388 PHYSICAL CaARACTERISTTCS OF TJHffi 



maiid of the Swedish naturalist is more desirable than easy of accom-" 

 plishment. What tribunal is to determine the coveted cranium 

 embodying in itself the ideal type ? Dr. Spurzheim directed 

 a series of minute observations with this object in view ; and other 

 evidence shows that the body of British cranioscopists called into 

 being by the teachings of Dr. Gall and his coilaborateurs, systemati- 

 cally aimed at determining this and other leading ethnical types* 

 The collection of the Bdinburgh Phrenological Society includes a cast 

 marked as the Celtic type: one of a series described in the Phreno- 

 logical Journal as "selected from a number of the same tribe or 

 Bation, so as to present as nearly as possible, a type of the whole in 

 the Society's collection."* It is characterised in the catalogue as & 

 *' Ions Celtic skull ;" and as will be seen from its measurements, — No, 

 16, in the following table of crania, otherwise obtained from ancient 

 Celtic areas under circumstances that afford the greatest presumptive 

 evidence of their truly representing the native race^ — it is remarkable 

 for its length and narrowness. It is also characterised by the narrow, 

 elongated frontal region, which French anthropologists appear to rC" 

 Gognise as a typical Celtic feature. 



An unbiassed judgment, as well as great sagacity and experience, i& 

 required to determine such a selection in comparative eraniology. 

 Wilde, as we have seen, describes the heads of the Irish beyond the 

 Shannon as distinct from what he calls " the more globular headed, 

 light-eyed, fair-haired Celtic people " to the north of the same river. 

 The former, with long heads, be designates the dark or Firbolg race, 

 the representatives as he conceives of the aboriginal Irish Cromlech- 

 builders. But who the Firbolgs were, and whence their name is de-^ 

 rived, are questions still in dispute among Irish antiquaries and his- 

 torians. They came into Ireland according to the Annals of the Four 

 Masters, A.M., 3266. O'Flaherty, in his Oyygia, fixes their advent 

 at the still earlier date of A. M., 2657. Keating, Algernon Herbert, 

 and others believe them to have been a colony of Belgae, or other 

 Gauhsh tribe ; and the last named authority regards the date of their 

 arrival in any part of the British Isles as little more than a century 

 before Christ.f On this latter theory^ it is in no degree remarkable 

 that a comparison of Breton, French, and Irish skulls in Parisian 

 collections, should produce such harmonious results. But Dr. Davis, 



* Phrenological Journal. Vol- VI. p. 144. 

 flnsft Nenius, pp, 44, xcix. 



