at most length, this passage 
occurs: ‘The pre-celtic hypothesis is received by investigators deserving so 
much respect and confidence, that we feel both bound and anxious to do ample 
justice to every fact of the case, and to exercise the utmost candour in the 
estimation of the hypothesis itself.”—P. (4). This passage was written in all 
Sincerity, and Iam not aware of any page in the work in which I have deviated 
from the spirit which it expresses. 
5. I confess to one delinquency with which I am charged, to this extent, that 
{ may have manifested some change in my views upon some points in the course 
of the seven years during which the “ Crania Britannica” has been in progress, 
and thus given opportunity to Dr. Wilson to point out some trifling incon- 
sistencies. My opinions were not “crystallized” when my labours commenced, 
and, I am ready to acknowledge, even now, that they are not in that completed 
and fixed state, that the rays of light which Dr. Wilson and other inquirers may 
yet cause to shine into my mind must necessarily be wholly inoperative upon 
them. 
Finally, I cannot help regretting that any act of carelessness on my part 
should have occasioned any uneasiness to my friend Dr. D. Wilson, to whom I 
owe so many favours and acts of kindness. I can assure him that it is a source 
of congratulation to Huropean craniologists that the learned and acute author 
of “The Archeology and Prehistoric Annals of Scotland,” and of the recent 
and elaborate volumes on the curious subject of ‘‘ Prehistoric Man,” should have 
directed his attention to the subject of cranial forms among the American races, 
and the strange difformities to which they have been exposed. In this branch 
of inquiry he has already shown, what I have long anticipated, that great dif- 
ferences of skull-forms have existed among these numerous and diversified 
nations,—doubtless coincident with their other diversities. 
Iam, &c., J. Barnarp Davis. 
No. 5. Zo the Hditor of the Canadian Journal. 
University College, Toronto, Jan. 19, 1863. 
Sir,—Having invited Dr. Davis to avail himself of the pages of this journal 
for any counter-statement he desired to make to my paper on “ Artificial Distor- 
tions of the Human Cranium,” I enclose herewith his reply. In this, as it 
appears to me, he fails to discriminate between expressions of dissent from his 
opinions, and an attack on himself; the latter of which I altogether disclaims 
After having been familiar for years with the utmost freedom of critical assault 
on my own published opinions, I find it difficult to appreciate his extreme sensi- 
