ANCIENT AND MODERN CELT. 403 



type ; and could not fail to supply other information no less accepta- 

 l)le to the ethnologist. 



But there is another aspect of the inquiry into the significance of 

 cranial forms which derives striking illustration from the mode of 

 investigation now referred to. When treating in a former communica- 

 tion,* of the various causes tending to produce unsymmetrical cranial 

 development, I remarked ^ The normal human head may be assumed 

 to present a perfect correspondence in its two hemispheres ; but very 

 slight investigation will suffice to convince the abserver that few living 

 examples satisfy the requirements of such a theoretical standard. Not 

 ©nly is inequality in the two sides of frequent occurrence, but a per- 

 fectly symmetrical head is the exception rather than the rule. The ex- 

 amination of the head-forms already described amply confirms this opi- 

 nion. Examples of extreme dissimilarity between the two sides, and of 

 abrupt inequalities of various kinds are far from rare. Of one group 

 of 373 head-forms carefully tested for their unsymmetrical characteris- 

 tics, only 48 could be set apart as uniform, or only slightly unsym- 

 metrical, and not decidedly developed in excess on one side or the 

 other. Of the French heads 67 exhibited a decided development 

 towards the left, with a flattening or depression on the opposite side i, 

 and 20 were correspondingly affected towards the right side. Of the 

 British heads, including those with Celtic and other patronymics, 116 

 exhibited a decided bulging to the left side, and 31 a less decided de- 

 velopment in the same direction ; while 63 had the same characteristic 

 feature no less strongly on the right side, and 23 a less decided bulg- 

 ing to the right. In all, the results on this point were, that out of 

 eleven hundred and four British and French head-formsj four hundred 

 and forty-two were developed in excess to the left, and three hundred 

 and eighteen to the right ; leaving three hundred and forty-four nearly 

 symmetrical. It thus appears that the tendency to unsymmetrical 

 deformity is nearly as three to one ; and that in the abnormal head 

 the tendency towards excess of development towards the left, is upwards 

 of two to one. But so far as ray opportunities of investigation have 

 extended, this tendency is more decidedly expressed in the brachyce- 

 phalic (French) heads than in the dolichocephalic, and in those the 

 sinistral is to the dextral excess fully in the ratio of three to one. I 



* Ethnical forms and undesigned artificial distortions of the human skull. Cana- 

 dian Journal, vol. vii., p. 414. 



