ZXPEE.=5I0>r ET MEAffURKMENTfc 277 



referred to ; tbey also illustrate the uncertainty which must pertain to 

 the most careful reproduction of typical forms by means of the pencil. 

 Comprehensive deductions as to the characteristics of the supposed 

 precursors of the Eed Indians in the great river valleys of North 

 America, have been based on the assumption — rendered all the more 

 reasonable by the general skill and accuracy of Messrs. Squier and 

 Davis's illastrations. — that the well-executed lithographs of the Scioto- 

 Mound skull did correctly represent the original. 



Seeing, then, the liability of the most artistic drawings to fail in 

 scientific accuracy, it becomes obvious that if a system of measurements 

 can be determined and generally adopted, capable of producing results 

 available as a test of comparative cranial form, it will prove alike easier 

 in its application, and more trustworthy, than the pencil. The photo- 

 graphic art, so reliable in many respects, has indeed come to our aid, 

 and greatly facilitates the production of truthful drawingrs, but it does 

 not solve all the difficulties in question, owing to inevitable exaggera- 

 tion of the nearer points, and consequent misrepresentation of relative 

 proportions on which so much depends. 



The Cro.nia Brito/anicrx is an example of the illustrative process 

 applied with a degree of skill and accuracy that conld scarcely be 

 surpassed ; but the result is very costly, and consequently limited in 

 the number of examples illustrated ; whereas ethnical deductions, to 

 he of much value can scarcely be founded on too many observa- 

 tions. Whatever system, therefore, is simple, free alike from costly 

 application and liability to error, and sufficiently definite in character 

 to make its results, so far as they go. precise and definite, will best 

 satisfy the aims of the comparative craniologist : and those the test of 

 measurement professes to supply. But even if a metrical system be 

 admitted to embrace more certainly than any other, the requirements 

 here specified : the question still remains undetermined, what are the 

 most useful measurements for giving expression to the specialities of 

 head-forms. No detailed system has yet obtained universal acceptance ; 

 and hence the value of some important contributions to science is dimin- 

 ished, owing to the impo-ssibility of bringing the results of different 

 observers into comparison. Looking to the growing interest which 

 attaches to this subject among Anthropologists, I have more than 

 once proposed giving publicity to the early labours of a deceased friend 

 in the department of craniometry, under the belief that the elaborate 

 minuteness of detail adopted by him embodies some valuable suggestive 



